Stevedog
Truth Seeker
- Joined
- Aug 9, 2018
- Messages
- 1,458
- Reaction score
- 5,059
- Points
- 203
- Age
- 47
I prefer watching at home. The only times I've been to the theater in the past 12-15 years has been to take my kids to see a movie, which comes out to about 8 or 9 times in their entire lives.
Now as for streaming, I'm going to sound like some kind of movie addict as I have quite a few. When streaming services first came available I thought they were a huge leap forward in home entertainment, but soon realized the film industry was not fully ready in terms of film contract rules. So someone can be subscribed to every service and still not be able to watch certain movies or TV shows due to licensing issues. For example, the TV show The Wonder Years used a lot of music by bands such as The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. So it can't be streamed unless an agreement is made between the streaming service, the TV studio who owns the rights to the show and the various music studios who own the rights to the music. Another one is the original Cocoon, the movie about aliens visiting a retirement home and making the residents young again. Unless you have an old VHS copy laying around it's almost impossible to watch that movie ever again.
So to help combat license issues I cast a wide streaming service net. However I'm also a bit on the frugal side so I do so for as cheap as I can. The only services I pay full price for is Netflix and Amazon Prime. My internet is through Xfinity and it's cheaper to bundle it with cable and phone so I get the Xfinity on demand. I can use my Xfinity login to get Peacock streaming service for free. My wife is a teacher and can get a discount for Discovery +, which we bundled with Hulu, ESPN and Disney +. Then there are free streaming services such as Crackle, Tubi and Pluto TV. It sounds like a lot but we don't watch all of them all the time. It's more like "Hey, we should watch this movie" and odds are pretty good that at least one of these services will have it. To make things more crazy I also have a VPN. So I can sign into Netflix from different countries which have different license agreements and therefore very different movies catalogs.
Now as for streaming, I'm going to sound like some kind of movie addict as I have quite a few. When streaming services first came available I thought they were a huge leap forward in home entertainment, but soon realized the film industry was not fully ready in terms of film contract rules. So someone can be subscribed to every service and still not be able to watch certain movies or TV shows due to licensing issues. For example, the TV show The Wonder Years used a lot of music by bands such as The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. So it can't be streamed unless an agreement is made between the streaming service, the TV studio who owns the rights to the show and the various music studios who own the rights to the music. Another one is the original Cocoon, the movie about aliens visiting a retirement home and making the residents young again. Unless you have an old VHS copy laying around it's almost impossible to watch that movie ever again.
So to help combat license issues I cast a wide streaming service net. However I'm also a bit on the frugal side so I do so for as cheap as I can. The only services I pay full price for is Netflix and Amazon Prime. My internet is through Xfinity and it's cheaper to bundle it with cable and phone so I get the Xfinity on demand. I can use my Xfinity login to get Peacock streaming service for free. My wife is a teacher and can get a discount for Discovery +, which we bundled with Hulu, ESPN and Disney +. Then there are free streaming services such as Crackle, Tubi and Pluto TV. It sounds like a lot but we don't watch all of them all the time. It's more like "Hey, we should watch this movie" and odds are pretty good that at least one of these services will have it. To make things more crazy I also have a VPN. So I can sign into Netflix from different countries which have different license agreements and therefore very different movies catalogs.
