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Comment on Plex’s crackdown on free remote streaming access starts this week

remon@ani.social ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

Even if just 10% of that is active at any given moment, streaming at 10Mbps… that’s 25 MILLION megabits per sec.

Streaming traffic doesn’t usually go through Plex’s server, though. That only happens with “indirect streams”, which usually means something is wrong with your connection and they are capped at like 2 mbps.

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fonix232@fedia.io ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Streaming traffic has to go through the Plex proxies if your server isn't exposed to the internet (meaning proper port forwarding, no CG-NAT and no other ISP fuckery that would prevent such functionality).

Of the 25 million users of Plex, how many do you think have the setup (either the ability or availability) that supports direct playback remotely?

Ideally yes, only basic things like authentication and server mapping should go through the main Plex servers but sadly this isn't the case. And Plex has provided that service for years, for free. Them asking money for a service that isn't free to run, is fair game.

What isn't fair is how they've been doing it.

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- remon@ani.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  
  Of the 25 million users of Plex, how many do you think have the setup (either the ability or availability) that supports direct playback remotely?
  
  I think of those that use remote streaming at all, the vast majority. All it takes is to forward one port in the router.
  
  Of the 8 plex servers I have access to, all have direct streaming. And mine as well, of course.
  
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  - ITGuyLevi@programming.dev ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Yeah, been a lifetime Plex pass holder for a long time, it was fun but it still doesn’t support OAuth and now they are forcing ads before local TV streams now. I realize the latter is probably more on the Roku side of the house as my shield hasn’t started doing that yet.
    
    Really live TV is the last thing holding me onto Plex, well that and I really do love Plexamp and the sonic analysis bit Plex can do. Plex’s days are sadly numbered for this selfhoster.
    
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    remon@ani.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    What do you need OAuth for? Also I never really used the live TV thing, I pretty much exclusively stream from my or other people’s libraries.
    
    As long as they don’t mess with the lifetime pass and start charging me or my friends for accessing my library, I really have no quarrels with Plex.
    
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