Microsoft just raised the price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to $29.99/month, and fans aren’t happy. Many are canceling, some are calling for a boycott, and even Microsoft’s website is struggling to keep up.
Microsoft just raised the price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to $29.99/month, and fans aren’t happy. Many are canceling, some are calling for a boycott, and even Microsoft’s website is struggling to keep up.
See but it was only released that way, it’s not like it was physical and became digital only (as far as I’m aware) it’s like music or YouTube videos, it is primarily a digital platform and medium.
As someone who’s been digital only with media for nearly a decade and a half, it doesn’t matter to me if I can physically buy it, can I get it digitally somehow? Yes.
But what if you can’t get it? Go try to watch the Willow TV show on Disney+. There is no longer a legal way to watch it. They removed it from the service. You can’t buy it. It’s gone. Disney has also been editing its classic movies like Lilo and Stitch and Splash to remove parts that I guess they found objectionable.
When Robert Redford died, a bunch of streaming services took down his movies and locked them behind a premium paywall. They know you’ll pay more, so they’ll make you pay more. For absolutely zero additional benefit to you or work on their part.
The trend that entertainment and culture are increasingly held hostage behind a paywall and subject to edits is dystopian as hell. What’s to stop Spotify or Netflix from moving all of your favorite media to Spotify Pro or Netflix Premium? What if there’s no other way to acquire that media? How much would you pay per month to experience it again? In what way is this a service that benefits the consumer?
I like my collection of movies, shows, and music, and as long as I’m careful not to lose the files, I can experience them, unchanged, for as long as I like.
And that is happening. Many movies are out of print. DVDs don’t always last forever. There has never been a legal way to obtain a movie in a DRM-free digital format. Ripping backups from discs is the only way to guarantee they are preserved and available forever.
Purely legal means is the issue here, I agree it’s a problem that they’re do things like that, I just feel that if they’re going to take those routes and make it literally impossible for me to own something well… There are rather easy ways around that, and if I can directly support those who made that piece of media, I will!