HBO Declines to Renew Amazon Contract Leading to Removal of Shows in 2018

[illram]

No, it does not give us the right. It gives us the cause.

Yeah that's where I diverge. Not being able to watch a show or listen to a song is, at most, a minor inconvenience. I don't see this as some sort of "cause," where by not paying for stuff you're "sticking it to the man" or whatever. I find that sort of silly when you consider actual real protests over real civil rights being infringed. (Like, to use a timely example, the right to privacy.)

Ripping or otherwise unlawfully downloading media, or otherwise engaging in copyright infringement because you refuse to pay the asking price or be inconvenienced is not a protest. You have no "right" to view or consume content you do not own or that you have not made some sort of bargain for. Your rights are not being violated. That's just infringing because you don't like their terms. It is similar to breaching a contract because "fuck it, I don't feel like paying you." Call it what it is and we can agree to disagree on whether that is good or not, I can grumble at your actions costing me a little bit more on my fees for paying for the service, whatever. But when people say they are protesting or this is some sort of just cause or whatever, that's where I call bullshit.

 

[Shotglass01]

Yeah that's where I diverge. Not being able to watch a show or listen to a song is, at most, a minor inconvenience. I don't see this as some sort of "cause," where by not paying for stuff you're "sticking it to the man" or whatever. I find that sort of silly when you consider actual real protests over real civil rights being infringed. (Like, to use a timely example, the right to privacy.)

Ripping or otherwise unlawfully downloading media, or otherwise engaging in copyright infringement because you refuse to pay the asking price or be inconvenienced is not a protest. You have no "right" to view or consume content you do not own or that you have not made some sort of bargain for. Your rights are not being violated. That's just infringing because you don't like their terms. It is similar to breaching a contract because "fuck it, I don't feel like paying you." Call it what it is and we can agree to disagree on whether that is good or not, I can grumble at your actions costing me a little bit more on my fees for paying for the service, whatever. But when people say they are protesting or this is some sort of just cause or whatever, that's where I call bullshit.

Dude, it's never ending. You've got guys like me who believe the copyright laws are nothing more than a corruption of a broken system and you who believe it's just fine.

Great, we agree to disagree. I believe the laws governing intellectual property are just as wrong as you believe they are right. There's a god - there is no god. It's a no win scenario. Kobayashi Maru.

 

[illram]

Dude, it's never ending. You've got guys like me who believe the copyright laws are nothing more than a corruption of a broken system and you who believe it's just fine.

Great, we agree to disagree. I believe the laws governing intellectual property are just as wrong as you believe they are right. There's a god - there is no god. It's a no win scenario. Kobayashi Maru.

I think this is the part where I buy you a beer or roll up a joint and we have a much more interesting discussion...

 

[Shotglass01]

So I ask again, if your boss doesn't give you a paycheck next Friday then you'd be ok with that, because he has not stolen anything physical from you?

If my work were cloned in another environment with no cost to me, I wouldn't expect two paychecks? Wha?

 

[travbrad]

They may see themselves as competitors to Amazon but they are small potatoes in comparison. HBO has a tiny selection of shows in comparison to Amazon or Netflix, so you have to already be interested in one of their shows to subscribe. Amazon Prime is significantly cheaper than HBO, has more content, and ALSO has free 2 day shipping for physical goods. The value of HBO Now looks pretty terrible in comparison

Maybe the math still works out that they'd be making more money off a small number of extra HBO subscriptions than they would get from Amazon though, just because they charge so damn much for it.

 

[nilepez]

I'm ok with pirating content you would have never paid for in the first place. For instance I just downloaded season 7 of The Walking Dead. Why? Because I don't have cable and I don't give a shit about AMC or TWD really. I could live the rest of my days never knowing what happened with Neegan. But I was bored and figured meh, might as well watch it. However I fricken LOVE Silicon Valley and GOT, so I'll pay for HBO NOW just to watch those shows.

Um uh...that's what Netflix is for and TWD has been on there for years.

 

[nysmo]

If my work were cloned in another environment with no cost to me, I wouldn't expect two paychecks? Wha?

You mean like driving back and forth to work, spending 80 hours at your desk, the physical exertion and effort that went into your job, the time spent away from home doing it, etc? You mean those kind of costs?

 

[nysmo]

Under current laws that's comparing apples to oranges. That's your boss not piracy. I don't think that falls under the category of theft anyway. Maybe larsony? I admit I'm no lawyer. Regardless, that's a matter for the labor board.

The point of my labor argument is that people seem to misunderstand what they're paying for when they buy something. If you buy a physical item like a gallon of milk from the grocery store, you arent just buying the milk. You have to consider how that $5 pricetag was adjusted. Nobody just woke up and said "i go tit, 5 bucks sounds about right!". The cost of that gallon was derived upon the expenses that went into making it and the profit they felt they could get from it. You're paying for the cows that the milk came from, the food that fed the cows, the machines that milk them, the health insurance policies of the employees who operate those machines, the companies in china who sold the screws that hold the machine together, etc etc etc. All of those expenses are calculated and evenly distributed and then whatever is left is profit.

People seem to think that if they clone a movie that none of those expenses exist, because they seem to think they are just taking the movie and "leaving the original" there as if the original is the only variable in the expense process. If BestBuy still has that dvd on the shelf then nobody has been hurt. But they have, at least if you would have bought the dvd if piracy didnt exist. The creators of that movie need your $15 to make more movies, or else they cant recover the costs of the camera crew, actors, guy who mops the studio floor at night, etc.

When you buy something physical you arent just buying that physical thing, you are buying everything that went into producing it. The inverse is true for non-physical items. It's like watching a stage performance, do you think it's ok to sneak into an auditorium and watch something for free because you havent taken anything out of their pockets directly?

 

[GoldenTiger]

Technology is developed to fulfill a need or solve a problem. If nobody was dying in car accidents the airbag never would have been invented.

If nobody was streaming/downloading tv shows it's very unlikely that streaming services would ever have caught on.

Uh, no. Just no, Mr. Pirate.

 

[sirmonkey1985]

I raised the same concerns when youtube channels started to offer their premium services separately. I'd pay a mild fee to see them all on the same platform, but I won't pay them individually each on different platforms. And lack of pirated availability of said shows won't change that.

same boat as you, i pay for netflix and amazon prime and quite frankly the only reason i really have prime for is the free 2 day shipping since the video service is just a nice added feature. personally i hate amazon's video browser so i rarely ever use it and i haven't watched a single HBO show on amazon prime so it going away isn't a loss for me. i honestly don't see it as competition though between the companies, i see it more as greed and thinking people will throw money at anything to get what they want which isn't happening and won't happen. people would rather throw money at things that make it easier for them to see content, having to bounce through 4-5 different streaming services isn't easier. either way this has everything to do with the deal between directv/AT&T + HBO watch tv anywhere campaign then it has anything to do with HBO Now.

 

[NeoNemesis]

Uh, no. Just no, Mr. Pirate.

Yarrrrrrrr!

Also, you should at least attempt to defend your response. what's the point of even posting 'no, just no.' Completely meaningless.

 

[Shotglass01]

You mean like driving back and forth to work, spending 80 hours at your desk, the physical exertion and effort that went into your job, the time spent away from home doing it, etc? You mean those kind of costs?

It's a clone doing it. A copy of me that didn't cost me anything to make. Now if my clone wants a paycheck, well, take it up with him.

 

[nilepez]

It's a clone doing it. A copy of me that didn't cost me anything to make. Now if my clone wants a paycheck, well, take it up with him.

So if you come up with some software that you worked on for 2 years and someone copies it and offers it for free to anyone who wants it, you're OK with that? You're OK with the fact that you spent 2 years and your money on creating this awesome software and you will make less money and possibly lose money on your hard work?

 

[opfreak]

Everyone hated paying for cable bundles. Well here's an insight into the future, you can pick the channels you want to watch and pay for it accordingly.

 

[opfreak]

While I understand the nuances of pirating, you have a completely wrong thought process here. A lot of folks who pirate shows would not normally buy that product. You're advocating upon a physical product, which media is not in this particular case. It's not taking anything away from their revenues if it wasn't going to be a sold product anyhow.

Again, with your example of painting, your assuming a physical product. That's akin to someone stepping into a Best Buy and stealing seasons of GoT, which no one here is going to do for obvious reasons. This is digital media where there actual product is marginalized. Start thinking in terms of digital media and not physical product.

So because they wouldn't pay for it makes it ok? Why are you defending mouchers? They want to enjoy a product but don't want to support it.

 

[opfreak]

I will pirate all of it... screw them all. I pay for services that make it easier for me to watch their content. I pay for netflix... cause I can watch any of their content at any time without having to store massive amounts of it on my computer.

HBO Now isn't an option in Canada... and all the TV networks that want to start a service can bite me as well. Most of it is free over the air anyway.

Art should be free... and so it is. lol

The masses have shown them that we are willing to pay for easy to use services. If instead they want to haggle with each other over pricing and who gets to control the platform ect. Then I will "steal" from them... an no I don't subscribe to pirating a Copy of a art work as theft. Sorry not theft, I have not removed something from another possession.

Theft;
"the act of stealing; the wrongful taking and carrying away of the personal goods or property of another."

I really wish people would stop buying into the Music/Movie industries attempt to redefine English words.

And for the record... I own aprox 300+ blu rays at this point. Sub to Netflix, and pay for basic cable. I "pirate" plenty and don't own one "digital era" movie that I didn't pirate first. The entertainment industry needs to figure their shit out >.< Every pirate I know is willing to pay for good service, high quality packaged product... but if you make me jump through hoops to access your product, I have zero issues making digital copies of Art, if I enjoy it I will even support you with a purchase.

your a liar

 

[M76]

same boat as you, i pay for netflix and amazon prime and quite frankly the only reason i really have prime for is the free 2 day shipping since the video service is just a nice added feature. personally i hate amazon's video browser so i rarely ever use it and i haven't watched a single HBO show on amazon prime so it going away isn't a loss for me. i honestly don't see it as competition though between the companies, i see it more as greed and thinking people will throw money at anything to get what they want which isn't happening and won't happen. people would rather throw money at things that make it easier for them to see content, having to bounce through 4-5 different streaming services isn't easier. either way this has everything to do with the deal between directv/AT&T + HBO watch tv anywhere campaign then it has anything to do with HBO Now.

The reason I don't have prime is because it doesn't come with any perks here. No free shipping as there is no warehouse in my country. I think in the long run if each go their merry way, their income will be less.As most people will decide between HBO and Prime but won't pay for both. So it really comes down to what's better for them. Get a little after every prime subscriber or get more but after significanly less direct hbo now subscribers.

 

[Killahurtz]

"Would you want to go into 5 different stores to get all the groceries you want?".....hahaha

sure I would ,if it means I get the lowest price for or the availability of some things at one store , and something else at a different store, then I call that a good plan. I have at least 5 different grocery stores in a 2 mile radius. Adding in a little healthy walking in a couple can't hurt. The word lazy comes to mind....hmmm.

 

[/dev/null]

I think it will sort itself out in time. I think people will only invest anything into whatever one or two services at most. The rest will go ignored. It's already pretty bad with TV shows. CW has their own shit, NBC has their own shit, etc. At some point it will come down to survival of the fittest and the heard will thin out. We just don't know how long that will take.

Pretty much this...

I use steam and that is about it. if something is exclusive to origin/uplay, etc I'm not going to bother. Steam has a ton of games, linux, mac and windows support (I have all 3). Last I checked, no other service does.
For movies we have Amazon Prime and a Blu-ray player. Our TV even supports amazon prime 4k natively. If it's not on one of those we don't bother. We do have vudu & itunes/appletv, but both are $0 monthly fee and we pay $0 for movies (get them from codes that come with physical disks). For tv we have Dish.

We really only have a cheap-o last gen appletv to mirror content & play what we got for free from blu-ray discs.

Netflix, hulu, hbo now, etc don't have a chance (of us subscribing) unless amazon prime or blu-rays all of a sudden way too expensive.

 

[JayteeBates]

Do you use the same argument at the grocery store? "I'd gladly pay $50 to fill my shopping cart but I will NOT pay for each individual item I throw in there"???

This is just wrong. This is like saying Kraft products are only available at Publix, General Mills cereal only at at Winn-Dixie, Vlasic pickles only at Kroger etc etc. It wasn't like HBO wasn't compensated for the content - Amazon paid them hundreds of millions. HBO is going to find out a lot of people like me sign up for the two months of Game of Thrones and then cancel. Been costing me $30 (I think-whatever two months cost) a year past few years to get HBO Now which I get directly from HBO. As soon as GoT is over - sub cancelled until the next GoT season. I will not be exposed to new HBO shows either as we cut the cord so once GoT is done we will no longer even do the two month thing. I think this is going to be the overriding issue that once these content creators all go "our service only" they will have a major exposure crisis. I don't get TV as an internet only household. How are they going to expose thier product to me to entice me into paying them anything.

Know what I have been watching most lately - Dragnet 1960 and Hunter on Hulu when I want with no commercials.

 

[illram]

If you have HBO, Netflix, and Amazon you're basically covered for everything. Hulu maybe if you want their original content.

With Amazon, or iTunes, or Google Play you can also buy individual shows without any subscriptions if they're not prime and not on Netflix. Doesn't get more a la carte than that.

On my TV with WebOS (LG) I just say the show I want to my controller and it searches across all streaming platforms. Then I can buy it, rent it, or watch free if it's on anything I have a subscription too. It is incredibly easy and I don't get the frustration here for needing multiple logins especially considering your devices remember all your logins anyway...

 

[ChadD]

your a liar

How so... every pirate I know has a netflix sub. Are you suggesting you don't know anyone that pirates and subs to netflix ? lol Netflix is ubiquitous everyone has a sub, or shares one with a family member or friend. Even us pirates. Its not worth the time it takes to torrent shows like OITNB, Sense8, Stranger Things ect when they are all on netflix on demand on any device I own for a fair cost. It costs less to sub to netflix then it used to cost to head to blockbuster and rent a couple movies for a night. Its fantastic value and easier then pirating the content.... so they earn my $, and everyone I know that pirates feels the same.

 

[opfreak]

How so... every pirate I know has a netflix sub. Are you suggesting you don't know anyone that pirates and subs to netflix ? lol Netflix is ubiquitous everyone has a sub, or shares one with a family member or friend. Even us pirates. Its not worth the time it takes to torrent shows like OITNB, Sense8, Stranger Things ect when they are all on netflix on demand on any device I own for a fair cost. It costs less to sub to netflix then it used to cost to head to blockbuster and rent a couple movies for a night. Its fantastic value and easier then pirating the content.... so they earn my $, and everyone I know that pirates feels the same.

Because if the were willing to pay for content they would.

Pirates just don't want to pay for things, but they want to enjoy things others pay for. They just throw up a bunch of rationalizations for why they pirate.

 

[Gavv]

So because they wouldn't pay for it makes it ok? Why are you defending mouchers? They want to enjoy a product but don't want to support it.

That's to simplifed an answer.

Many don't support the movie directly as cost. Many don't support movies due to cost and cost of extras (pop corn /drink)

Many of us like streaming. However streaming doesn't always fit the need either. Cost.. availability.. selection.

When you think of the above then how shitty the actors are and weak the story or it was regurgitated from another...

Then you can't even imagine how people loathe Hollywood and actors/actresses in general and their views which seem to make it into politics and the movies its of.

More importantly are data caps now.

For me I don't pay for movies at the theater.... ever. That doesn't mean I won't use a free ticket here and there. But won't ever pay at a theater.

Same way I will never pay another dime for cable tv or satellite. Streaming is ok and redbox helps. But honestly with a mix and match of above I don't blame people for avoiding the price of content. A la cartel is a phrase for continued nickel and dining or more derogatory rape of the customer.

Provide a value to a customer and they will pay for it. Provide shit and some will work around it.

 

[ChadD]

Because if the were willing to pay for content they would.

Pirates just don't want to pay for things, but they want to enjoy things others pay for. They just throw up a bunch of rationalizations for why they pirate.

Believe what you will... I think most people on [H] know better. Cause if the majority of people here don't know how to torrent or have never seen a kodi box ect I would eat my hat. Yet I bet most people here have a netflix sub. The difference in ease of use between their service and all the wanna be studio projects is massive. HBO Now sounds like a wonderful service for instance as long as you live in the US. For the rest of us marks, we are expected to pay 100s of dollars a month for the legal right to watch a show like GOT... unless we are willing to wait 6 months to a year for it to show up on blu ray. Networks are draining their content from netflix to setup their own PITA streaming options. In Canada the cable companies launched 2 streaming options and fought with each other over content for 2 years so that neither had all that great a line up... when one finally won in most parts of the country they tied its sale to cable packages. Not to mention that it only runs on a very small number of devices.

Netflix proved pirates are willing to pay for SERVICE. Content no I will never pay crazy amounts simply to access low quality streams of content. I will pay top dollar for content I like in high quality packaged formats. I will pay top dollar for a lower quality streaming service... as long as the service is priced well and provides excellent service and usability. Their has never been anything stopping all the Traditional Television media companies from teaming and building a true Netflix killer. They may have almost got their with Hulu... if you lived in the US of course, and consider commercials ok. When it comes to the rest of the world they protect their lucrative deals with local cable companies and geo locking deals... and gouge customers.

So you can say I'm justifying and frankly I don't care.... making digital copies of ones and zeros is not theft, I don't care what the entertainment industry would like us to believe. I will however pay them for quality service if they can deliver, I will pay for quality packaged product as well. I do know a good number of pirates... and in general almost all pirates sub to netflix. I also know personally a bunch of heavy pirates that have massive retro Vinyl collections. I know a guy that has terrabytes of drives full of pirated material that has a room full of laser discs, I didn't even realise they made that many of them. We will pay for unique, or high quality packaged product. We will pay for high quality high value streaming. We won't sub to 20 different services half of which won't work with X or Y streaming box.... some that won't load on the older PS3 my kids use to stream ect ect. The industry has fragmented things and made everything a geo locked huge PITA. The number 1 driver of piracy is the industry itself.

 

[Killahurtz]

"making digital copies of ones and zeros is not theft, I don't care what the entertainment industry would like us to believe"

hahaha....young and....well....stupid , the law says it is and you are not above the law , and the Canadian market is worthless so you should be "expected to pay 100s of dollars a month for the legal right to watch a show like GOT"...but then since most of the Canadian entertainment stuff that is produced is garbage I can see your dilemma....o' well who cares

 

[dsmwookie]

Do you use the same argument at the grocery store? "I'd gladly pay $50 to fill my shopping cart but I will NOT pay for each individual item I throw in there"??? What about the movie theater? "I'll gladly pay a yearly membership to see all the big screen feature films I want but I will NOT pay for each individual movie that comes out"???

If you want to pay one fee for all your entertainment then buy an $80 cable TV package that includes this channel. The reason HBO is a la carte is because the production value of their shows is 100x that of any other show right now. Quite simply -- it's worth it, and they could not produce shows like Game of Thrones based purely upon advertiser dollars and piggy back off a basic cable TV lineup.

Or pay the $15 to stream it online through HBO NOW which is a direct competitor to Netflix. Or do none of you pay for Netflix either?

The problem is they are making you use a separate cart for each brand. I don't want a train of carts to carry my Coca-Cola and another for my Orange Juice. Companies need to figure out their pricing and let a few select vendors be the delivery vessel. I will not have 30 different apps, flat out it's inconvenient and that's the point of all this technological shit. Otherwise I might as well go back to a fucking movie store in the time it would take to sift through 30 apps and remember account info for each and type it in with a little fucking remote.

 

[ChadD]

"making digital copies of ones and zeros is not theft, I don't care what the entertainment industry would like us to believe"

hahaha....young and....well....stupid , the law says it is and you are not above the law , and the Canadian market is worthless so you should be "expected to pay 100s of dollars a month for the legal right to watch a show like GOT"...but then since most of the Canadian entertainment stuff that is produced is garbage I can see your dilemma....o' well who cares

Well according to Canadian law it is not theft. They have failed many times in Canadian courts. The same laws in Canada that protect people recording the radio and sharing it apply to the internet in Canada. Its why they lobbied and got media taxation pushed in Canada. We pay tax on blank digital media sold in Canada no matter what its used for and that money is distributed to rights holders, in a scheme that heavily favors the big boys in the industry. If you are charged in court with piracy you are not charged with theft... you are charged with distributing copyrighted material. Not petty theft, not theft over... not theft of anything, because those laws are for physical property. If I go into wall mart and steal a disc, that is theft. If I make a copy of a signal for personal use in Canada that is 100% LEGAL. If I make a copy of a file off the internet that has had its DRM broken by another party in Canada that is also LEGAL. If I am the one who has broken the DRM that is Illegal. (this for example is why you will see on the bottom of lots of pirated Television shows network watermarks like CTV (Canadian Television Network) yes we are a hub of "illegal" pirating, because bottom line is if a major network broadcasts it over the air in Canada we are free to copy it as much as we like its perfectly legal.

I'm sorry that you are clearly from a country that doesn't pass laws with your interests at heart... instead passing laws prescribed to them by the people paying them off. In Canada our Gov has caved on a few things where pressure has been applied. For the most part though the Canadian Gov has protected its citizens first. Many of us hate paying the stupid levy to the Canadian Private Copying Collective... still that law exempted us from having to deal with two decades of BS. No record or movie company has EVER successfully sued a Canadian citizen for piracy based on the downloading (or redistribution) of anything from the internet. The only Canadians convicted of any copyright related charges have been large scale distribution type cases involving breaking of DRM and distribution from their... and honestly I can't remember one of those going their way in court in years. For the most part they have stopped trying... the one major American blackmail company that tried a couple years back got their fingers lapped by a Canadian Judge. They where fighting to have ISPs name names... and in the end the judge ruled in their favour, and declared a Max judgement they could extort from end users at something like 50 bucks, and ruled that for the PITA it was for ISPs they would have to pay 50 bucks to the ISP per name. Turns out they Fucked off back to the hole they slimmed out of.

 

[ravx25]

So because they wouldn't pay for it makes it ok? Why are you defending mouchers? They want to enjoy a product but don't want to support it.

Did I say anywhere in there I thought it was okay to pirate anything? I was simply pointing out the fallacy in thought that all pirated downloads equate to lost sales revenue, because they do not. Some might have otherwise purchased the media, but most, arguably, would not. From there it becomes a sense of entitlement that a person cannot wait for it to hit a common streaming service like Netflix, Amazon or Hulu. Not to stray too far off on a tangent though, the argument at the time was that pirates were stealing from the mouth of media providers/creators, which, no, they don't always necessarily do. There are no absolutes in revenue when dealing with pirated downloads.

And I'm not trying to justify anything either. As an example, I like GoT like a lot of folks and I like to see it when it comes out. Once HBO made HBO Go a publicly accessible stream without having a whole cable package paywall, I subscribed to HBO Go for a few months at a time to watch them. Before that I borrowed my buddies login to HBO Go from him having cable.

 

[nilepez]

Everyone hated paying for cable bundles. Well here's an insight into the future, you can pick the channels you want to watch and pay for it accordingly.

From a Mass Media class I gook 25 years ago: "Eventually cable will be ala carte and you will pay more to get less."

Now that may not always be true, especially if you pass on ESPN, Fox News and only get a few of the other channels, but let's face it, Fox is going to charge a lot more for FX ala carte than they do packaged with all of their other properties. What's more, as less people subscribe, they'll have to charge existing customers more to make up the difference.

 

[opfreak]

That's to simplifed an answer.

Many don't support the movie directly as cost. Many don't support movies due to cost and cost of extras (pop corn /drink)

Many of us like streaming. However streaming doesn't always fit the need either. Cost.. availability.. selection.

When you think of the above then how shitty the actors are and weak the story or it was regurgitated from another...

Then you can't even imagine how people loathe Hollywood and actors/actresses in general and their views which seem to make it into politics and the movies its of.

More importantly are data caps now.

For me I don't pay for movies at the theater.... ever. That doesn't mean I won't use a free ticket here and there. But won't ever pay at a theater.

Same way I will never pay another dime for cable tv or satellite. Streaming is ok and redbox helps. But honestly with a mix and match of above I don't blame people for avoiding the price of content. A la cartel is a phrase for continued nickel and dining or more derogatory rape of the customer.

Provide a value to a customer and they will pay for it. Provide shit and some will work around it.

So the movies are terrible, the actors are terrible, hate Hollywood, and have data caps. Yet you will still pirate and watch this stuff you claim is so terrible? Pirates are just freeloaders.

If movies are crap, don't watch them. If you have data caps you wont torrent.

 

[Killahurtz]

hahaha...and I am sorry that you come from a country of snowflakes expecting someone else to give them something....have a great one in the land of 35 million moochers