Illegal Streaming Business Model
January 25, 2018 6:27 AM Subscribe
How do illegal streaming sites make money? I know that the end websites have tons of creepy and malicious ads, but most of them don't host their own content and stream the videos from other areas. I know bandwidth is cheap, but full movie streaming is a ton of bandwidth. What is the catch that I am missing?
If you buy bandwidth in bulk, it costs pennies to stream a movie. I don't know what the current number is, but 10 years ago it was like $.20 to stream two gigabytes, so it's certainly way less than that now.
posted by wnissen at 7:22 AM on January 25, 2018
posted by wnissen at 7:22 AM on January 25, 2018
most are just linking to other sites that actually host the videos (eg like putlocker, if that's still around) while also including their own advertising. the video host eats up the cost, the site is just the interface
as far as video hosting sites making money, I have no idea and I imagine that's pretty much the entire reason why those don't last for more than a year most of the time
posted by runt at 7:38 AM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
as far as video hosting sites making money, I have no idea and I imagine that's pretty much the entire reason why those don't last for more than a year most of the time
posted by runt at 7:38 AM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
My guess is that for a legit streamer like Netflix, bandwidth is a secondary expense compared to the costly licensing fees for the actual content -- hence the drive among all streaming services to develop their own original content. An illegal service that pays basically nothing for its content has an advantage in that sense, albeit with a much greater risk of getting squashed like a bug by rights holders.
Without seeing the actual numbers, it's hard to say how much money is involved here; My sense is that the increased availability of legal streaming options has led at least a sizable minority of the people (like myself) who gladly pirated Game of Thrones and Doctor Who to pony up a few bucks to go legit.
posted by Strange Interlude at 8:07 AM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
Without seeing the actual numbers, it's hard to say how much money is involved here; My sense is that the increased availability of legal streaming options has led at least a sizable minority of the people (like myself) who gladly pirated Game of Thrones and Doctor Who to pony up a few bucks to go legit.
posted by Strange Interlude at 8:07 AM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
- Bandwidth is cheaper than you think
- Income from malware installed and recently extended into mining.
- in the past, they had used services like twitch/justin.tv, and youtube (Before their owners clamped down on copyright). Back when mp3 blogs were in their heyday, services like megaupload, rapidshare had a freemium models so content was uploaded onto there and either subsidized by VC $ or by customers paying to use megaupload, rapidshare.
- Donations from users. I don't have any proof but my hunch is that this a higher source of revenue than you'd think. Some of these subscribers/users are outside of Western Europe and North America, so legal access to a particular show/event is not even available for people or paying for the illicit streaming service is remarkably less than what they'd have to legally pay.
- They use their users' bandwidth, a la bittorrent.
This extends even into pro sports as well. Even as a North American, I had considered seeking these options when I'd want to watch a live game because I, as someone who doesn't have cable tv, were to directly pay the NBA to watch live basketball games online, a non-insignificant amount of them would be blacked out (unavailable) to me because of TV contracts with ESPN, TNT, or your local cable provider.
- They likely make very little money. I'd be shocked that operators were making a living on it.
posted by fizzix at 1:08 PM on January 26, 2018
- Income from malware installed and recently extended into mining.
- in the past, they had used services like twitch/justin.tv, and youtube (Before their owners clamped down on copyright). Back when mp3 blogs were in their heyday, services like megaupload, rapidshare had a freemium models so content was uploaded onto there and either subsidized by VC $ or by customers paying to use megaupload, rapidshare.
- Donations from users. I don't have any proof but my hunch is that this a higher source of revenue than you'd think. Some of these subscribers/users are outside of Western Europe and North America, so legal access to a particular show/event is not even available for people or paying for the illicit streaming service is remarkably less than what they'd have to legally pay.
- They use their users' bandwidth, a la bittorrent.
This extends even into pro sports as well. Even as a North American, I had considered seeking these options when I'd want to watch a live game because I, as someone who doesn't have cable tv, were to directly pay the NBA to watch live basketball games online, a non-insignificant amount of them would be blacked out (unavailable) to me because of TV contracts with ESPN, TNT, or your local cable provider.
- They likely make very little money. I'd be shocked that operators were making a living on it.
posted by fizzix at 1:08 PM on January 26, 2018
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by NormieP at 6:40 AM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]