I’ve poked around on FMHY and most of the direct download sites are total garbage banner ads everywhere and popup galore with slow ass download speeds. Even the big public trackers like 1337x are whack in this regard. Yes obviously use an adblocker which takes care of that problem but if the ~average user goes at this blind they’re gonna end up on some random ass sites from misclicks or get redirected or at best wait way too long for a download or it’s in parts of an archive and they have to wait til tomorrow for another download etc etc.

Private trackers or bust, always and forever

I just work a trade. Nobody is trying to network with the guy there to rewire an electrical system in a steel mill. Unless it’s to poach to jump ship to a different job haha

There never used to be tornadoes in my area. Now there are. With climate change, anything’s possible!

My friends don’t have it set up. Some of them are friends of friends, and people I don’t talk to regularly. I’m not going to try and convert them. It’s also a bit more complicated via tailscale or VPN reverse proxies and Plex “just werks”. If there’s anything beyond just installing an app and clicking an invite, a bunch of people who use my library are going to have a hard time. Like my dad, he’s pushing 70. My friends would also have to do the goofy networking setup for it to work for me.

I’m also not even sure if people I share with have means of installing. My one friend who uses my library a lot does it through a Samsung TV. That involves sideloading the app to install jellyfin.

Lastly, like I said, music. Plexamp is one of my #1 used apps. There’s a lot that goes into that beyond just being able to play media. It curates playlists depending on what you just listened to or gives you similar artists, similar to how Spotify makes a “radio” after playing something.

Something that’s getting glossed over in these comments is the ability to easily watch or listen to friends’ media.

I have my own library with about 1k movies, a bunch of anime and TV, and 10k albums. But I have like 6 or 7 friends with libraries even larger. My one friend has 37k albums, they all have thousands of movies I never even heard of, etc. It really makes it like my own mini streaming service, and I love throwing on a huge music library on shuffle via plexamp while driving to/from work.

I paid like $70 for a lifetime pass years ago, so I’m along for the ride I guess. I really rely on the music aspect of it, I haven’t had a spotify subscription in like 7 years.

I know they changed a lot lately, and particularly what pisses me off is how vague and how they intentionally obfuscate how their model works now. I have friends that for years used my library, and recently have been like “I saw Plex started charging now so I stopped using it” and I have to be like “no it’s still free because I have a lifetime pass”. It’s definitely just to trick people into getting monthly subscriptions.