Netflix has managed to annoy a good number of its users with an announcement about an upcoming update to its Windows 11 (and Windows 10) app: support for adverts and live events will be added, but the ability to download content is being taken away.
Netflix must realize that it’s a huge frustration for people who relied on offline downloads to watch content without internet access: on planes, trains, and campsites, and anywhere else where Wi-Fi is unavailable or unreliable.
There’s a small chance that Netflix will change its mind if it gets enough complaints, but the streaming service seems determined to add as many money-making features as possible, while taking away genuinely useful ones.
The fact of the matter is that people will happily pay for content if it is made available in a convenient and affordable way. Hell, many people will voluntarily pay artists for content that is available completely for free. That’s how patreon works, and there are self published authors approaching $1M/year in income due to readers choosing to support the author for their hard work.
People have no issue paying content creators.
Piracy rose to prominence in the 2000s because a few executives were funneling massive amounts of money into their pockets by the sale of CDs and cable services that were simultaneously expensive and inconvenient. The studios attacked pirates directly to little effect because you simply can’t stop the free dissemination of information among the public.
Piracy almost completely died when streaming made the alternatives affordable, user friendly and convenient. In a world where the proliferation of streaming services is making content just as expensive and inconvenient as in the old days of cable, it’s only natural that piracy will once again rise to prominence.
If they want to get paid, they simply need to stop fucking with the customer and offer a service people want to pay for.