Streaming services have become the most popular way to watch movies and television shows all around the entire world. There are a variety of things to watch as well, for absolutely everyone. Kids, teenagers, adults and elders could definitely find something they would like on their television screen, cell phones, tablets, or computers.

Many people enjoy using streaming services, and got them through many different ways.

“Since I was little I always used ‘Netflix,'” Cooper Clayton (’25) said, “I’m the only one good at tech so I set up all the accounts for my family, so I had to adapt fast.”

There is one question, however. What is the cost of all this entertainment at the grasp of your fingers?

To answer this, it’d be good to take a look back all the way to when streaming services became popular.

Of course, streaming services were used throughout the 2010s, but gained a bit more popularity around the later years before 2020. There are many reasons for this, in fact way too many to talk about. The most prominent reason would be the certain shows that were popular at the time, case and point: “Stranger Things.”

“Stranger Things” is the hit show that made its debut on “Netflix,” a fellow streaming service that was one of the very first, and at one point the most popular. Many people wanted to subscribe to “Netflix” in order to watch “Stranger Things,” and so “Netflix” got even more popular.

Of course, many other people could have subscribed to “Netflix” for another show that they were interested in, or some other streaming service, in fact. But one of the bigger ways that “Netflix” got big definitely had to be the surging popularity of “Stranger Things.”

And while here a lot of streaming services gained a bit more traction, they still have not gained as much popularity as they will in the future, and that “future,” would be 2020, in the midst of the coronavirus quarantine.

A lot of people found comfort in paying for streaming services to easily watch new shows while being stuck inside of their homes. And so, streaming services became way more popular, in fact so popular that those services began taking advantage of the fame with advertisements and even some sponsorships.

And so, many different companies began to take advantage of the popularity that streaming services brought. The amount of services multiplied until it became a common thing for people to indulge in. Services like “Netflix,” “Hulu,” “Amazon Prime Video,” “HBO Max,” etcetera.

But it also brought some certain issues that weren’t exactly clear before, or ones that weren’t exactly made known at first.

“Sometimes ‘Prime’ might be weird and think that past movies that you bought were actually unbought, ” Sean Mavety (’25) said. “‘Netflix’ can be slow at times, and ‘Hulu’ can be annoying and delete seasons from TV shows.”

“The price hikes a lot, as well as shows getting cut or not completed.” Nick Anello (’22) said.

“‘Peacock’s’ UI is not great, and that is really important for a streaming service,” Clayton (’25) said.

These issues have become even more apparent as streaming services have made their way into our lives. And there are way more issues that have been talked about than these.

One of the biggest issues we are seeing now is the oversaturation of streaming services. What started as a simple amount of them has become extremely large, and it brings up the issue of oversaturation.

Many have stumbled upon the issue of wanting to find a certain movie that interests them, only to find that they must pay for a certain streaming service that they don’t have.

“It happens almost daily,” Mavety (’25) said.

Now with so many streaming services out there, it’s hard to watch certain movies that interest you without running into these types of issues. However it could bring certain merits with the companies themselves.

“People might get irritated and buy the subscription,” Mavety (’25) said.

“Oversaturation makes the ones responsible for these services competitive and add more to offer,” Anello (’22) said.

Everyone else has these irritations while the companies behind them and their streaming services could profit. It still does not leave a good taste however, as many others are facing frustrations with the oversaturation or streaming services, but all the individual issues in the streaming services that they subscribe to and pay for.

One of the bigger controversial streaming services right now is ‘HBO Max,’ which was praised before for its wide range of movies and shows, but now suffers. It made a deal with another fellow streaming service known as ‘Discovery Plus’ to merge with it. This means that ‘HBO Max’ would need to take their shows down, as a way to get money; specifically three billion dollars.

And so, many television shows and movies were taken off of the platform. Some movies that were being made were scrapped altogether, many directors and producers got fired, especially ones who create animated shows and movies.

“‘HBO Max has proved that content exclusive to a platform that can remove anything at any time and have it be lost forever,” said Clayton (’25). “It’s a sinkhole for lost media.”

While streaming services are great to use whenever you want to watch a good movie or show, it is really important to point out the problems that come with them. Hopefully in the future all of these issues can be fixed in some way where everyone is happy. The companies who make the services, and the ones who use them.