This is why I prefer physical media.

Darth Lars said:
I worked at a streaming company once, building up its technology, but that company was such a bad experience that I don't feel like joining a streaming service for anything. It would just remind me of that bad time.

The video game market also has a schism between physical media and digital downloads...
Even with games on physical discs that you would "buy", it is common that there is a DRM scheme where it tries to contact a server over the Internet every now and then, or it won't start. No Internet connection, or reinstall on a different computer: no game. Once the game publisher discontinues the DRM server, you can no longer play the game you "bought". This means that there is no second-hand market so there is no way to collect them, you can no longer play old games on your new computer ... and some games can not be (legally) played by anyone anymore because the game publisher has discontinued the DRM server. Such a waste ...
There have been a few attempts at similar schemes for movies on physical discs but thankfully they haven't taken off.
I'm afraid that if you have a streaming-device and a movie downloaded to its hard disc that you would risk getting into the same problem that some games have: that some time, it would just stop playing because the rights-holder has discontinued (or maybe just reconfigured) its DRM server.
Click to expand...
This is exactly why I bought a sealed copy of the PS2 Battlefront II for Christmas, our internet is through mobile devices so we only play offline games.
 
sztriki said:
Netflix specifically gets on my **** with this. Their stuff just NEVER comes out on physical, not this side of the pond at least. I wanted to have Stranger Things, Gerald's Game, Annihilation, House on Haunted Hill, Rick and Morty (I know it's adultswim but it's on NF in the UK) and it's just not on DVD/Blu-ray. It's nuts that Stranger Things came out in the States in a really cool VHS style package and if I want it on the shelf I gotta order it from the US and buy a region free player.
Bit sidetracking but why is region code still a thing in the digital age?
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Netflix is a streaming service and different then buying digital media, methinks, and for a small fee once every few months you could still watch Stranger Things.

And I thought that 4K UHD disks were not region locked ?

I will keep on buying physical media as long as the price stays the same as digital media, that is still in lower quality.
(knowing in the back of my head, that newer disk players always need an internet connection to connect to the publisher, as a check)
 
xeno said:
Netflix is a streaming service and different then buying digital media, methinks, and for a small fee once every few months you could still watch Stranger Things.

And I thought that 4K UHD disks were not region locked ?

I will keep on buying physical media as long as the price stays the same as digital media, that is still in lower quality.
(knowing in the back of my head, that newer disk players always need an internet connection to connect to the publisher, as a check)
Click to expand...
Oh don't get me wrong I know exactly why Netflix doesn't release them, it's better business for them to have subscribers than one time customers. I just miss the actual case and disc. I might end up making my own.
 
SirSandalot said:
I loved Acción Mutante (a dumb cyberpunk comedy from 1993) as a kid. There is no way it's ever gonna make it to streaming platforms. There's no bluray and nobody knows the movie nowdays. It was fairly popular in 1993, but since it's not on netflix it has been forever forgotten and no company is gonna risk money to release it in bluray. So I should've bought the DVD like 15 years ago. But I was young and I thought things lasted forever. Lesson learnt.
Click to expand...
PM me your shipping info. I'll send you the region-free DVD as a belated Christmas present. Hanging on that long, you deserve some payoff. ;)
 
Bigdaddy said:
This is exactly why I bought a sealed copy of the PS2 Battlefront II for Christmas, our internet is through mobile devices so we only play offline games.
Click to expand...

I only play offline games too, not because I can't, but because I can't stand online multi-player anything. I went from many, many years of playing MMOs and other online games to never touching the things. It usually isn't the games that are at fault, it's the people that you have to suffer through. Therefore, I only play single-player games these days.
 
Darth Lars said:
I worked at a streaming company once, building up its technology, but that company was such a bad experience that I don't feel like joining a streaming service for anything. It would just remind me of that bad time.

The video game market also has a schism between physical media and digital downloads...
Even with games on physical discs that you would "buy", it is common that there is a DRM scheme where it tries to contact a server over the Internet every now and then, or it won't start. No Internet connection, or reinstall on a different computer: no game. Once the game publisher discontinues the DRM server, you can no longer play the game you "bought". This means that there is no second-hand market so there is no way to collect them, you can no longer play old games on your new computer ... and some games can not be (legally) played by anyone anymore because the game publisher has discontinued the DRM server. Such a waste ...
There have been a few attempts at similar schemes for movies on physical discs but thankfully they haven't taken off.
I'm afraid that if you have a streaming-device and a movie downloaded to its hard disc that you would risk getting into the same problem that some games have: that some time, it would just stop playing because the rights-holder has discontinued (or maybe just reconfigured) its DRM server.
Click to expand...

I actually bought and downloaded the DuckTails remastered game before Disney and Capcom let it drop from the stores. Another great example of games lost due to not having a physical copy is the Scott Pilgrim vs. The World video game.

The only thing I know that Netflix has released for Physical media on any of their programs is Season 1 of Stranger Things (I picked up the Blu-Ray/DVD combo from Target). Not sure if anything else.
 
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I think the last physical PC game I bought was Fallout 4 and it still downloaded about half the game! My only gripe with digital game downloads is price. When Steam first started everyone said "This is great! Now they don't have to have a package, a disc, and a manual, so the savings will be passed on to you!" Never at any point did that happen. As soon as it caught on, the digital games, unless they had a Steam sale, were the same exact price as a physical copy. To make it even worse, for a while PC games were always about $10 cheaper than Xbox or Playstation games. Now they are the exact same price. I remember in early 2000s PC games were $39.99 while the consoles were $49.99.
 
I typically buy everything on a physical copy and then rip it for my plex server. I just don't buy as many movies as I used to. But with the relative ease of ripping and reencoding blurays (though time consuming) I can still be lazy enough to not have to get up and change discs when my 2 year old wants to go from Trolls to Tangled.
 
I do this also, have most of my dvd's and bluray disks (and some VHS tapes) ripped to 4 external drives. I don't buy many dvd's, but still get blurays (Many dirt cheap at Big Lots) and I'm keeping most of my disks as backups in case an HD fails.
 
^ That. This way, you can keep most or all of it packed away where it's not taking up valuable (and, usually, limited) wall/display space. I love living in the future sometimes. The current industry-standard for most devices is for 32GB MicroSD cards (they're up to 2TB now, but those require purposed hardware -- the standard for other devices is only slowly starting to shift to 64GB). That's enough to hold over forty LPs worth of uncompressed audio (.wav files). A two-day road trip playlist with no repeats on a single card the size of my fingernail.

I'm slowly working on a home setup that has all of my a/v media on appropriately sized MicroSDs in those tiny USB adapters where the card is the wafer in the USB plug:

20200106_125631.jpg


Except with LEDs indicating content. And all plugged into a hub that allows for access and swapping that just might look, say, a bit like this:

hqdefault.jpg


I love the thought of a thousand CDs, LPs, DVDs, VHS tapes, and BluRays all on a wall panel like that.
 
I Guess I'm different. I don't have any digital anything as it's not my cup of tea. Digital means they have the possibility to get hacked or wiped or system crashes and hard drive or thumb drive is lost. I prefer to go to my shelf and hold and protect my favorite movie with it's artwork and being able to put the disc in.
 
CB2001 said:
The only thing I know that Netflix has released for Physical media on any of their programs is Season 1 of Stranger Things (I picked up the Blu-Ray/DVD combo from Target). Not sure if anything else.
Click to expand...
They have also released the first two seasons of Daredevil and the first season of Jessica Jones on Blu-ray and DVD. Not sure if further physical media releases are forthcoming.

Although it isn't a physical release, they have released some of their material on iTunes, which at least does allow you to download files you can save and backup.

SSB
 
sbaxter said:
They have also released the first two seasons of Daredevil and the first season of Jessica Jones on Blu-ray and DVD. Not sure if further physical media releases are forthcoming.

Although it isn't a physical release, they have released some of their material on iTunes, which at least does allow you to download files you can save and backup.

SSB
Click to expand...

Might have to look into iTunes (one of many experiments to come).
 
I have always liked a physical copy over digital, although these last 10 years I have gotten more lazy and all my music is mp3...but I do keep a bunch of backups just incase....although I do need to backup some still. One thing I really don't care for is Google's Stadia gaming service. The idea sounds nice and all, but what if I did try it out and really love a game, but 15 years down the road it's no longer available. I actually just bought a SNES classic mini last week because there are games I never played, even though there like mp3s, at least I own the system.
 
JoeG said:
If an EMP event happens, any device capable of playing your media will be useless. Have fun with your collection of coasters.
Click to expand...
Only if they're plugged in, right? I keep backup units of all my electronics mint-in-box inside my cement walled bunker.
 
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