Kodi Add-Ons are Feeling the Heat

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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Recently we have discussed Kodi (formeraly Xbox Media Player / XBMC) and it gaining big ground in North America, mainly due to its Add-Ons allowing extremely easy access to pirated content. And while there have been crackdowns in the UK, folks are being sued right here in Texas as well over Kodi Add-ons. It seems that these lawsuits are catching the eyes of other Kodi Add-On developers as well as Torrent Freak is reporting that several prominent Kodi Add-Ons are going dark this week.

Over the past few days, several prominent third-party Kodi add-ons have thrown in the towel, at least temporarily. While most developers remain vague about the exact nature of their decisions, it appears that legal worries are the main trigger for many.

It seems that some of the Add-On developers are blaming "third party popularity" for their downfall. Build it and they will come. Give away free movies and TV and they will beat a path to your door.

"The reality is we did say the growth of third party popularity would hinder us. Unfortunately, now it looks like an implosion," he tweeted yesterday.
 
Welcome to internet censorship.

Seems like next they prob should target sites that are just cracking user accounts because I been seeing that a lot lately.
 
Will ipv6 kill off most forms of piracy as a whole? Unless there's a way to proxy the connections, I don't think anonymity would be possible with it.
 
I'm a huge fan of Kodi, but I use it for streaming and cataloging my own content, nothing pirated. I haven't found any program that's easier to use, or has better "scrapers".

I'd hate it if this ends up killing Kodi altogether.
 
The start of kodis downfall happened a whileback imo.

Kodi will end up going the way of the dodo, albeit it will probably return with a different name.
 
Skillz said:
Plex.
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Well, hopefully Kodi will continue as it's been made, and the guys who made the 3rd party apps will feel all the heat. If I have to switch one day, that'll be my likely target. Can you run Plex on a RaspberryPi?
 
You can run Plex on nearly anything. Though if you wish to use Plex's transcoding abilities on the server side you'll want something with a decent processor to do the transcoding. This just allows you to play the media on more devices since the transcoding happens on the server.

Most TVs have Plex add-ons.
 
Damn, a fucking good app went down this week too. Shits about to get worse for these apps I guess :(
 
Paying the LAWYERS and FIGHTING an endless fight instead of EMBRACING new technology and providing it to the consumer at a reasonable price AND quality.

Is this capitalism at work?

and before this turns into a pirate vs non pirate thing, f*k off.

there are MILLIONS of people, including myself who are willing to pay for quality content. not bloated bs.





edit: there will be a revolution and a real uprising against this garbage... unfortunately it will not be in any, any of our lifetimes.
 
you can't kill piracy, ever full stop.

like recording from the radio, vhs, napster, limewire, bittorrent, kodi the list goes on, it is evolving changing shape and creating new forms.

it's inevitable that your content will be free in some shape.
 
Skillz said:
You can run Plex on nearly anything. Though if you wish to use Plex's transcoding abilities on the server side you'll want something with a decent processor to do the transcoding. This just allows you to play the media on more devices since the transcoding happens on the server.

Most TVs have Plex add-ons.
Click to expand...
I'll second a vote for Plex. Running it as my media server is a blessing. Shit just works, mostly.:)
 
marzzez said:
Hollywood/cable company’s have a kung-fu grip pissing off everybody
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Just like the left will never give up, no mater how wrong they are,
the cable/media companies will never admit their mistakes and will continue to double down with even more restrictions and suing little old ladies for piracy.

Even if they could somehow stop all piracy on the internet, it will continue elsewhere.
I have older family members who still exchange VHS tapes and DVD's with others they know.
They have boxed of media they pass around. Just take out the movies you want to watch and pass the box onto the next person.
I'm sure the media companies would like to stop that too, but it would be difficult to infiltrate the group :rolleyes:

Helped them out several years ago by clearing out all my old VHS tapes and donating them to the cause :p
 
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This is ok by me. If people don't pay for things, things won't get made.
 
Drewis said:
Paying the LAWYERS and FIGHTING an endless fight instead of EMBRACING new technology and providing it to the consumer at a reasonable price AND quality.

Is this capitalism at work?

and before this turns into a pirate vs non pirate thing, f*k off.

there are MILLIONS of people, including myself who are willing to pay for quality content. not bloated bs.


edit: there will be a revolution and a real uprising against this garbage... unfortunately it will not be in any, any of our lifetimes.
Click to expand...

It's also about convenience. As much as some companies today might seem like they are "embracing" (HBO Streaming, etc...), in reality they are taking a step to the left instead of a step forward. If we want convenience, we dont want to have to fire up our system, go into Netflix, sign in - OH look, all the content sucks, let's see whats on Hulu - exit out of Netflix, fire up Hulu, sign in. Oh look, everything sucks here, let's see whats on HBO Go.

You get the point - They are making access to everything incredibly inconvenient.
 
boss99 said:
Will ipv6 kill off most forms of piracy as a whole? Unless there's a way to proxy the connections, I don't think anonymity would be possible with it.
Click to expand...

Fighting the endless phishing attacks in my day job, I can't help but ponder that. IPV6 means everyone should be identifiable. But it also means there's a huge, HUGE supply of disposable addresses.

I'd be less cynical if it weren't for the fact that the people running the internet are printing of TLDs seemingly to just sell to spammers and make a buck.
 
Cyraxx said:
It's also about convenience. As much as some companies today might seem like they are "embracing" (HBO Streaming, etc...), in reality they are taking a step to the left instead of a step forward. If we want convenience, we dont want to have to fire up our system, go into Netflix, sign in - OH look, all the content sucks, let's see whats on Hulu - exit out of Netflix, fire up Hulu, sign in. Oh look, everything sucks here, let's see whats on HBO Go.

You get the point - They are making access to everything incredibly inconvenient.
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The folks who make a business collecting and selling TV schedule data are starting to include streaming catalogs. It'll be convenient, but it'll be behind something that costs you money.
 
Fuckin people. Now it's just like Napster all over again.Why can't we have nice things? Greedy fucks selling these stupid premodded boxes.
 
Hollywood just dont get it.

Instead of allowing customers access to the media as they see fit, they insist in making it as impossible as they can, hence not understanding that piracy is mostly because the service is more friendly, not because its free.
 
Bandalo said:
I'm a huge fan of Kodi, but I use it for streaming and cataloging my own content, nothing pirated. I haven't found any program that's easier to use, or has better "scrapers".

I'd hate it if this ends up killing Kodi altogether.
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Considering it's open source, I'm not sure how it would "die"
 
Seventyfive said:
Considering it's open source, I'm not sure how it would "die"
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Well, open source and supported/developed by a small, dedicated team of guys. If this bad press starts eroding their user base, I can see them moving on to other projects.
 
Bandalo said:
Well, open source and supported/developed by a small, dedicated team of guys. If this bad press starts eroding their user base, I can see them moving on to other projects.
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There will always be people who pick up the development themselves even if someone else puts it down. Or you could even pick up the development yourself personally.
 
Seventyfive said:
There will always be people who pick up the development themselves even if someone else puts it down. Or you could even pick up the development yourself personally.
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I could, except the last time I wrote code was in college about 15 years ago. And I need a paying job!

Hopefully the current team will stay on though, they've been doing great work.
 
Cyraxx said:
It's also about convenience. As much as some companies today might seem like they are "embracing" (HBO Streaming, etc...), in reality they are taking a step to the left instead of a step forward. If we want convenience, we dont want to have to fire up our system, go into Netflix, sign in - OH look, all the content sucks, let's see whats on Hulu - exit out of Netflix, fire up Hulu, sign in. Oh look, everything sucks here, let's see whats on HBO Go.

You get the point - They are making access to everything incredibly inconvenient.
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While conveniently ignoring the fact that Roku has universal search, "just create your account once" single sign-on to any service they offer, along with reusing your payment details for each one.

If you can't find it on your Roku, chances are you can't find it on "free" streaming either. I'm as much of a "fuck authority" man as you are, but only when they're not even trying. Roku's tons of searchable services is proof that the companies are trying now.
 
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Bandalo said:
I could, except the last time I wrote code was in college about 15 years ago. And I need a paying job!

Hopefully the current team will stay on though, they've been doing great work.
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I think if they try to curtail piracy, the most likely thing, will be they create a fork that blacklists certain add ons and a 3rd party will modify that fork to re-enable them.
 
Bandalo said:
I'm not in the tin-foil hat crowd, but this sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.
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It's called a credit card. If it gets stolen, they refund the charges and send you a new one. They don't even charge you a fee, because they're so poorly secured they're expected to be stolen.


But that said, the last time my CC was stolen was due to a swipe theft at a restaurant in New Jersey, NEVER online. So yeah, you're a tin foil idiot - let them bring that convenience for you, and let you START OR END a subscription with a few button presses.

Trust a company with your CC number, because in the end of the day it's not your money. Because fucking stealing it from you is as easy as somebody stealing your mail, or scrounging through your trash for bills. And that gives them everything except your CCV number. If you're just cloning a card, you don't need that.

You already check your credit card statement every month, right? Then you have nothing to worry about.
 
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monkeymagick said:
I'll second a vote for Plex. Running it as my media server is a blessing. Shit just works, mostly.:)
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I recently tried to set up Plex on one of my machines. Everything went fine. Looked to play a ripped TV show and about half way through, got a message stating that my network connection wasn't fast enough.

It appears my Plex client didn't have a good enough connection to the Plex server ... even though they were both on the same machine.

And with Plex clients on PC (at least) seeming to require a $4.99 activation charge ...

As for Kodi, I like it, but don't have plugins like Exodus or Bob installed.
 
I'd be willing to say Plex isn't quite as safe as it appears... While the server side is installed in house, you have to login to plex.tv to manage it.. how much stuff behind the scenes is getting transmitted up to the TPTB..
 
whateverer said:
It's called a credit card. If it gets stolen, they refund the charges and send you a new one. They don't even charge you a fee, because they're so poorly secured they're expected to be stolen.


But that said, the last time my CC was stolen was due to a swipe theft at a restaurant in New Jersey, NEVER online. So yeah, you're a tin foil idiot - let them bring that convenience for you, and let you START OR END a subscription with a few button presses.

Trust a company with your CC number. Because fucking stealing it from you is as easy as somebody stealing your mail, or scrounging through your trash for bills. And that gives them everything except your CCV number.

You already check your credit card statement every month, right? Then you have nothing to worry about.
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Woah, calm down man, no need to turn directly to insults.

My point is giving the payment authority to that one company, and allowing them to distribute your info to a number of different sites is security nightmare, and makes them a big hacking target.

I trust a lot of companies with my CC info. But I like to make sure they're reputable, and that they don't share that info with other sites if I can.

Getting hacked or a card stolen would not be a financial burden. My bank takes good care of me and I won't pay a dime personally. BUT, it's a gigantic pain in the ass. Your card gets hacked, you get a notification, and your card is cancelled. So you're stuck with cash only for a while. A few days later, you get a new card. Now you get to spend hours setting up new payment info at Amazon, PayPal, your cable company, your power company, your cell phone provider, and everywhere else you've used that card as a default payment method. THAT is the headache I'd like to avoid.
 
Bandalo said:
Woah, calm down man, no need to turn directly to insults.

My point is giving the payment authority to that one company, and allowing them to distribute your info to a number of different sites is security nightmare, and makes them a big hacking target.

I trust a lot of companies with my CC info. But I like to make sure they're reputable, and that they don't share that info with other sites if I can.

Getting hacked or a card stolen would not be a financial burden. My bank takes good care of me and I won't pay a dime personally. BUT, it's a gigantic pain in the ass. Your card gets hacked, you get a notification, and your card is cancelled. So you're stuck with cash only for a while. A few days later, you get a new card. Now you get to spend hours setting up new payment info at Amazon, PayPal, your cable company, your power company, your cell phone provider, and everywhere else you've used that card as a default payment method. THAT is the headache I'd like to avoid.
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True, I understand your caution. Then I suggest you do some research on hacks of Roku's services, and see if they have a good-enough reputation for you. I don't recall reading any hacks of their online data stores. The devices have vulnerabilities just like anything, but nothing I've seen gets you access without finding a way onto the local network first.

I just thought you were over-reacting to putting your CC information on a reputable service.
 
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jlbenedict said:
I'd be willing to say Plex isn't quite as safe as it appears... While the server side is installed in house, you have to login to plex.tv to manage it.. how much stuff behind the scenes is getting transmitted up to the TPTB..
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I don't have to log into that site while managing or playing anything in my Plex library, only when I am outside of the house, like in the car playing music, or on travel watching stuff in the hotel. Actually, Plex works just fine in house when the internet it out, just external users/friends cannot get anything from my internal library. This also doesn't include any of the Plex cloud features, which I do not use.
 
whateverer said:
True, I understand your caution. Then I suggest you do some research on hacks of Roku's services, and see if they have a good-enough reputation for you. I don't recall reading any hacks of their online data stores. The devices have vulnerabilities just like anything, but nothing I've seen gets you access without finding a way onto the local network first.

I just thought you were over-reacting to putting your CC information on a reputable service.
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I shop online all the time, so I'm not that paranoid. Having one service that shares all your payment info with a series of OTHER services is what makes me nervous. Especially considering the number of connected apps they use, each one is it's own attack surface.

I can't say I've heard anything particularly negative about Roku's security practices at this time, but for me, I'd stick with doing them manually for now.
 
Bandalo said:
My point is giving the payment authority to that one company, and allowing them to distribute your info to a number of different sites is security nightmare, and makes them a big hacking target.
Click to expand...

That's not how Roku works, from my experience. You want Netflix, you set up a Netflix account and then put the the creds in the Roku app. Same for Amazon, Hulu, CBSAccess, etc. I haven't looked into other "less popular" channel addons, but I would assume it is the same for them.
 
Richard R said:
I recently tried to set up Plex on one of my machines. Everything went fine. Looked to play a ripped TV show and about half way through, got a message stating that my network connection wasn't fast enough.

It appears my Plex client didn't have a good enough connection to the Plex server ... even though they were both on the same machine.

And with Plex clients on PC (at least) seeming to require a $4.99 activation charge ...

As for Kodi, I like it, but don't have plugins like Exodus or Bob installed.
Click to expand...

I've never paid for plex. He'll i even got the phone app for free from Amazon. Now, you can pay for plex + or whatever it is to get earlier updates or whatever extras they have.
 
farscapesg1 said:
That's not how Roku works, from my experience. You want Netflix, you set up a Netflix account and then put the the creds in the Roku app. Same for Amazon, Hulu, CBSAccess, etc. I haven't looked into other "less popular" channel addons, but I would assume it is the same for them.
Click to expand...

I don't own one personally, I was just responding to another user who described the service.
 
I tried to update a friends firetv stick and found out the hard way tvaddons Indigo config wizard is missing along with the movie/tv and sports addons. You have to manually install any addon still left in the repo.
Luckily Specto-Fork from MrKnow still works.
 
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