Before I streamed music I'd just download it from YouTube at the low cost of free.
this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2026
219 points (98.7% liked)
Frugal
6009 readers
7 users here now
Discuss how to save money.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
People still pay for this shit?
Jesus dude, buy an android TV and use Cloudstream or Stremio and the cost will just be the device itself. If you have decent internet but your ISP blocks that kind of streaming traffic, use DNS over HTTPS
🏴☠️🦜
Bandcamp is still the GOAT and Tidal as actually lower their price last year.
Wait until they implement Surge Pricing. If it's a busy time, it costs more, if it's a popular song, it costs more. If it's both, go watch TV, you can't afford music.
Qbittorrent and a VPN, I've been using Proton VPN and it's been good.
Save up for a 2 bay NAS and a couple hard drives once you cancel your subs, if you want to keep any content that is.
Plex is still a solid choice, but there's probably other self host media options now.
Jellyfin is generally what people are using now instead of Plex, including myself.
load more comments
(2 replies)
Cancel and setup a nas.
Truenas, openmediavault, unraid, yunohost. There are many option out there.
Many would gladly help you if needed. :)
I'd say piracy ... but it's definitely no cheaper the way I do it (at least not short term).
But if you have some spare storage and don't need a huge amount of content, that's a good option.
What are you spending the money on? Physical sever devices? Electricity?
Hard drives. That shit's gotten expensive lately. But keeping your own media is worth it. Also, paying for the annual VPN subscription.
NTA but I spend about $30/month on various self-hosting-specific services: Usenet subscription, VPN, Plex Pass, a few little recurring donations to OSSes that I use, etc.
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(13 replies)
I see a ton of people talking about setting up a nas and running Plex or Jellyfin, and i do prefer to store my own media but I've gotten so many more people to switch over since suggesting stremio.
People can take their current firestick or android tv, delete Netflix and Hulu and get stremio set up in 10 minutes. Pay $3/m for torbox and you get a pretty seamless streaming service.
The last time Spotify put up their prices, I told myself that I would cancel if they did it once more. If they do they would rise beyond the maximum budget I allocated to them, so to speak.
It's not that these use a lot of gasoline explicitly, but their shareholders need to to drive too.
Maybe the shareholders should get a job. Or cancel their streaming subscriptions.
load more comments
(1 replies)
🏴☠️ good ol' piracy will never let you down. 🏴☠️
Jellyfin on an old computer that you happen to have lying around is free.
You can get videos to watch by going to your library and checking them out and using MakeMKV to rip them to digital format and saving them to the Jellyfin server.
Alternatively, many thrift stores and pawn shops sell DVDs usually for a buck or two.
Get an Android device go on the Play store download a torrent search engine and then look for something you want to download it will prompt you to download another app that will then download that torrent and then you watch it
Or look for download forums. There used to be one called Bolt that was incredible. They had EVERYTHING.
There are still a few out there.
We use deezer and basic netflix since a month and I don't know how but we never had a single ad (using firefox with ublock on linux mint)
Edit: works as well with tv websites.
And public library is the best
I have to admit my biggest grievance with Netflix at the moment is their anti-sharing technology. It bad enough that they no longer consider my kids at college as my family but when I use “Hide my Location”, then neither am I
Why subscribe? Subs like this perpetuate a worse future. Go cold turkey for two years and re-evaluate then.