The discussion on the street has been, for months, whether it is worth it, it would return to the piracy that did so much damage to the cultural sector in the mid-2000s. The blame? Largely Netflix, but also the fragmentation of the audiovisual world via streaming.

A decade ago, a lot of content from series and movies that we consumed in Spain was legal. That is to say: unloaded. Although here to decide what is legal and what is not there are sentences and judges who have expressed their opinion on the matter, the reality is that millions of people downloaded daily via Torrent.

Whether through Emule, uTorrent or BitTorrent, users searched the internet for the corresponding link and fearlessly downloaded the movie or series of the day. So many of us were young and did not know the effect on the industry that this simple gesture had.

In the last decade, Things have changed thanks to the fact that the cultural sector has understood that affordable and good quality services equals millions of users and a lot of money. We all come out winning. Spotify and Netflix They were an example of this. So what has happened?

A fragmented offer and dozens of services

One good day Netflix stopped growing and stagnated at 200 million users. The wheel stopped and they saw that their policy had to change if they wanted to make more money and improve their financial numbers. Investors demanded it.

This slowdown in growth is explained when you look around and discover that where you were alone before, you now have dozens of platforms competing against you. HBO Max, Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV+. SkyShowtime, Filmin and we could go on all afternoon.

Netflix, the largest service by volume of content and number of customers, decides to change its ancestral policy and is dedicated to progressively raising prices for 7 years in a row and eliminates the option of sharing accounts.

At that time, a few weeks ago, the population seemed to wake up from a long coma: am I paying more than 500 euros a year to be able to watch the series and movies I like? The answer was yes, but since before you shared the accounts with friends and family, the final amount was less, hence it hurt less.

With Netflix’s decision, a sacred platform for millions of people (including myself) the discourse in favor of the services and streaming seemed to return to a bygone era where many people pirated. And it is that today there are four compared to the millions of 2010.

The solution is not Emule in 2023

Let’s be honest: never before have we created so much content and of such quality as today. And the reason is the legal platforms that offer series, movies, music and books. Money makes it possible for people to dedicate themselves body and soul to their passion. Without money only the lucky ones can.

In 2023 we have to accept that we cannot have all the contracted services. If the 2000s were the years of piracy. The 2010s, the time of platforms and services. The 20s should be the decade of conscience: pay only for those that you use.

The intelligent and collaborative client must understand that they cannot have contracted all the options offered by the market because it is too expensive (so we also punish those services that have unfair policies and excessively high prices, as has happened with Netflix in 2023).

The best thing we can do as lovers of culture is to pay for those works that we are going to consume. That is, do we want to see The Last of Us but not pay for a year of HBO Max? Great, we wait for the full series to be released and that month we pay for the subscription to HBO Max. In this way, for 6.99 euros we can see that series that we were so excited about.

And by the way we see each other that month all the movies and series that we had pending. This example is valid for when the third season of The Witcher is released on Netflix, they publish the latest Marvel movie on Disney+ or Apple TV+ launches that new adventure called “Tetris, the movie”.

go through it Emulate or the uTorrent It can be understood and there will be times when they are the only way to get certain content (discontinued movies and series, for example). But it cannot be the answer to an abusive policy like Netflix’s.

With those 17.99 euros that you are not going to spend more on the American platform You can contract up to three services at the same time (HBO Max, Filmin and Disney+) and enjoy new movies and series that you haven’t seen before, for example. Or give SkyShowtime a try which now comes out with unpublished content in Spain for only 2.99 euros per month.

Alternatives to piracy there are many if you want to search. And, best of all, for very little money. So low that surely many of you can invest 4 or 5 euros that the current streaming platform costs per month and thus support culture. Emule is not the solution to Netflix.