Data doesn’t get shared between people because they are sharing your server as ‘friends’. They need to be friends with each other or allow access by friends of friends. That’s a user level choice so it’s not surprising there’s no override at server level.
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is this the case? my understanding was the only people that see who is watching what are people you are friends with. So my friends, are by default all my “users” but my users aren’t friends with each other unless they have explicitly done so. Is this not the case?
for example, as the server admin, unless a user opted out of the sharing information it will show in my weekly email. However, my friend A will only see me and him, and my friend B will only see me and him, but Friend A won’t see Friend B.
Regarding the controls, while I wholeheartedly agree Plex would be 10000% easier to help users with if server admins had ultimate control, that too is a privacy control/overstep as well so I understand why they are hesitant to implement server side controls for an end user. As much as I would love to be able to shut off XYZ feature from my end for specific users, I get why Plex as a company wouldn’t allow that.
There are no server settings that I’m aware of, or any other other privacy related settings you can enable, disable or change on a client device like a Roku, Android TV, HTPC ect…
There’s very good reasons for that
They know that these types of devices are in households that sometimes have many people accessing them in community rooms in the house. That includes children that may not even be able to read, or elderly adults with vision problems
You can’t enable media deletion from a client because it would be a terrible idea right?
Well, so was this. They made it as easy as they could for people to mistakenly enable this
Then they hired the guy who buried Jimmy Hoffa to hide these settings all over the place so nobody could find this s**t and disable it
Had this been handled properly there wouldn’t be a need to respond to any news articles
Because there wouldn’t be any
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I like this quote. Accurately described what happened. Intentionally hid multiple privacy settings, buried in many different places.
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This will depend on their privacy settings, on the defaults you are correct, but if they set Friends of Friends on some of the settings then A and B would be able to see each others watch history. That is if the server owner hasn’t gone in and removed all their Friends and left them only as users, which is something that can be done to prevent this.
However allowing the server admins to set a maximum privacy setting for users of the server for contents of the server would be good. Not sure how easy that would be to implement but, who knows?
If they have change the setting to that, can we not pretty safely assume that’s a choice they’ve made and that they’re happy to share that data. If they weren’t then given the 3 possible options it seems an odd one to pick.
Well seeing as Plex aren’t supposed to know where you watched an item that’s been marked as ‘watched’ or the contents of servers then I’d guess it wouldn’t be at all easy to implement.
That would depend on where the update of watched is being send from, if it is being sent from the server then it would be as simple as blocking the server from sending that update type. However if it is the player client that is sending the update then we are out of luck.
Doing something like that would make the feature as a whole useless, because
Regular user accounts can have access to several servers, from different owners. Imagine each server having a different policy with your proposed setting. The result would be an inscrutable melange of interdependent server and user settings. Regular users would simply complain that it doesn’t work.
Remember, it cannot be deduced that a certain media title is on your server, even if the user in question has only access to your server.
He could as easily have just marked the title as “watched”, because he watched it on a streaming service or even in the cinema.
It is therefore not critical if a user simply says “I have watched [title X] at [date]”.
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I suppose that I just don’t want to be the one supplying the anti-privacy gun to shoot themselves with. If they want to shoot and destroy their own privacy on someone else’s server/streaming service/etc then that is their own decision.
I feel you’re still missing the key point. The watch status change doesn’t indicate where or how the item was watched. There’s nothing that says user A watched item X on server Z, as opposed to marking it watched on a watchlist, or watching it on Plex’s offering. All that’s known is User A says they watched item X. The only ‘privacy’ related information is all about User A.
No the key point is the invasion of privacy in general that this ‘feature’ is. I’m just trying to limit the data going into it, plugging the leaks as best I can.
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If a user is sending watch status updates about items they’ve watched on plex servers (i.e. their own or ones they have shared from others) then they’ve chosen to turn on ‘Sync watch status’. That’s not a ‘leak’ which needs plugging by server admins, it’s a conscious choice that was made. And one that can be rescinded by the user in question.
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I’m sure Plex has the numbers/percentages of how many users watched a title on a streaming service/cinema vs. on a Plex server - and I’m sure that number is really small.
Especially since the vast majority of the Plex users are streaming from a Plex server.
How are you sure of that?
Oh quit being a shill for Plex FFS!
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Me asking you to prove (or just support) your claim that Plex definitely knows something isn’t shilling.
However, I’ll just take your response as confirmation that you’re not in fact sure Plex has that data. Would’ve been simpler if you’d just said that tho.
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They might not have the numbers of which actual titles were watched on what service (Plex server vs streaming service vs “watched in the theater”), but I’m sure they know numbers/percentages generically.
(And the whole comment Plex staff has made about “they might have watched in the theater and marked it as watched because of that” is pretty ridiculous. Honestly how many people are going to go out of their way to do that?)
The problem is Plex’s privacy policy is vague enough that they don’t clearly explain exactly what they collect - would be better if it was much more detailed.
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Again, how are you sure of this? What data do you think they collect that would give them any idea of what those numbers are (generically or otherwise)?
However, they do clearly explain they don’t collect details of what is stored on people’s servers.
They might have some assumptions about that number, probably the same as yours.
But that doesn’t matter.
They don’t store that information anywhere. And what is not stored cannot be handed over to a court, even if lawfully compelled to do so.
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Anyone that uses Trakt but would prefer to use the new Plex Discover feature, that is who. I never would have done this in the past as I didn’t use Trakt but I was always intrigued by Trakt. I didn’t use it because I didn’t want to deal with syncing it with Plex as it was hacky at best. Since Discover launched (I did the beta) I actually started doing this. I even went back and rated all my watched movies as well. My “users” are friends and family (as it should be since well, otherwise you may as well be selling your server access which is against the TOS) and we like to talk about movies and shows we have watched, this just does it for you in a nice UI. My friends and family report issues within movies on my server etc etc. I also use Plex Meta Manager and Tautulli, but I would much rather only have to use one product to do all and Discover is a step towards that. I don’t disagree the role out was poor at best, but the feature is probably more liked than you think it is. If it wasn’t, there would be thousands upon thousands of new people in the forums complaining about it. I have been a Plex user since 2010/11 ish, maybe earlier before my Plex Pass.
They have released numerous features in good (Plexamp), bad (games, download/sync) and indifferent (tidal to me) ways. They have released many features I love and don’t but the product is driven for the whole not just me and as long as they keep giving me ways to disable stuff I don’t use I am fine with it (tidal for example). Losing plugins was the thing that got me years ago and I still hope one day it comes back although I doubt it will. I understand why it was removed, it didn’t flow at all with the product, but I wish they had revamped it. Is what it is on that one. Same with Cloud Photos. The server has been rock solid for 7+ years though for me and all my users rarely have issues either for 5+ years. The onboarding process could be better but it is by FAR the best available. I think some of the UI hiccups for customizations are actually caused by trying to make the UI slick. For example, hiding pin buttons off unless you scroll left. Looks better, but tough to tell grandma how to do it, etc. etc.
I do think the settings needs to revamped across the board ASAP with a more straightforward approach. Like things need to be combined and easily found.
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