I find this argument to be pretty questionable. Plex’s entire existence exists in a sort of gray area unless you’re suggesting that people are only using it for their home movies. To single out plugins, thus, makes little sense.
1 Like
In Australia Plex (or Emby or Kodi) can only be legally used for home movies and transfers from analogue (e.g. vhs) to digital. Digital reformatting of copyrighted material* and DRM removal is illegal and so is the use of DVR if the intent is to keep it. I know of no legal source for non-DRM movies or TV.
Obviously Plex isn’t breaking any laws, but by Zorg’s logic they should probably stop offering their services in Australia.
And to be fair to Plex, I haven’t read anything from them saying website TOS was the reason they are ditching plugins.
*this makes transcoding of copyrighted material illegal, and also ripping CDs to mp3s illegal.
Incorrect - Plex offered entire list of “channels” in it’s own advertising and features list, advertising thier own ‘channel’ store.
They then also advertised the great ability to extend Plex using them, which became the ‘unsupported’ app store.
I’m also tired of the whole legality argument.
In America, many companies have gotten in trouble for rebroadcasting OTA transmissions in a different format than received, or to multiple stream from one antenna.
Aereo tried this and was sued into bankruptcy, even using an antenna for each subscriber.
Cable/Sat companies for years have payed millions, passing cost on to their customers, for the right to rebroadcast those transmissions. Though we have the (legal) right to DVR OTA, Plex transmits OTA live or DVR to other devices, including shared non-antenna owners, outside the local home, even transcoding to a different format.
That seems all kind of illegal in the US also.
Shouldn’t Plex take away the ability to stream TV and DVRed content to other devices/users?
If that’s not questionable enough, Plex still recommends using applications in it’s support articles that are illegal in ‘western’ DRM/copyright agreement countries. Shouldn’t that be fixed?
And if that’s not questionable enough, - Does Apple TOS allow it’s itunes library content to be played on/streamed to non-Apple devices/shared with non-store purchased users using itunes created XML files?
Isn’t that what the Itunes channel included with Plex by default allows for?
Shouldn’t that be removed?
Either stop using legality as the reason for removal of plugins, or stop offering most of Plex features and only allow for home videos with no external lookup service, and personal photography.
You know, kinda like what Youtube + Imgur/other photo sharing site does now.
4 Likes
It’s the constant wall that we run into: Technology advances and outpaces current law — always. It is a shame that the stalwarts stand in the way of innovation because there is a refusal to adapt. Adapt or perish and let the consumers decide what we want and how we want it.
Never gonna happen
Exactly. It’s a done deal.
In the famous words of Monty Python, “I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now.”
1 Like
Chiming in on this issue. I’m not some big shot plugin developer, but I wrote a stupidly simple plugin just for myself which that reads a JSON file and uses that for the metadata.
After this change, I’ll have an entire library of home movies where I can’t add any information about it at all. I used to be able to identify who’s in my home movies, when it was recorded, categorize it, and add it to collections. It was manual, sure. But it freaking worked.
Without the proper tools in the frontend to do all of that (specifically, add “Actors” and such) it’s going to be completely broken. Even so, editing a JSON file is way easier than clicking and editing each file one by one, clicking and clicking and clicking.
2 Likes
It is for functions like yours that many will miss plug-ins, and we can hope that the ‘replacement’ vaguely alluded to may come sooner than later.
Of course, most of us who like/use plug-in functionality are not holding our breath, individually, or collectively.
See, I don’t get you. You’re probably right, unfortunately, but that isn’t a reason for paying customers to not respond about what is a) a lousy decision and b) something that wouldn’t be tolerated in most business environments (charging a lifetime fee and pulling features is most definitely a bait and switch).
3 Likes
Sony - Other OS
Class action settlement.
Didn’t get Other OS back, but I should be getting $65
I’m not sure I’ve seen anyone from Plex itself elude to a Plug-In replacement option? I think that’s just been brewing in the rumor mill.
It kinda is. You see, I work, I attend college damn near full-time, and I have family and social obligations. IN all that I don’t know why I would join or support a community that’s not responsive to it’s members. I have too much to do to shout into a vacuum especially when there are alternatives in the same ballpark. I’d pay an extra 20 dollars a year for a product that’s still moving in a direction consistent with it’s founding mission and a community that appears to be a lot healthier than Plex’s, both in the sense of how Plex treats its community and how the community treats itself. I’m not salty about it, it just seems that’s the way of the world that people and companies lose sight of what made them great as they grow. I look at this as an opportunity to support a new player, give someone else a chance.
PS none of this is meant to be sarcastic or rude towards you, just sharing some thoughts and I welcome yours.
2 Likes
Connected to Plex tonight, the program forced a re-sign in, then automatically switched to the new ugly format WITHOUT PLUGINS I hate it! I use my plugins all the time. I don’t watch any of my stored content anymore. Especially Bittorent, Fmoviesplus, Channel Pear and G2G. Jesus Christ Plex you’ve got to be kidding me, those 4 plugins alone are the cream of the crop for live channels and 1000’s of free movies. And to think, I was days away from going Premium, then this crap hit the fan. BRING THE PLUGINS BACK!!!
BTW - Anyone know of a good alternative to the Plex Plugins that would be compatible with say, Roku?
+1 for continued plugin support. It’s now removed from the Roku client, meaning I am now looking for a replacement system despite being a lifetime PlexPass user and eager advocate for the platform. Support for plugins I use is a reason to stay with Plex. Without that, there are a lot of systems that do what Plex does just as well.
+1 only use Plex for Plugins, if no plug means no Plex for me.
2 Likes
+1 for keeping plug-in support.
plex has people contributing for countless users via 3rd party plug-in support and should be proud of that.
2 Likes
+1 for plug-ins, especially now that Roku has updated and I cannot use them anymore…ugh.
1 Like
Yes, it was a rude awakening to find the plugins gone after my Roku updated. I have checked out Emby and the plugin support is limited. At first I used plugins all the time but recently it has been CBC which has been great over the past year and USTV NOW which has no Roku support. So I guess I am back to torrents and EZTV.
To get PLEX to sit up and take notice we should start listing alternatives in this thread…Like Emby.
I have already priced an OTA antenna - $500, about 6 months worth of basic cable.
Hopefully PLEX will come out with something new and improved, I did enjoy network streaming libraries, it is much easier than OTA.
Emby has great plug-in support but in Emby land thus far plug-ins are used for mostly for features and meta-data or backend type things and not really for content like you mention (eg ABC, NBC, CBS).
$500 OTA antenna??? Is this thing built to work on the space station or something? 
Way to much money. No one can recommend an antenna without looking up your geo and the distance/power/direction of the antenna towers around your area. If you want help with this PM your zipcode to get a basic idea of what’s available.
You can also build your own antenna if you are somewhat handy with tools and can measure/cut correctly. Knowing what type(s) of antenna is needed is the key. I work 3 different markets with my antennas (NY, Phila, MD) just for sports so I can get additional football games.
Depending on your area and how you need to access OTA you might want to check out Locast. I use this free service to watch additional football games that aren’t in areas I can receive. Today for example I used it to watch the Patriots/Dolphins game while recording a bunch of other games via cable & OTA.
It is indeed a sad day to learn Plex Channel plugins have been eliminated from the Roku Plex player. As a “Lifetime” member I find the discontinuance of features we used and loved for many years both alarming and disappointing. It is a sad day for cord-cutters to see these decisions made and loyal Plex customers will undoubtedly be looking for alternatives. Please reconsider this decision.
