GOODBYE PLEX, hop on the train to leaving plex in the dust

[cayars]

@Xhaka

@bblboy54

I looked into Emby but there are certainly some concerns that Emby is starting to build some things into the software that will ultimately push the project in the exact same place that Plex is now.

Out of curiosity could you give examples?

How is closing off certain parts of the code like the premium parts going in the same direction? If people weren’t stealing these functions (guys behind Jellyfin) then this probably wouldn’t have happened, nor would you need to purchase some of the apps without a premiere license. “Freeloaders” ruined this for those who like source, not Emby itself. JellyFin is basically Emby 3.5 using Mono if I remember correctly.

V4 (3.6+) is rewritten using NET with many database optimizations and new code optimizations that is no longer open source. What was released as open source will always be open.

The issues were cleared out because they were for OLD code and not the new base code, simple as that. The issues that were in the github are still in the forums so there should not be any conspiracy theories.

But if you follow things you’ll see the team is working to move the proprietary parts into sections that can stay private while the base can be open. Once this is done you’ll likely see Emby re-release the open parts of v4 making JellyFin largely irrelevant again.

[bblboy54]

@Xhaka

Fair enough.
Personally I have no interest in open or closed source. As long as it works or at least if something stops working the issue is actually acknowledged and fixed then I’m all good.

It’s more the attitude that was displayed rather than the actual changing of the source license. It was a complete disregard for the feelings of multiple paying users.

@cayars

If people weren’t stealing these functions (guys behind Jellyfin) then this probably wouldn’t have happened, nor would you need to purchase some of the apps without a premiere license. “Freeloaders” ruined this for those who like source, not Emby itself. JellyFin is basically Emby 3.5 using Mono if I remember correctly.

Stealing? You really need to look at the legal aspects of what you are talking about. The licensing is DESIGNED with forks in mind… and people who helped develop Emby did so with that intent as well – not with the intent of a company being informed. If anyone is “stealing” here it is Emby who is taking open source code and using it for their for-profit business.

[per_PLEX_ed]

I read the Emby forums fairly actively and aside from a very few disgruntled users, there was hardly any noise at all about their decision to close off some of their code. Interestingly, none of those “multiple” (we’re talking a handful indeed) irate people were ever actively involved in the Emby development. If you ask me, was all a tempest in a teapot.

For the record I have no problem with either Plex or Emby being closed source, as long as they are the media application I am looking for. These days Emby delivers in that regard and Plex… less so… sadly.

As for Jellyfin, it’s early days what they will do with the Emby fork. They are a long ways off being true competition to either Emby or Plex, but if they keep working at it as hard as they are doing now, they may some day be a worthy solution in its own right.

[Xhaka]

@bblboy54

Stealing? You really need to look at the legal aspects of what you are talking about.

I may be wrong on this but I thought way back, I saw something about a hack someone created that pretty much granted anyone Emby Premiere features. (Or something similar)
If that’s the case, then yes stealing.
I was still using Plex mainly at the time so didn’t really pay to much attention.

[er0sion]

I feel you. They ruined an almost perfect user experience. I HATE the new roku client app. It’s horrid, slow, terrible UI, and confusing.

[cayars]

@Xhaka

@bblboy54

Stealing? You really need to look at the legal aspects of what you are talking about.

I may be wrong on this but I thought way back, I saw something about a hack someone created that pretty much granted anyone Emby Premiere features. (Or something similar)
If that’s the case, then yes stealing.
I was still using Plex mainly at the time so didn’t really pay to much attention.

Exactly, that’s one example. There were other instances of people taking/using the code in other works without permission of the license as well.

But I believe one of the main reasons was for future expand ability. There was no way for example they could incorporate Gracenote EPG data in an open source manner. That would just be crazy to do as GN charges for this. You certainly wouldn’t want to pay for other software using your code! I doubt anyone would argue with that point.

I’m probably one of the handful of people who did speak up about this. I’m not fond of changing status like they did but understand why. However I had thought and recommended they close off portions of the code base that are premeire functions while allowing the rest to stay open source. I believe this is still something they are striving to do as they continue to move those parts of the code. Takes time to do properly. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the base source released for V4 at some point but likely under a different method.

The biggest draw back I currently see for Jellyfin is that it’s based on old Emby code and the fact they have no clients of their own. If you have to rely on using Emby clients then it’s not really a standalone solution per say.

That to me makes thing worse or possibly worse because it allows Emby to charge for these clients separately. Want a mobile client that works with Jellyfin? That will be $5 each please! LOL

[swanlee]

I wish for the Love of God Plex could fix the issues it has with the Xbox. Buffering, Buffering, Buffering. Random buffering it dirves me crazy and the pattern makes no sense.

I can play 4k 50 mbps files fine but a 10mbps 4k HDR file buffers at exactly 3 mins, a 1080p DTS file at 6 mbps buffers every 15 mins but much higher bandwidth 1080p files play fine.

No matter how many threads I make on this Plex devs barely respond and the issues has been going on a year with a lot of other people having the same problem.

[bblboy54]

@Xhaka

I may be wrong on this but I thought way back, I saw something about a hack someone created that pretty much granted anyone Emby Premiere features. (Or something similar)
If that’s the case, then yes stealing.
I was still using Plex mainly at the time so didn’t really pay to much attention.

That’s a different scenario. That might be classified differently, I don’t really know. The post I was replying to was accusing Jellyfin of stealing which certainly isn’t the case.

@cayars

Exactly, that’s one example. There were other instances of people taking/using the code in other works without permission of the license as well.

You outright accused Jellyfin of stealing in your post. I don’t know about the other scenarios so I’m not going to comment on those but I was talking about a completely legal fork of which Jellyfin is and you called that stealing which is absolutely is not.

@per_PLEX_ed

For the record I have no problem with either Plex or Emby being closed source, as long as they are the media application I am looking for. These days Emby delivers in that regard and Plex… less so… sadly.

I think there are a lot of people that would prefer it to stay open source but the majority of people (myself included) will except an open or closed source solution provided they have clear privacy practices and provided a system that functions.

@per_PLEX_ed

I read the Emby forums fairly actively and aside from a very few disgruntled users, there was hardly any noise at all about their decision to close off some of their code. Interestingly, none of those “multiple” (we’re talking a handful indeed) irate people were ever actively involved in the Emby development. If you ask me, was all a tempest in a teapot.

To be fair, a handful of people is multiple – but your point is valid. What concerns me about Emby is the attitude that was displayed in that github issue and, worse yet, the fact that they completely deleted it. When someone voices an opinion and the response is to attack and get defensive and then ultimately silence and remove from the record that someone had a disagreement that doesn’t sit well with me.

@per_PLEX_ed

As for Jellyfin, it’s early days what they will do with the Emby fork. They are a long ways off being true competition to either Emby or Plex, but if they keep working at it as hard as they are doing now, they may some day be a worthy solution in its own right.

I never did say Jellyfin was ready… but my hope is that it will be – and they do seem to have a lot of support so it’s possible.

[cayars]

@bblboy54

@cayars

Exactly, that’s one example. There were other instances of people taking/using the code in other works without permission of the license as well.

You outright accused Jellyfin of stealing in your post. I don’t know about the other scenarios so I’m not going to comment on those but I was talking about a completely legal fork of which Jellyfin is and you called that stealing which is absolutely is not.

One of the guys behind JellyFin bypassed Premiere checking to allow the use of all functionality. He made it possible to allow the use of unauthorized features. That is theft, clear and simple. Theft is the taking of someone’s property without the consent of the owner and with the intention of depriving the owner of it. That is what happened. Sorry I don’t write the law, just practice it.

@per_PLEX_ed

I read the Emby forums fairly actively and aside from a very few disgruntled users, there was hardly any noise at all about their decision to close off some of their code. Interestingly, none of those “multiple” (we’re talking a handful indeed) irate people were ever actively involved in the Emby development. If you ask me, was all a tempest in a teapot.

To be fair, a handful of people is multiple – but your point is valid. What concerns me about Emby is the attitude that was displayed in that github issue and, worse yet, the fact that they completely deleted it. When someone voices an opinion and the response is to attack and get defensive and then ultimately silence and remove from the record that someone had a disagreement that doesn’t sit well with me.

That’s your prerogative to have your own opinion. While I’d prefer open source myself I certainly understood the situation that was taking place and understood that they wanted to protect their intellectual property. When people start taking advantage of you then I usually feel it’s worth taking actions to protect one’s self (personal or business).

It’s their software, their forums, their github repository. They can do what they want with them moving forward at any time. What you’re talking about is no different then closing/hiding posts or threads here and it happens all the time.

If it were me, I would have removed it right away as I didn’t think it belonged in Github as it wasn’t a software issue. There was also a parallel thread in the forums that is still there and believe that is where the conversation should have taken place in it’s entirety IMHO.

@per_PLEX_ed

As for Jellyfin, it’s early days what they will do with the Emby fork. They are a long ways off being true competition to either Emby or Plex, but if they keep working at it as hard as they are doing now, they may some day be a worthy solution in its own right.

I never did say Jellyfin was ready… but my hope is that it will be – and they do seem to have a lot of support so it’s possible.

I have no hard feelings on this matter at all. I actually wish them luck. They have a really decent server with well written code to start with. What they really need is open source clients (and if they continue to work with Emby V4 all the better) so they don’t have to rely on using the Emby clients. This of course is a lot of work.

[rbf072858]

It’s been a week of nasty surprises from Plex.

Support has advised me that in spite of having been a LIfetime Plex Pass customer for several years, I am now frozen at 1.14 unless I jump through major hoops to upgrade my system. That one sound like bait and switch to me.

My internet connection went out for a while last week. No problem, my media is local here at home, my clients are local, I’ll watch some of my movies… No I won’t. If the Plex Media Server can’t communicate with Plex.TV, mothership no media for you!

No glibc update…

No SYSTEMD dependency

No “have to talk to the mothership”

No bad network decision that are out of my hands (if I own a block of public addresses and want to share across them, it should be permitted. Yes, I read that thread AND the responses from staff. Not cool. And yes, I DO have a fixed IP address block)… BTW, for the record, I do enterprise network support to pay my bills, and have for over 30 years, so I know EXACTLY of what I speak in this regard… The responses from staff/engineering on THAT issue were dead wrong.

Kodi, as much a pain as that is, is starting to look a WHOLE lot better. So far, I’ve not found anything that I need/want that it can’t do, up to and including the same level of support of my HD Homerun tuners that Plex has (poor, but that’s an HD Homerun thing).

Botton line here is that people that I was advocating Plex to, have now been advised to give it a pass. Several have already uninstalled. I’m sure there will be more.

The product isn’t "I’m scratching MY itch, do it your self if you don’t like the way I do it ". Alienating people who’ve paid for something isn’t smart in the long run.

Had the product been like this in 2016 when I signed up, there is no way I’d have given Plex a nickle let alone $149.00

[marcelhehle]

@rbf072858

My internet connection went out for a while last week. No problem, my media is local here at home, my clients are local, I’ll watch some of my movies… No I won’t. If the Plex Media Server can’t communicate with Plex.TV, mothership no media for you!

Ye, Plex did a REALLY clever design decision there! One can only guess how many people have been driven to Emby by this …

[Xhaka]

It was one of the major reasons I finally made the full time switch. The other major reason being the god awful clients. They really do go from strength to strength at totally sucking.

Who knew that after all the money I have spent on devices for Plex (Shield, Apple TV 4K) and various 3rd party apps for those devices to try and find a flawless client, It was built into my LG TV with Emby.

I can live without Atmos. I must be old enough to not really hear the difference between Dolby/DTS 7.1 and Atmos.
Basically I now have an extremely fast client, running on an extremely fast server and no need to worry about the future of trakt in Plex land.

[PristDean]

Well. months down the line after dumping Plex for Emby, I am still more than happy with the decision. I still have Plex installed on my Shield, noticed that nothing has been done to improve the Live TV / EPG aspect. It remains a terrible offering not worthy of Beta in my opinion, so many awful flaws.
Emby on the other hand is slick and easy to use, does the job very well. Not without it’s flaws of course, but none as tiresome as Plex’s flaws.

Long and short… Plex seems to have lost focus on what their customers want and are driven to money making streams such as Tidal… in which I have absolutely no interest. Emby on the hand seems to be focused on an overall decent product for its customers.