We are also changing how remote playback works for streaming personal media (that is, playback when not on the same local network as the server). The reality is that we need more resources to continue putting forth the best personal media experience, and as a result, we will no longer offer remote playback as a free feature. This—alongside the new Plex Pass pricing—will help provide those resources. This change will apply to the future release of our new Plex experience for mobile and other platforms.

  • jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev
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    30 minutes ago

    The audacity of this company to increase prices when: A) downloads are locked behind the paywall but havent worked in years (probably close to a decade at this point) B) they focus all the development time on bringing bullshit to the platform (live tv, rentals, other streaming app searches, etc)

    Requiring a subscription for remote access is actually fucking insane, they don’t have any bandwidth costs associated with that other than authentication so ???

    This will drive people to Jellyfin, and watch how fast Plex drops into irrelevance when all the selfhosters move away. Plex is (now was) the #1 thing to that both myself and others in this community would recommend to someone looking to get into selfhosting. ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ not anymore, wonder how much the revenue will drop?

  • bean@lemmy.world
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    1 hour ago

    I’ve been using Plex many years. I abandoned it about 1-2 years ago when they began their enshittification journey. Now I see they are continuing to double down on being assholes.

    They do not need any more resources to allow people to use what already exists. Most people run their own servers, and, they track all that by the way. Hence why people moved away from it.

    Don’t give them your money. Let them rot. They fucked their user base who built them.

  • Korhaka@sopuli.xyz
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    30 minutes ago

    I still remember sticking files on an apache server and openly sharing that with friends. Not had a need to do that lately but I can always start doing it again if necessary.

  • Green Wizard@lemmy.zip
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    5 hours ago

    I moved on to jellyfin after I found out the hard way Plex servers need to authenticate for use. I’m sure by now there are ways to set up offline authentication but I already didn’t like the idea of paying monthly to stream my own content from my own machine. It just didn’t make sence to me. Jellyfin isn’t perfect, or as flashy as Plex, but it works, looks fine, and its free, not counting a much deserved donation to the devs .

  • cantankerous_cashew@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    So basically… this is a blatant cash grab, and a nearly 200% one depending on the level of service you pay/paid for. Wonder how long it will be before the lifetime pass is discontinued and everyone gets forcibly moved over to a monthly subscription model

  • profilelost@discuss.tchncs.de
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    8 hours ago

    I’ve been meaning to set up a homeserver with plex recently but will defnitely go for jellyfin now that I read this thread.

  • rekabis@programming.dev
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    6 hours ago

    I don’t like it, but it’s a pragmatic decision.

    Hosting for a simple website can be as little as a few bucks a month. That’s easy for any project to absorb, even if they are open-source with no one pulling a paycheque.

    Streaming requires high-performance, high-bandwidth machines that cost anywhere from several dozen dollars to several hundred dollars a month. You build a resilient high-availability network, and you could easily be looking at several tens of thousands of dollars a month.

    That isn’t easy to absorb, even for a for-profit company with clearly-defined revenue streams.

    Some people want everything for free, but free doesn’t pay the bills.

    Full disclosure: I don’t use the streaming feature. I prefer to grab actual copies to drop onto my NAS. I also don’t share to friends and family, as I am the only one I know of who uses Plex.

  • PhAzE@lemmy.ca
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    10 hours ago

    As a plex pass lifetime user, this doesn’t change anything for me.

    I am, however, blown away that the price went from $75 CDN to $350 CDN over the last 10 years!! That’s just insane!