Interesting problem here. So I self host jellyfin, happy to share my (owned) movies with my family. Well, my mother has asked me to digitize her collection too and have me host it. Originally, fine, you give your movies to me, I host them, same thing.

However, what I didn’t bet on was the amount of garbage, terrible movies she would give me. There’s a few that are fine, but the vast majority are, well I’ll just put it bluntly, christian propaganda. I don’t think any of them are as terrible as some of the worst case, but think “My life was horrible until I found god now look and see how fulfilled I am” type propaganda - and they make for horrible plots. Left Behind with Kirk Cameron is a good example. Even removing the blatent boring christian plots - it’s just a horribly made movie. Cheap, not thought out well, and honestly I read the book decades ago, it’s a horrible adaptation too.

Not that I keep only top tier movies in my libraries, but these are, well they just bring a pit to my stomach.

What would you do in my situation? (And I’m going to go ahead and say the pure atheist comments aren’t needed, yes of course I could burn them, or dance around them, but I’m not looking to just burn the bridge between my mother and myself over a lifetime of her indoctrination and bad taste in movies). I’m more looking for generic, how do you handle your users asking you to put content you don’t find appealing on your server?

  • @merthyr1831
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    87 months ago

    I’d keep the physical library around and just digitize as and when she asks for specific stuff. You’ll probably never back up half the library. That or stick it on a HDD out of the way and transfer the few she wants, then tuck the drive in a draw forever in case she wants something else.

    Jellyfin must have a feature like Plex where certain user accounts can have certain libraries attached? You could use that to avoid having to look at those crappy movies in your library.

    I don’t really have much of an issue with family recommendations but I do tell them that the space isn’t unlimited so if they don’t watch something they asked for I’m likely to remove it for something we WILL watch. In your case, you could at least have leverage to get her to narrow down what needs hosting and what doesnt.