New social features further Plex’s evolution from media server business
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I don't have a snappy name for every software under the sun eventually evolving a chat feature and social media functionality, but maybe we can work on one here in the comment section.
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Given what I know about the average plex user, I can't help but think that this is the exact opposite of what they're looking for from this service
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Great, more shit I have to turn off. I'd have gone to Jellyfin already if not for the fact that trying to share your Jellyfin library with other people is a massive pain in the ass compared to Plex's "friend" system.
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Spare a mention for all the features the brilliant management and talented developers at Plex have removed in the last year or two, such as Watch Together and the ability to play music libraries from the Plex app.
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$750, eat my ass lmao. Raising prices to a stratospheric level at the same time you're offering features that are objectively terrible isn't the best strategy, tech bros.
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I thought Plex was about carefully curating your library like you would with Physical media?
I don't need to have the equivalent of the Marvel/DC fanbois shouting "LOOKIT THIS ISN'T IT JUST AMAZING" when I clearly don't have any of those movies in my queue.
But more eyeballs is more dollars so (manshoutsatcloud.gif)
I don't need to have the equivalent of the Marvel/DC fanbois shouting "LOOKIT THIS ISN'T IT JUST AMAZING" when I clearly don't have any of those movies in my queue.
But more eyeballs is more dollars so (manshoutsatcloud.gif)
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As someone who does run Jellyfin and shares it with my kids I think this is a fair assessment.
It's not beyond the abilities of Ars readers to sort out, but it does take more effort for sure. I think it's worth it, I enjoy having control over my server and knowing that a third party focused on some profit motive isn't going to mess with my vibes. But I did have to do some work to get it all functioning smoothly and securely.
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Ah, emoji reaction to movies. That must be the kind of development that price hike is paying for.
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Yes, and no. It depends on what your goal is.
- If your goal is to run a sustainable business of happy customers, you are completely correct.
But...
- If your goal is to make the news, in order to juice an upcoming IPO--or simply be bought out by a larger company, and as upper-management punch out with your Golden Parachute and never need to work another day in your life....it probably isn't as bad a strategy as we Normals all collectively wish it was.
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I think I can speak for almost all plex users when we say: get rid of this and give us back our plugin architecture
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They are definitely trying to pivot to a FAST only service. I wonder how long they'll let their old customers use their servers?
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I've had a plex lifetime pass for over a decade and would switch over to jellyfin (or similar) in a heartbeat if they had PS5 clients. I already have one giant PC-like box hooked into my TV and don't really feel like putting an actual computer over there too. I know I'll have to at some point when plex gets too enshittified to use anymore, but hopefully that day keeps barely not coming.
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Let's see about the new features: don't care, don't care, don't care, annnnnnd...don't care.
Honestly, Plex did everything I needed it to back when we bought a lifetime pass in 2017. It undoubtedly saved us hundreds by avoiding physical disc damage as our kids grew up, and it worked well enough that I was OK sending money their way as a thank you.
The gradual enshittification since then, especially of the mobile/tablet apps, has not been in users' interests at all. As Szechwan mentioned above, the average plex user isn't looking for any of this crap.
I'm not going to cut off my own nose to spite myself, but I will be reassessing Jellyfin's progress some time this year in case Plex rolls out another sudden step-change of shittiness. It's cheap enough to spin up a VM or container for testing, after all. I wouldn't put it past them at this point to do something else that's bloody stupid, and I'd like to be prepared if they do.
Honestly, Plex did everything I needed it to back when we bought a lifetime pass in 2017. It undoubtedly saved us hundreds by avoiding physical disc damage as our kids grew up, and it worked well enough that I was OK sending money their way as a thank you.
The gradual enshittification since then, especially of the mobile/tablet apps, has not been in users' interests at all. As Szechwan mentioned above, the average plex user isn't looking for any of this crap.
I'm not going to cut off my own nose to spite myself, but I will be reassessing Jellyfin's progress some time this year in case Plex rolls out another sudden step-change of shittiness. It's cheap enough to spin up a VM or container for testing, after all. I wouldn't put it past them at this point to do something else that's bloody stupid, and I'd like to be prepared if they do.
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FSTargetDrone
Ars Scholae Palatinae
As a Marvel fan (among many, many other genres) I don’t give a shit about sharing or taking about what I watch with anyone I don’t personally know.
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Well, is Metastasizing too on the nose? Or pincers as it were? Goodness knows every time I see a chat window or social media function pop up somewhere unexpected on a website it makes me only want to look at it like a suspicious mole...
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I bought a lifetime membership when it was $79 during a deal a few years ago. That was worth it, but I wouldn't start using Plex at this point in time. It's all working fine at the moment for sharing the library within the extended family, so I'm going to keep it running. But I don't want any "discovery" or "social" features.
I used to use Plex for audiobooks as well (using Prologue as the client app), but I'm not happy with that solution, especially since I couldn't find a good Android client app for it. Also, the metadata agents were just not very reliable. Last week I switched to Audiobookshelf + Tailscale (thanks @Aurich for leading me to read up on this solution) and it's so much better!
I used to use Plex for audiobooks as well (using Prologue as the client app), but I'm not happy with that solution, especially since I couldn't find a good Android client app for it. Also, the metadata agents were just not very reliable. Last week I switched to Audiobookshelf + Tailscale (thanks @Aurich for leading me to read up on this solution) and it's so much better!
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What solution did you use to remotely connect the kids? I'd love to share Jellyfin with my sister, but she streams via a Firestick or something and I can't fathom trying to get Tailscale running on a device like that, whereas Plex just works as an app (for now).
I'm actually running both Plex and Jellyfin in containers on my home server and they both point to the same media folders. The redundant systems has come in handy several times.
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I've been a plex user for over a decade and paid less than $80 for my plex pass. I've been happy with its function for my own media, but have grown increasingly frustrated with the sprawl and focus on streaming services over hosting my own media. Family members can't even find my stuff on a new install anymore without me helping to disable/hide all the irrelevant unwanted 'features' that have been shoved down our throats. I certainly would not pay more than $100 for what it is now, and even having an existing pass may not be enough to keep me as a user if they continue to move against the current of what their userbase wants to see rather than what they think will get them the best cash grab.
When they announced the most recent price increase I finally broke down and installed Jellyfin. It runs fine alongside plex, it just isn't nearly as mature from an organization and metadata management perspective and has a much more limited client app ecosystem. Unfortunately the writing appears to be on the wall for plex's continued enshittification and classic VC/PE death spiral, and most plex pass holders I know are already planning for the inevitable by testing out alternatives just like I am.
When they announced the most recent price increase I finally broke down and installed Jellyfin. It runs fine alongside plex, it just isn't nearly as mature from an organization and metadata management perspective and has a much more limited client app ecosystem. Unfortunately the writing appears to be on the wall for plex's continued enshittification and classic VC/PE death spiral, and most plex pass holders I know are already planning for the inevitable by testing out alternatives just like I am.
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The only thing I disagree with is the idea that Plex was "sustainable" before this. Had they actually achieved profitability just on being a media library curation platform? Because if they weren't profitable before, then their business model wasn't "sustainable".
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What are the alternatives for Plex? I've been kicking around the idea of setting up my own media server with some old PC parts. I've only just started the preliminary research into the idea of a media server set-up so I'm open to suggestions.
I just want to stream my music to me wherever I am and watch my stuff at home. I don't care about the social sharing part at all. I've been slowly migrating my gaming and media over to Mint Linux but have a Win 11 for music and other creative work. I'm switching the creative stuff to Apple once I find out how many internal organs and limbs a new Mac Mini is going to cost.
The biggest thing I'm looking for is something that I can set up and maintain without it becoming a time sink.
It just needs to work.
The second biggest thing I'm looking for is something that is enshitification resistant.
I just want to stream my music to me wherever I am and watch my stuff at home. I don't care about the social sharing part at all. I've been slowly migrating my gaming and media over to Mint Linux but have a Win 11 for music and other creative work. I'm switching the creative stuff to Apple once I find out how many internal organs and limbs a new Mac Mini is going to cost.
The biggest thing I'm looking for is something that I can set up and maintain without it becoming a time sink.
It just needs to work.
The second biggest thing I'm looking for is something that is enshitification resistant.
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I don't know if I'm a hoarder or if I saw this coming long ago, but I have kept every VHS tape, DVD, and Blu-Ray I've ever bought. Something tells me I should hang on to them a bit longer.
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Bought a lifetime pass at least 5 years ago for $80-100 and use it often. Up until recently the kids pretty much constantly had classic Simpsons on. Definitely would not bother with it these days as very few of the features added since I started using it seem like improvements
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As a newly ex-Plex user, this kind of shit is exactly why I switched to Jellyfin.
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I've had a lifetime pass for a little over 10 years - at the time it was to work around the need to jailbreak the Mrs ipad to allow her to run Kodi (nee XBMC) . I really do like plexamp, and was looking forward to the headless version supporting sync'ed audio as and option as I redo the house speakers but instead they focus on this useless (to me) stuff- however now there are so many options for host it yourself movie and whole house audio (been playing with music assistant, which seems to be maturing nicely) , I'm likely to try something new
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One shouldn't be remis to point out exactly how much data Plex collects from users, or at least has access to from users.
There was a Plex forum post I came across not too terribly long ago where an individual was having some sort of issue and (presumably) someone from the Plex team "took a look at [the user's] account" and rattled off a few notes which made me rather shocked as to how much detail into user setups they actually have. Given the following:
Given how selfhosting works, I would presume they would be able to provide a lot of data about the provenance of those titles and exactly who uses them and how. That, honestly, is very disconcerting to me for a multitude of reasons especially given the direction that the Plex team is moving with their product these days.
There was a Plex forum post I came across not too terribly long ago where an individual was having some sort of issue and (presumably) someone from the Plex team "took a look at [the user's] account" and rattled off a few notes which made me rather shocked as to how much detail into user setups they actually have. Given the following:
Given how selfhosting works, I would presume they would be able to provide a lot of data about the provenance of those titles and exactly who uses them and how. That, honestly, is very disconcerting to me for a multitude of reasons especially given the direction that the Plex team is moving with their product these days.
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Problem or feature? My home streaming Venn diagram is entirely in the circle of "just to the fam in the house." I don't want to share!
I run an increasingly aged Synology DS 225+. Any consensus on whether I should switch to Emby or Jellyfin? I'm prob also going to replace the Synology with a Ubiquiti NAS later this year.
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TIL
I wonder why Sony is being difficult about it. From what I read on follow-up, the Jellyfin devs have reached out a few times and gotten the cold shoulder.
Well, guess I need to re-evaluate my options. I'm intending to implement Jellyfin, but my local hub is a PS5. I do have eventual plans to set up a dedicated emulation PC which would double nicely as a streaming hub, but last I checked my build is still running 30-50% over its cost from a year ago and I can't swing that yet.
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You create an account for them. Hardly a "massive pain in the ass".
edit: oh, you're talking about the reverse proxy.. that is more work for sure.
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