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Comment by kingkilr | Hacker News Reader

Not that I disagree with a word of this article, but he's accepting the premise of those two articles: that the distribution mechanisms are a worse UX than pirating. My response:

Are you high? Once upon a time I pirated content, he's an approximate recap of what my expierience looked like:

* Search pirate bay

* Look at 2000 results, none of which look right.

* Ok, found one.

* Crap it's French with Arabic subtitles.

* Ok this one looks good.

* Shit, no seeders.

* Ok, this one has seeders and is english.

* Go get a bagel because it's going to take an hour to download.

Here's the UX of Netflix, rdio, or hulu:

* Search.

* Press play.

In my time using Netflix, rdio, hulu, and last.fm for my media needs there has been one title I couldn't find.

EDIT: I'll be clear, my comments on these services apply exclusively to the US, I know nothing about the status of these services elsewhere.

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Agreed that the UX of existing sites have much better UX than the pirating options. However a much more common experience on Netflix is:

* Search

* Whoops, this movie isn't available on streaming.

On Hulu:

* Search

* Only the last four episodes are available.

The content distributors are strangling themselves because they're trying to protect their existing means of distribution and refuse to adopt new ones that people actually want to use and pay for.

> The content distributors are strangling themselves because they're trying to protect their existing means of distribution and refuse to adopt new ones that people actually want to use and pay for.

In 2008 Starz and Netflix entered into an agreement where Netflix would be able to license and distribute Starz media for $30 million. Said contract expired, Netflix offers $300 million to renew, and Starz rejects the offer under the premise that their content is worth more.

Now Starz, like HBO (eg. HBO Go), is planning to roll out their own streaming service--which I would say is both an attempt to protect their means of distribution as well as an effort to adopt to new models.

As an aside, I tried to use HBO Go a few weeks ago...and was prompted to enter the details of my cable tv service in order to gain access. I didn't have the time/patience to proceed and decided to read instead.

All I can say is if every content distribution company expects users to pay a separate fee, etc, for streaming content they're SOL. Evidence of Netflix, Hulu, iTunes and the like show that people prefer one-stop shopping.

Edit: typo

I don't know what you're talking about, I do most of my searches on Pirate Bay only once, then sort descending by seeds (which not only indicates which is fastest to download, but also which is the most popular) ... then the download is over in 5 minutes.

Here's the UX of Netflix, rdio or hulu for me:

* content not available in your area

Well, that's fine for people in the US. But for everyone else (i.e., the vast majority) for whom Hulu, netflix, etc are not available, the legal onlines alternatives are for the most part crap or missing the content you want.

Then again Netflix isn't available in Europe and there are huge holes in the catalogue of any streaming service. With that said I think Netflix will be huge in Europe or at least in my native Sweden. As for your pirate bay experience here is how it goes today: 1. Search for content. 2. Sort by seeders. 3. Click magnet link. 4. Start streaming from uTorrent.

Total time consumed maybe a minute.

Netflix is available in the UK

If its "available" in the UK in the same way that it is "available" in Canada then you're lying to yourself.

They gimp the offerings on the foreign netflix due to licensing issues and it really hurts the service. I tried netflix but cancelled because the catalog of things aren't worth it.

Pirate Bay isn't the only way to find torrents. Private networks (such as what.cd for music) are hilariously easy to use, and generally much quicker than public torrents.

Not only that, but they always have a surplus of seeders and the quality of the music (or movie, or TV show, depending on the tracker) is always of the quality it says it is.

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