Last October, Best Buy confirmed a decision that had long been rumored: The chain will no longer carry DVDs or Blu-rays in its stores or online. Some observers certainly saw the change coming, given the prevalence of streaming, but it’s a symptom of a larger problem.
Don’t get me wrong. There are many great things about the streaming revolution and the promise of everything being available all the time somewhere. But that’s all it is: a promise. In fact, streaming services, for a variety of reasons, have been reducing their offerings across the board for a while. And for you, the consumer, that means that the seemingly unlimited streaming landscape is way more exclusive than you were led to believe.
The dream of streaming is that everything is available all the time. The reality of the services is that there are a lot of costs that viewers don’t see that make the dream infeasible. Server space for all that media is pricey. Licensing fees for shows can pile up. Large services like MAX or Disney+ frequently drop shows from their rosters as cost-saving measures or write down projects (essentially make them go away) for the tax bonus they receive in return. This was the fate of the highly publicized Willow series on Disney+; it essentially vanished from the streamer after only a few weeks, a victim of the parent company’s drive to save money. And that can leave consumers with big gaps in their viewing plans or even losing the programming they bought the service for in the first place.
And that’s where we come back to discs. In some cases, popular films and long-running movies have been completely orphaned by streaming services. Some are the victims of licensing deals, while others have been sacrificed to cost-cutting or because their audiences, while consistent, are smaller. But when you own a piece of physical media, it’s yours; you don’t have to worry that it will simply vanish overnight from your shelf.
Academy Award-winning directors Christopher Nolan and Guillermo Del Toro have taken up the cause in recent interviews and social media statements. Del Toro called owning physical media a “responsibility” and noted on X (formerly Twitter) that, “If you own a great 4K HD, Blu-ray, DVD etc etc of a film or films you love … you are the custodian of those films for generations to come,” because a studio or streamer can simply make it disappear.
So, by all means, subscribe to the streamers you enjoy. But don’t count on your favorite shows being there tomorrow. If you have a film or series that you want to be able to watch any time, make sure you get a hard copy. Better to make a little room on the shelf than have a favorite float away.
This article is featured in the July/August 2024 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. Subscribe to the magazine for more art, inspiring stories, fiction, humor, and features from our archives.
Become a Saturday Evening Post member and enjoy unlimited access. Subscribe now
Comments
I agree. And for similar reasons I never buy a DRM e-book. We may enjoy and treasure our CD/DVD collections, but there may come a day you can’t buy a player. I’ve ripped a few on opensource software on one of my linux computers. I guess I could do more of that if the time comes. I don’t distribute the electronic copies.
Owning CDs and DVDs is a must. It takes hardly any space and is always there at your behest. I even back up those onto thumb drives for additional access and convenience. Literally thousands of songs, weeks worth of music… in a shoebox. I’m so glad I didn’t fall for the trend of dumping my collection at the 2nd hand store for a few bucks. However, other’s doing so has bolstered my library. I’d call that a win!
I agree with Mr McGowan below and to add to his comment, there are so many good TV shows or movies that you might want to watch that are not streaming anywhere but you might be able to find them in a Cracker Barrel type gift store or online in a DVD form. There are a lot of excellent TV series you can find in the public domain (various web sites) that are not streaming. I “discovered” two such comedies a couple years back “Meet Corliss Archer” and “Blondie.” A true-story medical drama “Medic” which offers a lot for medical history nowadays and “26 Men” which are episodes based on the true stories of the Arizona Rangers can also be found in the Public Domain in their series entirety (or almost thereof).
This makes perfect sense from beginning to end. When you own the physical version of a particular film or TV series you really love, you needn’t worry about it “disappearing into the ether” due to a corporate whim or any other reason you have no control over. We the people are already living with this painful reality far too much everyday as it is.