Netflix kills casting from phones
Netflix kills casting from phones
Casting support is still available on older Chromecast devices or TVs that support Google Cast natively, according to Netflix’s support page
As a Chromecast user, it seems like Google is trying to kill this feature anyway.
The kind of people they're pissing off with this, are the same people most likely to switch to bittorrent.
The best part is how in the end-stages of capitalism, everything keeps getting worse for consumers. While prices go up, even. It's awesome. /s
What possible benefit does this offer to Netflix? Are they trying to avoid paying licensing fee or something?
Probably. Or they want to reduce their development and maintenance costs with the extra code for those devices. Or maybe they somehow make more money when users are watching on some other device/software.
Changes like this are always made to "Enhance the user experience" yet the UX only goes backwards
They recently made everything massive blocks of color so now it's impossible to read anything. Damn splash screen takes up a third of my TV
They're made to “Enhance the user experience profit”
“Enhance the user experience” is just what the dev or documentation team writes when management dictates that they drop a feature. The only reasons they would have dropped it:
Every decision is about increasing profits first, and UX almost always takes a back seat to that
UX almost always takes a back seat to that
If it even makes it on the bus in the first place
my favourite netflix client is jellyfin tbh. it fixes all of netflix's probems.
Does anyone know if it's possible to run a self-hosted Jellyfin server without having to run an entire data center on your house? I could do something simple like a NUC or equivalent and a tiny NAS, anything else?
an entire data center
What are you on about?
Mine runs on my desktop that I built in 2016. So yes. I also tested it on a Lenovo tiny (similar to a NUC) that I'm using as a self host "server" and it seemed fine but I didn't try any heavy transcoding yet.
There's people running old raspberry pis with USB hard drives.
It'll run on just about anything.
Though, you'll only be able to stream original quality, no on the fly quality changes for low speed connections and such.
NUCs (specifically Intel 8th?-gen or later) are pretty much ideal for serving Jellyfin because the Intel integrated graphics can do video transcoding and the software is actually not very demanding otherwise, so the low-power CPUs are fine.
If you were buying hardware specifically for Jellyfin (i.e. didn't want to cobble together something used), I'd suggest an N100 or N150-based NAS mini-PC like this: https://www.bee-link.com/products/beelink-me-mini-n150
You can definitely run it on those sorts of machines. You'll want plenty of storage, but apart from thst it's not too demanding if you don't load it up with very high res videos.
You absolutely can. Currently running mine off of my desktop, but it's overkill and have a few coworkers that used nucs/cheap mini PCs to setup jellyfin. Biggest thing is to make sure you have enough storage to hold all of your media, then you're fine.
I could do something simple like a NUC or equivalent and a tiny NAS
Literally me rn. A tiny second-hand Dell Optiplex with a 8th gen i3 and a 2TB SSD.
Maybe not the most future thinking solution since it can only fit 2.5" HDDs and NVMe's, which are both more expensive than conventional big fat HDDs, but hey, works great.
If you can find one for cheap locally and get a decent deal on a compatible drive you're set. You could stretch a Terabyte or two for a while as long as you're not trying to host Jellyfin for too many people (and are OK deleting watched Shows/Movies when you start running low)
Your biggest issue self hosting JF will likely be port forwarding and the infrastructure required so external users can connect via WAN. Plex abstracts a lot of this away since you just have to open the port and Plex will access your library and broker the data between your server and the client. This now requires the server owner have a Plex Pass. The easiest way to host JF is allowing users LAN access via WireGuard (pivpn) but then you start hitting limitations to which devices they can install WireGuard on (smart tvs). I use Plex and JF, Plex for external users since I bought the lifetime pass 10 years ago, and JF as a backup as the enshittification of Plex continues full steam.
You can probably run it off your existing hardware just using an external drive(s).
But then won't your rack look a bit empty?
i mean i'm only using it for me and my family but i just run it on my desktop linux (and before i switched i was running it on my desktop windows with scoop install jellyfin)
I just run it on my gaming tower in a container
Can you tell more about this please?
They're probably saying that they run the self hosted jellyfin app and stream their own media. That's what I do, and have been doing for like a decade because netflix and other shitty streaming companies can eat a bag of dicks (except Dropout, they're real Gs) from the number of times I've gone to watch something on my watch later list only to find out they didn't get the license this quarter so 🖕to my movie night
cough hoist the flag, and watch netflix shows on jellyfin cough
When is the next VC driven company that focuses more on growth than profit coming? I feel Netflix and all the other streaming services are ripe to be overtaken in the same way Netflix overtook tv channel packaging.
To streaming?
Never.
Streaming is a finite market that is already covered. The moment old money (aka existing media companies) jumped on it, it was done for.
I definitely understand your view and personally don't see a way to disrupt the market either. I just hope someone else finds a way.
the next VC driven company…
With you so far
that focuses more on growth than profit
Ah - there’s your problem. VC companies simply don’t do that.
The investors focus on growth first, then they enshittify. They were just saying it's time to start that cycle again.
Ah - there’s your problem. VC companies simply don’t do that.
That is exactly what VC companies do. That's why they need the VC money. First you conquer the market at a loss. Only when users have no other options to escape to, you start squeezing them.
Ah - there’s your problem. VC companies simply don’t do that.
They most certainly do and then either cash in by selling to the next more risk adverse VC or sells it at a loss if they believe the company failed to disrupt the market.
Well if they stay private and don't let the other companies just buy them out when they are small to squash the competition. Otherwise it's impossible to be a disruptor now.
Mandatory licensing of video content to anyone who can pay for it (similar to what the music industry does) is the only thing that the might disrupt the streaming industry, like a sort of Paramount Decrees for the streaming age, since monopolies on originals is what keeps people locked in
Yeah... There goes my subscription. I'm casting everything to Chromecast on my older TV.
I thought for Chromecast the "casting" part is just telling the Chromecast what to play. Do you need your phone on while Chromecast shows content?
Thou shalt buy a smart tv or other device that we can pull metrics from and force advertising to.
The only good thing about Netflix is their diverse global library.
As in, a Netflix subscription plus a VPN, gives you access to a large library of global content.
Taking that into account, it's probably still the best streaming service, which means they're the shiniest turd in the toilet.
But still, Jellyfin FTW.
Lol why?
Genuinely seems pretty arbitrary given you need to use their app to start the cast anyway
The fact that casting to older devices is allowed on the expensive plan but not the ad-supported one offers a clue.
Because fuck you, that’s why. I’m sure they will re-introduce the feature behind a paywall soon.
¯(ツ)_/¯
Once you tell a company that you are willing to pay for something more than once, prepare to get fucked, because that’s all you’re gonna get. And not the fun kind.
Casting support is still available on older Chromecast devices or TVs that support Google Cast natively, according to Netflix’s support page, but only for subscribers on pricier ad-free plans, which start from $17.99 per month. Netflix users with an ad-supported subscription ($7.99 per month) will be unable to cast from their phones even if they own legacy Chromecast devices.
Paywall already there. Excerpt taken from the linked article.
Over the last weekend I was surprised to learn that you can't stream from the mobile web interface of at least some, if not most, of the streaming apps.
I was gonna say this could be a way to make account sharing more annoying, so say if you go to a friend's house and you gotta fiddle to log in with the remote instead of picking up your phone and starting a cast they might be motivated to get their own subscription.
But it seems you can still log into an account by scanning a QR Code, so... ehh????
My understanding is they already made it more annoying. Your devices have to connect to the home accounts "home" wifi within a certain amount of time or that device gets locked out.
I quit Netflix when they announced the pilot program for removing account sharing in South America, and I stand by that decision to this day.
As if I needed another reason to never get netflix again. 🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️
enshittification
Between their new interface and this, it’s like they are actively trying to get you to use it less.
Keep paying them but use it less = more profit.
Yup, exactly what I was thinking. They’re no longer under any obligation to make their product easy to use.
The already killed AirPlay years ago 😔
I guess I don't do the casting thing much, but what would the application have to do with it? I mean you cast the presentation from the device, does it care what is on the screen at the time?