Let's Pirate Everything

Image: Badly edited by author

Tech history is littered with moments when consumers had the opportunity to push back, failed to do so, and were then left burdened with bad products and bad consequences.

Why did we fall for the pretty marketing and find ourselves in a routine of upgrading devices every year or two, throwing millions of perfectly good products into landfills?

Why did we continue to use platforms like Facebook, even when we discovered they were nothing more than data-harvesting machines, with the main purpose of selling ads?

Why did we allow our homes to be infiltrated by “smart products,” stuffed with unnecessary additions and features that made them dumb-as-hell spyware, and we’re now in a situation where your door might fail to unlock because of a software bug?

There are countless more (and I’d love to hear them in the comments!).

In most of these cases, it was the same choice. Had we, the consumers, resisted or chosen to stop using/buying the products, the outcomes could have been different. They don’t want to hear that, but it’s true. They can try to fake it till they make it, or attempt to survive on VC funding until they become “too big to fail,” but at the end of the day, most companies run on metrics like users and engagement. If we don’t become engaged users, they don’t have a successful business.

A great microcosm of this is streaming.

Think of what has gone on in the last few years: the crackdown on password sharing, the endless price rises, the slow destruction of cinema, and the un-skippable adverts in paid (!) subscriptions. Next on the list will be fully AI-generated ads and hyper-targeting, and then, before you know it, fully AI-generated programming. None of these are the hallmarks of a good product.

Speaking of endless price rises, there’s yet more on the way. As noted by Ted Gioia, Apple has announced another price rise, and Disney and Hulu are about to follow suit. This will be the fourth year in a row that Disney has bumped prices, meaning the ad-free subscription price has almost tripled in just six years. Bear in mind that inflation sits somewhere around 3%; it’s hard to justify a nearly 20% yearly rise in subscription prices. The sad thing is that, thanks to our endless ability to eat the shit we’re fed, the only innovation now seen at these companies is price rises. They’ve got lazy. It’s not better UX, new viewing options, interesting formats, or a commitment to 10/10 prestige programming — it’s boardroom execs and accountants tactically increasing prices in various regions here and there to juice their numbers and fill the wallets of shareholders.

It’s untethered greed, and it’s been allowed to run wild.

Look at this great chart from Stat Significant.

Image: Stat Significant

At every opportunity, we could have said fuck you and voted with our wallets. Well, in a way we have, just not the way we should have. Time and time again, these companies have implemented changes and crackdowns that have been detrimental to the user experience, and we’ve fought back by… agreeing to keep paying a continually rising fee for an ever-worsening product?

What options do we have? I’d love to see a mass boycott of these services, but we’re all suckers for having our minds numbed from the reality of lives with some trash TV. I get it. So, assuming we will all continue to consume content, the only answer might be to go back to pirating everything. Load up the PirateBay and go to town. SOMETHING I TOTALLY DO NOT DO AND HAVE NEVER DONE. I may or may not watch most of my TV on what I call “hooky sites.” I may or may not watch sports on streaming sites. I may or may not have used to get game consoles chipped so I could download games. I may or may not have been part of early-day Internet forums that leaked and shared music. Just to be clear, THESE ARE THINGS I TOTALLY DO NOT DO AND HAVE NEVER DONE.

But the point stands. These companies are going to bleed our wallets dry. They are not intent on winning the streaming wars by delivering the best experience or producing the best content. They are systemically, and likely in cohesion, raising prices year after year, in a desperate bid to maintain their completely overblown stock prices. By paying, and watching, you are subscribing to this business practice.

We’ve shown we can push back. I think it’s interesting to look at the AI space, particularly with hardware devices. Whenever a new device appears — like the Friend or the Rabbit r1, the public outcry is swift, and often kills these products on launch. We feel strongly about privacy (in this case, anyway), and about the consequences of letting a machine dictate our lives, or gain too much influence on them.

It’s time we start adding price-gouging to that list.

Pay for them if you want, even as they continue to get worse. Jokes on you. But know this. You won’t die from missing out on the latest series of “idiots dating other idiots while trying to get mildly Instagram-famous,” or not seeing whatever paint-by-numbers abomination is released each week. You might even feel a sense of freedom, unburdened by the need to keep up or the fear of missing out. You might find joy in other creative endeavors, or spend time engaging with other humans, or spend time working on yourself. All things that are not beholden to tech overlords and their addiction to price rises. And, if you’re desperate to see something, you can pay for a month (don’t forget to cancel), or you can always don your eye-patch and get pirating, SOMETHING I TOTALLY DON’T DO.

Whatever you do, stop giving your money to companies that don’t care about you.