cross-posted from: https://poptalk.scrubbles.tech/post/2333639
I was just forwarded this someone in my household who watches our server. That’s it folks. I’ve been a hold out for a long time, but this is honestly it.
They want me to pay to stream content that I bought from my hardware transcoded also on my hardware.
I’ll say it. As of today, I say Plex is dead. Luckily I’ve been setting up Jellyfin, I guess it’s time to make it production ready.
Edit: I have a Plex Pass. More comments saying “Just buy a plex pass” are seriously not getting it. I have a Plex Pass and my users are still getting this.
And for the thousandth person who wants to say the same things to me:
- YES I know I’m unaffected as a Plex Pass owner.
- My users were immediately angry at it, which made me angry. Our users don’t understand what plex pass is, and they shouldn’t have to, that’s why I had it. The fact that they were pinged even though it should have kept working is horribly sloppy
- Plex is still removing functionality. I don’t care that “People should pay their fair share”. If Plex wants to put every new feature behind a paywall, that’s completely okay. They are removing functionality.
- “But they have cloud costs”. Remote streaming is negligible to them. It’s a dynamic DNS service. Plex client logs in, asks where server is, plex cloud responds with the IP and port of where server is located. That’s it.
- “Good luck finding another remote streaming” - Again, Plex just opens up an IP and port. Jellyfin also just opens up an IP and port (Hold on jellyfin folks I know, security, that’s a separate conversation). All “remote streaming” is is their dynamic dns. Literal pennies to them. Know what actually is costing them money? Hosting all of that ad-supported “free” content that they’re probably losing money on.
In short, I don’t care how you justify it. Plex is doing something shitty. They’re removing functionality that has been free for years. I’m not responding to any more of your comments repeating the same arguments over and over.
Jellyfin. I’ve been waiting for Plex to do this for years. Enshitification is everywhere.
I never got the idea of selfhosting but paying (except for enterprise-grade support or donations) anyway.
For a good while, Plex was the only game in town that did the job well, and they put the transcoding feature behind the paywall.
Given it wasn’t that expensive for a lifetime pass a number of years ago (I remember it was cheaper than a game anyway) and they still seemed relatively user-centric at the time, many people like me felt like they were supporting developers building something that was useful to us.
I still run my Plex server since it’s not really costing me not to, but I’ve been running Jellyfin too for a little while and it more or less can do the same job these days
In the case of plex, it’s not 100% selfhosted. There’s a dependence on plexs public infrastructure for user management/authentication. They also help bypass NAT by proxying connections through their servers so you don’t have to setup port forwarding and can even easily escape double NAT situations.
I can understand paying for that convenience, but cost keeps rising while previously free features continue to get locked behind paywalls.
Tbh, having users required to authenticate with plex.tv was enough for me to look elsewhere. The biggest reason to self host for me is to remove dependency on public services.
The central user management is not a feature, it’s a hook to force people to pay for self-hosted software.
Can’t say I disagree.
Lol “Your Friends at Plex”
get fucked, assholes, Jellyfin is better anyway
I fucking hate corporate speak.
Doesn’t jellyfin just not do this at all? Like if you want to stream remotely you need to figure out a vpn solution to do it?
You can stream remotely via jellyfin if you expose your server to the internet. VPN is safer but not the only option.
Yeah, no way. Jellyfins Backend is like an open barn door. And with the kind of content most of us here offer through either Jellyfin or Plex, I wouldn’t want to open up like that.
Anecdotal but I’ve run Jellyfin publicly without any issues for around 5 years. It even has its own domain name.
That’s correct
That is not correct. A VPN would be one method but you can also just expose the service to the internet in a number of ways and accomplish the same thing Plex provides.
You’re 100% correct. I always find it funny how hardcore some people are with jellyfin vs Plex. I’ll probably end up getting downvotes on this but imo Plex is way simpler to setup and keep running, and as a lifetime pass owner, I’ve very rarely felt like my experience has been deteriorated by any of the changes that the jellyfin crowd freaks out about. Plus plexamp is honestly such a great music player. I’ll happily keep running Plex for the foreseeable future.
Seems like it was only a matter of time.
20% more will jump to Jellyfin. The other 80% will entrench and talk even more about how great Plex is. I mean Jesus, $250 to watch pirated movies. lol wtf It’s also fucking wild to me that people are defending a monetization model that is on self hosted hardware. Like, I gotta pay for my server and then a license to avoid buying DVDs. Fuck it, at this point just buy the fucking movie.
Ya’ll are brain dead. Plex loves you tho.
Yup, read through this thread and it becomes clearer and clearer. and trust me, I’ve been a long time hold out, I’ve been through this many times - but this is the first time I’ve seen functionality removed from Plex to be put behind a paywall. And doing a price hike at the same time. Absolutely shitty. I’ve already migrated off.
You have a plex pass though, so nothing changed for you - you just got all angry because you didn’t read the email properly.
Your users are going to be much worse off now than they were, and you will absolutely lose a bunch of them who don’t want to (or can’t) have to connect to a VPN every time they want to stream from your library.
I dunno man, I don’t care much, when Plex gets shitty enough I’ll jump. But paying for the ongoing maintenance of software isn’t some evil thing, even if I self host it.
You’re not paying for software maintenance, you’re paying a subscription service to a private company that has already decided to cut back on features that others also thought they were paying to maintain.
If you want to actually pay for software maintenance, migrate to Jellyfin and pay them instead, rather than filtering your payments through middle managers and shareholders first.
It’s also fucking wild to me that people are defending a monetization model that is on self hosted hardware.
It’s wild to me that people who claim to be tech savvy don’t understand that Plex Server, the software, is what makes Plex what it is and as popular as it is. No other solution exists that is as easy as Plex and as secure as Plex. Jellyfin, Emby, Kodi, etc are nowhere near as simple to use and don’t have the breadth of app support that Plex does. Plex is basically on every device anyone owns. They sign in and they can stream from everyones libraries. No VPNs needed, no other hoops.
I paid like $100 for a lifetime Plex Pass like 10 years ago. The 2 dozen friends and family that share my server don’t pay a cent and this changes nothing.
Welcome to jellyfin!
Guess it’s time to start using jellyfin and contributing
JellyFin is fantastic software and I have no complaints.
yup same. First thing I install on a new device is jellyfin. For software that’s relatively young, it’s pretty awesome.
Oh no a paid, proprietary, piece of shit software does something shitty. Who could’ve ever saw this coming?!
I’ve said it for years anytime anyone mentioned running a Plex server. As soon as you install that on your server or your homelab it’s no longer your server. Proprietary software is malware
B-b-b-but my convenience!!!
not a plex user but someone buried the lede here… to me, this is the neon sign that screams GTFO:
we noticed that you’ve accessed libraries in the past
what business of yours is it to notice my private comings and goings?! what other actionable intel do y’all keep in your logs?! bye!
Trying to monetize the piracy of your users. That’s a bold business strategy.
Look, I know a lot of people could be using the sharing feature to share material that is in the public domain or that they own the copyright to, but let’s be honest: most of that sharing would be considered an “unlicensed public performance” by the MAFIAA.
They sold to private equity a couple years back. The enshittification started that day.
They took VC funding (which is also bad), selling to private equity is very different (they strip mine businesses).
Dropped this for jellyfin years ago
Jellyfin users have been warning about such things for a long time, but very few actually listened. Well, here we are, hope more people migrate now
YES JELLYFIN! Thank you Plex for enshitifying!
And how are you doing remote streaming from friends with Jellyfin?
My mom streams mine across an ocean.
My whole family streams from my brother’s server hundreds of km away…
Thank you for posting this. I thought it was just me.
In my case, one user actually lost access entirely to my libraries, the updated app was trying to force him to buy a personal pass, even though I have a Plex pass.
I had him reset his app and clear cache, to no avail. I ended up having to REMOVE his access to my libraries, and then reshare them to him, before he could access them again.
He was quite upset at Plex during the entire process.
Then the next day, he got this same email, and was frustrated all over again thinking he was gonna have to fight it again.
Really terrible customer service here, very sloppy. Aside from the fact that this is a greedy cash grab, it’s just being done poorly.
Jellyfin still isn’t feature packed enough for me to switch to, unfortunately.
“On 21 May 2008, XBMC developer Elan Feingold forked the source code of XBMC and started a new project called Plex”
GPL v2 source.
They’ve long been suspected of being greedy lil GPL violaters.
Wasn’t expecting to see that.
Another reason donating to FOSS is better than paying for proprietary software. Proprietary software devs get to run around stealing whatever code they like from the open-source community and never suffer any consequence because they don’t make their source available. I can think of a select few proprietary projects that have the balls to be source-available.
If you want to intentionally create a system that lets you evade accountability for stealing code, “fine”, but I have zero respect for you or your product, and I’m certainly not paying you a dime. I’ll put my money toward the developers who work to better the world instead of the rat fucks who steal from them to make money and pollute the software ecosystem with proprietary trash.
Friendship ended with plex, jellyfin is new best friend.
It was only a matter of time. Plex is a Series C startup, employs 100+ people, and has taken substantial VC investment. Those investors are expecting exponential returns, and a “one-time lifetime payment” will never sustain that sort of growth
