[knodi123]

This is technically true, but not helpful. These online services have buttons that say "rent" and "buy", they don't say "rent for a little while" and "rent for a longer but unknown amount of time". Of course they can go out of business, but the impression they intentionally give to the customer is that if you click "buy", you get access to the movie for as long as the site exists.

[zarzavat]

If you're the ethical type you can "buy" it on one of these services and then pirate it in order to keep it in perpetuity. If you're the less ethical type you can skip the "buying" step.

[like_any_other]

Is it really ethical to keep giving them money? Eventually you have to face the fact that you're feeding a monster that lobbies for anti-consumer laws and makes anti-consumer technology. They're actively working to make our world worse. Helping them in that endeavor is not ethical.

[microgpt]

Why is it ethical to give $29.98 to a forcefully inserted middleman and $0.01 to a creator? If you're ethical, pirate and then donate.

[port11]

Okay, but who do you donate to in the case of a movie or show? Because for authors and musicians I agree with your take. I wish more musicians were on Bandcamp, and more authors sold e-books directly from their website.

[tmtvl]

Even with musicians it can be tricky. Imagine an album with various classical pieces performed by different orchestras. Not only are there the conductors and the musicians of the orchestras, but the album also wouldn't have existed without the sound engineers and recording crews and the composers...

Even authors are dependent on their editors, so the idea of 'giving money to the people who create the things we like' is more complex than it may seem at first glance.

[anonymars]

Yeah, but do all those people get residuals? When you buy a real copy, who gets money from that?

[port11]

Not sure about music, but I’ve dated an author and her contract was for 10% royalties, and she had to arrange any payments to other rights-holders (e.g. photographer) but not the editor.

[wolvoleo]

Well, if I had been the ethical type (I'm not), having my paid content deleted would convert me into a non-ethical type really really quickly. Just saying.

I don't care if some lawyer suit says it's ok because I really bought a license and not the content. Screw that. I bought a movie. If that's allowed by the law, the law deserves no respect.