Great opportunity for Emby to really shine and grow

[sross44 233]

If anyone has been keeping up with Plex, they’ll know that there are a lot of disgruntled users out there. Between the banning of Hetzner servers, to cancelling a lot of people’s accounts (some for just cause, others for not), a lot of users are looking for alternatives. It seems a lot of people are recommending Jellyfin over Emby unfortunately and I’d like to see Emby really capitalize on this.  What a great time to really hammer things out, continue to make Emby the kick ass option that a lot of us know it is and really start to take some market share. 

I’m really hopeful that the next stable release flushes some things out, makes it even better and we see a lot of Plex users start to gravitate towards Emby as an option. Hopefully the staff has the bandwidth to really take advantage of this opportunity and get the Emby brand out there! 

Just your average users thoughts on a situation where I hope you guys can really shine! 

[Luke 37067]

Hi, please create feature requests for the things you'd like to see and we'll take a look at them. Thanks !

[Gilgamesh_48 943]

There is a basic problem with streaming issues that puts any "system" that allows remote streaming like Emby, Plex or Jellyfin in that they exist in a legal grey area because so many people have libraries they acquired from questionable sources where they do not own the content. That makes remote streaming of that content "piracy" under some definitions.
Plex has chosen, because of the number of people streaming such content and the number that violate Plex's TOS to try and block the domain they feel houses the worst violators. It is also possible that Plex has been clobbered with take down notices that cannot be shared outside the company and this whole action is designed to keep this out of the courts. It is possible that Plex has calculated that the customers they lose will not cost as much as court fees and judgements and, the biggest expense, lawyers.
Actually that is one of the very few things that Plex has done that I agree with.

Another problem is that Plex considers Emby to be a competitor but they do not, at least yet, think Jellyfin is much of an adversary. That means that much mention of Emby on Plex's boards gets you a ban pretty easily but you can, at least for now, mention Jellyfin as much as you want.

Actually I hope that both Emby and jellyfin have strong solid methods in place to prevent the crooks that are the driving force behind the action taken from ever even becoming customers.

Plex behaves like a VERY stupid company much of the time and I think they could have prevented this by strong enforcement of their TOS.

I hope this benefits Emby but Emby need to exercise great care that the do not attract too many of the bad actors from the Plex movement.

[arrbee99 1560]

There's plenty of feature requests for everything, maybe implementing them would be a good idea. I can certainly think of one...

[sross44 233]

12 minutes ago, Gilgamesh_48 said:

There is a basic problem with streaming issues that puts any "system" that allows remote streaming like Emby, Plex or Jellyfin in that they exist in a legal grey area because so many people have libraries they acquired from questionable sources where they do not own the content. That makes remote streaming of that content "piracy" under some definitions.
Plex has chosen, because of the number of people streaming such content and the number that violate Plex's TOS to try and block the domain they feel houses the worst violators. It is also possible that Plex has been clobbered with take down notices that cannot be shared outside the company and this whole action is designed to keep this out of the courts. It is possible that Plex has calculated that the customers they lose will not cost as much as court fees and judgements and, the biggest expense, lawyers.
Actually that is one of the very few things that Plex has done that I agree with.

Another problem is that Plex considers Emby to be a competitor but they do not, at least yet, think Jellyfin is much of an adversary. That means that much mention of Emby on Plex's boards gets you a ban pretty easily but you can, at least for now, mention Jellyfin as much as you want.

Actually I hope that both Emby and jellyfin have strong solid methods in place to prevent the crooks that are the driving force behind the action taken from ever even becoming customers.

Plex behaves like a VERY stupid company much of the time and I think they could have prevented this by strong enforcement of their TOS.

I hope this benefits Emby but Emby need to exercise great care that the do not attract too many of the bad actors from the Plex movement.

I agree with what you said. I should mention though that I haven’t been on the Plex forums and a lot of the recommendations for Jellyfin have been on places such as Reddit and the such.

From the server side, I think Emby and for that matter JF beat Plex. May take a bit more to get everything working the way you want but you have much more control. Some things need to improve IMO like transcoding and some feature parity, but it’s already really strong!

 

The client side is where Emby hopefully someday can catch up. One of the things I think the “average” user appreciates is that all of Plex’s apps look and operate the same regardless of client. Android TV and Apple TV have the same features and look and feel as each other, as do all of their clients. Emby and others aren’t quite there yet. It definitely helps when migrating to something new that the UX is an easy one from start to finish. 

[sross44 233]

26 minutes ago, arrbee99 said:

There's plenty of feature requests for everything, maybe implementing them would be a good idea. I can certainly think of one...

There’s a bunch of them that should be implemented…. I try to remember that the Emby team is a small group of developers. They focus on what they think is a must have/fix before we get to feature requests though lol. Out of curiosity what’s the one you were thinking of?

[sross44 233]

@GrimReaperout of curiosity, why move this to Non-Emby talk? The whole point of the post was that it is literally about Emby and how to utilize this opportunity to grow? It's literally all about Emby haha. I don't really care... was more so just curious lol

Edited September 20, 2023 by sross44

[arrbee99 1560]

4 minutes ago, sross44 said:

There’s a bunch of them that should be implemented…. I try to remember that the Emby team is a small group of developers. They focus on what they think is a must have/fix before we get to feature requests though lol. Out of curiosity what’s the one you were thinking of?

NextgenTV

[GrimReaper 3294]

13 minutes ago, sross44 said:

@GrimReaperout of curiosity, why move this to Non-Emby talk? The whole point of the post was that it is literally about Emby and how to utilize this opportunity to grow? It's literally all about Emby

I'm glad you brought that up, as I used same argument in the past in internal discussion when trying to get it renamed:

On 3/28/2023 at 3:46 PM, GrimReaper said:

Every now and then there comes a topic which IS Emby related however it doesn't apply to any existing threads nor available subforums hence ends up in "Non-Emby General Discussion", moving into which might give OP a wrong impression. Could we dump that "Non-Emby" part from the title and leave it only as "General Discussion", as there ARE multiple Emby-related topics contained within? 

One would say that's exactly the case in question?

Anyway, as it stands, any topic that is not related to any Emby app/is not a technical support topic belongs in (unfortunately named "Non-Emby") General discussion.

@Abobader

 

[sross44 233]

2 minutes ago, GrimReaper said:

I'm glad you brought that up, as I used same argument in the past in internal discussion when trying to get it renamed:

One would say that's exactly the case in question?

Anyway, as it stands, any topic that is not related to any Emby app/is not a technical support topic belongs in (unfortunately named "Non-Emby") General discussion.

@Abobader

 

Agreed, that should be 100% the case. Should just be called General Discussion then and not regulated to the bottom of the forum like some after thought lol. It does give the OP a certain vibe if it's "dumped off" like that. 

[Gilgamesh_48 943]

17 minutes ago, sross44 said:

The client side is where Emby hopefully someday can catch up. One of the things I think the “average” user appreciates is that all of Plex’s apps look and operate the same regardless of client. Android TV and Apple TV have the same features and look and feel as each other, as do all of their clients. Emby and others aren’t quite there yet. It definitely helps when migrating to something new that the UX is an easy one from start to finish. 

That is actually an area where i feel both Plex and Emby make a mistake. They limit features by not allowing developers to take full advantage of an ability that one client might have simply because other clients can't do it.
While I do believe that look and feel should be similar across platforms I believe that trying to make them identical is simply done by making some clients dumber that they need to be simply because others cant do the same thing.

I also  do not like the idea of pandering to the "average" user as that also requires making apps dumber.

But, so far, Emby has not really limited their apps much while Plex has.

Plex tries to be the "prettiest" app but they miss a lot in functionality and usability. By trying to be everything for everyone they end up being nothing to no one. It is very hard, at times, to get through all the Plex crap just to stream a movie.

[sross44 233]

6 minutes ago, Gilgamesh_48 said:

That is actually an area where i feel both Plex and Emby make a mistake. They limit features by not allowing developers to take full advantage of an ability that one client might have simply because other clients can't do it.
While I do believe that look and feel should be similar across platforms I believe that trying to make them identical is simply done by making some clients dumber that they need to be simply because others cant do the same thing.

I also  do not like the idea of pandering to the "average" user as that also requires making apps dumber.

But, so far, Emby has not really limited their apps much while Plex has.

Plex tries to be the "prettiest" app but they miss a lot in functionality and usability. By trying to be everything for everyone they end up being nothing to no one. It is very hard, at times, to get through all the Plex crap just to stream a movie.

Makes a lot of sense. The only thing I'd argue to that is that in a business model where you're striving to make money (Plex and Emby) the majority of your users are probably "average users" and you should probably make it so everyone can use it.  You can dumb down an app so it's easy enough for everyone to use, but still have features in there that makes it so the power user or more curious can go in and do things with it. 

For all of us that have servers set up, a lot of us have family such as parents, grandparents, wives, husbands, siblings and kids using the apps as well. If it's to complicated, I'd be getting calls all day long on "how do I play a movie". I don't want to deal with that lol. I really enjoy sharing my media server with my family though so making it as user friendly as possible with minimal setup on their end is a huge plus for me. 

 

[justinrh 174]

I think brand awareness may be lacking.  Why would JF be mentioned and recommended and not also Emby?

[RanmaCanada 345]

2 hours ago, justinrh said:

I think brand awareness may be lacking.  Why would JF be mentioned and recommended and not also Emby?

Because Jellyfin is the creation of a neckbeard who got angry that an at the time open source software package had a nag screen in it.  Jellfyin was basically created becasue of "FU give me my stuff now" and the community that supports it believes that everything that other people work on should be theirs.  Jellfyin is years behind Emby in many core features, and their app game is a joke.  The biggest reason Jellfyin is mentioned is because it's free and there is no licensing limitations to go around.  Even Emby limits you to "up to" 75 users and then you need to contact support to get more.  

In the end, no one wants to have their software being responsible for massive copyright infringement as it would put a serious target on their backs.  It's why Plex did what they did, and Emby will probably follow suit if things get out of hand, which they will, as people hate paying for stuff, specially movies and TV shows.

[Abobader 2945]

10 hours ago, GrimReaper said:

I'm glad you brought that up, as I used same argument in the past in internal discussion when trying to get it renamed:

One would say that's exactly the case in question?

Anyway, as it stands, any topic that is not related to any Emby app/is not a technical support topic belongs in (unfortunately named "Non-Emby") General discussion.

@Abobader

 

It used to be knowing as "general discussion" from some years back, it change to non-emby, the reason for that as you know, now general discussion serve the threads for announcement, FR, ... etc as this Emby related matters.

[sross44 233]

12 hours ago, RanmaCanada said:

Because Jellyfin is the creation of a neckbeard who got angry that an at the time open source software package had a nag screen in it.  Jellfyin was basically created becasue of "FU give me my stuff now" and the community that supports it believes that everything that other people work on should be theirs.  Jellfyin is years behind Emby in many core features, and their app game is a joke.  The biggest reason Jellfyin is mentioned is because it's free and there is no licensing limitations to go around.  Even Emby limits you to "up to" 75 users and then you need to contact support to get more.  

In the end, no one wants to have their software being responsible for massive copyright infringement as it would put a serious target on their backs.  It's why Plex did what they did, and Emby will probably follow suit if things get out of hand, which they will, as people hate paying for stuff, specially movies and TV shows.

So I'm not saying I disagree with you, but what core features is JF years behind in? Forget the app side of things, that I agree with, but I'd be curious to know what core features you're talking about for my own knowledge? There's some things that Emby does better in my opinion like Live TV and there's some things that JF does better like transcoding. Those are just two examples where one is better than the other IMO. 

I do disagree with the statement that the community who supports jellyfin believes that everything other people work on should be theirs. There are a lot of people out there who prefer FOSS solutions for a variety of reasons. One of which is being security. The recent Emby hack is a really good example of that. The Emby team knew about the security risk for a very long time and didn't do anything about it. Right or wrong, it is what it is. With JF being open source, as long as someone wanted to fix the security risk, they were able to and they had it done for a long time before Emby brought their servers down. 

Again, not saying I disagree with you on most of your stuff, just bringing to the argument that there are other reasons for FOSS other than "it's mine and I want it my way".

[RanmaCanada 345]

On 21/09/2023 at 11:24, sross44 said:

So I'm not saying I disagree with you, but what core features is JF years behind in? Forget the app side of things, that I agree with, but I'd be curious to know what core features you're talking about for my own knowledge? There's some things that Emby does better in my opinion like Live TV and there's some things that JF does better like transcoding. Those are just two examples where one is better than the other IMO. 

I do disagree with the statement that the community who supports jellyfin believes that everything other people work on should be theirs. There are a lot of people out there who prefer FOSS solutions for a variety of reasons. One of which is being security. The recent Emby hack is a really good example of that. The Emby team knew about the security risk for a very long time and didn't do anything about it. Right or wrong, it is what it is. With JF being open source, as long as someone wanted to fix the security risk, they were able to and they had it done for a long time before Emby brought their servers down. 

Again, not saying I disagree with you on most of your stuff, just bringing to the argument that there are other reasons for FOSS other than "it's mine and I want it my way".

Except that is the literal reason why it was created.  The user went on to create "Emby Unlocked" before he created Jellyfin because he was angry and wanted his free stuff, as in his mind, OSS should be FOSS.  They also hounded the Emby dev team for over year for source code that they were not entitled to (demanding source code to closed sourced apps claming they were FOSS).  As for what they are behind in, other than their app game, the layout and such is still the same as when they forked it, and Luke is still the contributor for over 70% of the source code and he hasn't "contributed" in over 6 years.  If they were really about making it their own project, and not "FU you give me my free stuff" more of the code would have been replaced.  Instead, all they've done is patch work, nothing more.

As it stands, Jellyfin will have a massive target on their back if/when the pirate providers move to them.  I know many IPTV servers are already doing this, and ACE, the MPAA, et al will do what they do.

You weren't here when the drama unfolded.  If you enter any discussion about Jellfyin and mention paying for a Plex Pass or Emby Premiere, you'll be told you're stupid, you're an idiot, because Jellyfin is free, and only a moron would decide to pay for something.  Hence, FU Give me my free stuff, NOW!  FOSS is not the utopia FOSS advocates think it is.  It would be great if it was, but it's not.  As bad as it sounds, FOSS is rife with theft of other people's hard work, which is legal as long as you credit them.  The zealots ruin it for everyone, and Jellyfin guy (he who shall not be named) is one of them. 

Again, Jellyfin all started because of a nag screen in OSS that the person thought should be FOSS.  Something that was 100% pefectly legal as OSS can be monetized.  They just didn't like the fact that OSS was being used to make money and felt that all the hard work Luke and company did should be free to them.  If that's not FU GIVE ME MY FREE STUFF, I don't know what is.

[Junglejim 351]

Lets face it, streaming copyrighted content without the authority to do so is not a good idea. The platform.. Emby, Plex or Jellyfin is mute as far as that goes. There are some instances were it could be ok.. You own the media and have ripped it to save the physical disc and just play it locally from the hard drive, then you want to access that on holiday or away from your local network... Still there is a gray area there.. But as soon as you add Jo Blow or cousin Bill to your users that don't own that media then that's illegal in most countries.

I personally think the business model of streaming servers is skating on thin ice. I can see them all come tumbling down, that's why Plex are shitting there pants!

I just use Emby on my local network. If I'm on holidays or away from home the last thing I want to do is watch media..

Kodi/XBMC could be the only one left for local servers, sure they had trouble with illegal plugins but that got sorted to some degree. I could be doing a total 360 as far as server software goes.

Edited September 24, 2023 by Junglejim

[polaris70 9]

On 9/22/2023 at 6:35 PM, RanmaCanada said:

Except that is the literal reason why it was created.  The user went on to create "Emby Unlocked" before he created Jellyfin because he was angry and wanted his free stuff, as in his mind, OSS should be FOSS.  They also hounded the Emby dev team for over year for source code that they were not entitled to (demanding source code to closed sourced apps claming they were FOSS).  As for what they are behind in, other than their app game, the layout and such is still the same as when they forked it, and Luke is still the contributor for over 70% of the source code and he hasn't "contributed" in over 6 years.  If they were really about making it their own project, and not "FU you give me my free stuff" more of the code would have been replaced.  Instead, all they've done is patch work, nothing more.

As it stands, Jellyfin will have a massive target on their back if/when the pirate providers move to them.  I know many IPTV servers are already doing this, and ACE, the MPAA, et al will do what they do.

You weren't here when the drama unfolded.  If you enter any discussion about Jellfyin and mention paying for a Plex Pass or Emby Premiere, you'll be told you're stupid, you're an idiot, because Jellyfin is free, and only a moron would decide to pay for something.  Hence, FU Give me my free stuff, NOW!  FOSS is not the utopia FOSS advocates think it is.  It would be great if it was, but it's not.  As bad as it sounds, FOSS is rife with theft of other people's hard work, which is legal as long as you credit them.  The zealots ruin it for everyone, and Jellyfin guy (he who shall not be named) is one of them. 

Again, Jellyfin all started because of a nag screen in OSS that the person thought should be FOSS.  Something that was 100% pefectly legal as OSS can be monetized.  They just didn't like the fact that OSS was being used to make money and felt that all the hard work Luke and company did should be free to them.  If that's not FU GIVE ME MY FREE STUFF, I don't know what is.

I don't know how many people shared the same thought as me when I decided to purchase Emby Premier. My intention was to support the developer rather than paying for the Emby software itself, especially considering Jellyfin is free if I prefer that option. The primary reason for choosing Emby is its superior stability when compared to Jellyfin. While I do appreciate a modern and visually appealing Home Screen, the core stability is of utmost importance to me.

[wolfram84 9]

My 2 cents, focus on improving TV clients, Plex was by far the easiest and more updated app for those without an external device like ATV or Nvidia Shield.