PBS, specifically the Passport that you can get through your local PBS. You get tons of content and you support public broadcasting
Volumio - Multiroom audio service. You install the os on a pi and hook up some speakers. The basic streamer is free for local files on a single device at a time. I paid $200 for a lifetime pass a few years ago. That gets you multiroom synced audio like Sonos and lets you add in streaming services.
Qobuz - Music streaming service. Much higher quality than Spotify, no shitty MQA like Tidal. They will have articles diving into a genre, band or record label with links to notable albums. It’s “station” playlists and similar artist recommendations are garbage but I’m more of an album person.
I’ve never heard of Qobuz before but just signed up for the 30 day trial. Thank you!
Having my Nextcloud instance for file storage, podcast, syncing my phone and photos, etc.
Tidal for music is 10x better than Spotify if you need music streaming. Otherwise buy albums on bandcamp.
Just tried free version of Pycharm and definitely going to pay for it.
- A privacy-respecting mail service: I use mailbox.org since it follows email standards, but I think many ppl like Proton mail/Tutanota. Recommend because they are privacy-respecting, and self-hosting email is way too difficult
- More of a yearly subscription per-se, but a personal domain from any domain registrar. Recommend because why not? There are so many cool things one can do with a domain: custom email, your own blog, professional website for job, …
- A VPS from Linode (or any reliable provider). Recommend because some things are better done on a VPS… and I want a public-facing IP that is not directly from my bedroom
- I used to have subscriptions to the local arcade. Recommend because I basically get cardio workout on the DDR machine (and it costs less than a gym. And easier to cancel)
public library
here the subscription fee for one year is about as expensive as a single book.
Been listening to digitally imported since the winamp days! Never subscribed though. Good stuff!
Yeah, they’ve been around for ages and are still excellent. I’m also very glad they still support actual audio streams and don’t require some stupid app.
(No affiliation just a happy customer.)
I use the app haha I play it in my car during my commute.
Proton Mail. High quality mail service where they don’t mine your emails for data to sell. It’s like 4-5 bucks a month depending on how you pay and it’s been worth every penny.
Dropout and MeansTV
Dropout is a mostly improv streaming service, very high quality entertainment and a chemistry between performers only seen between people who love each other, it’s like watching a friend group of very prepared comedians. It’s about 6 bucks a month and password sharing is encourages
MeansTv is a worker owned streaming service aiming to provide information and entertainment tailored for a class conscious audience, it’s mostly documentaries but they’re really good and i’ve seen many ideas from all the left spectrum, it’s about 10 bucks a month
Love the content from MeansTV!
Having your own domain is pretty cool, even if it’s just a single page with some text and links to social media profiles.
Nebula. It’s a video streaming service that is ad free and directly supports the creators.
It’s crazy that we live in a time where you have to add to your answer that it is ad free
I also have a Nebula subscription and recommend it as well. $60/yr or a $300 lifetime subscription.
Frequently you can get discount codes from the creators on there. I think I paid $20 this year.
Yeah I paid $30. Totally worth it.
As a fan of Jet Lag and the crew, it pains me how expensive it is outside the US.
Um subscription to what? Is none an ok answer?
I pay for my fibre, and my phone. They’re indispensable.
Oh and a VPN
I can see why people pay subscriptions for media, but people who pay subscriptions for software or services are a massive problem. If people refused to use a service as soon as it turned to a subscription model, the idea would’ve died out
Nope, folks are fucking stupid
What’s wrong with paying a subscription for a service that requires resources to continuously operate, such as email hosting?
I don’t think of phones as subscriptions but ok, yeah, they are somewhat needed, so fine, especially if you use it enough.
A bus pass maybe, that way you can just get on and not have to fumble around paying the fare when you board.
I live in the Los Angeles area and have a car but yes, I have the bus pass on my phone for when I don’t want to drive or just have a short trip in town. It’s great!
Maybe it’s just my area but there’s also like, a 25% chance the reader won’t work and you’ll just get a free ride if you try to pay with your phone rather than cash. It makes hopping on the bus a fun gamble!
Paying the subscription for The Great Courses is absolutely insane value if its something you use regularly. Its not a credit system like Audible, its literally unlimited streaming of university level courses for 20$ a month (or like 12$ if you pay annually). The individual courses can cost upwards of 100$ so even if you only take one course every two months you still haven’t lost money.
It’s infinite learning, i cant shill hard enough.
my library gives them to me for free through hoopla
Thats awesome! Do they offer the whole catalogue?
afaict
Oh this seems like something I’d be interested in for sure. Thank you!
You bet! It’s even better if you have a braindead job like I do, then you can spend all day learning and getting paid for it.
Youtube and OCW have infinite amounts of that, why pay some company?
Because they don’t want to sift through tons of garbage to find the good stuff. I presume.
YouTube Premium. I watch a lot of content on YT. I work from home and will generally have something on in the background while I work, so I’m easily consuming 10+ hours of content a day. It’s honestly worth it for me, if for nothing else than to avoid the cat-and-mouse hellscape of adblocking. I’d rather pay $25 each month and have everyone in my family have an ad-free experience on all their devices no matter where they are or what network they’re using, than having to help them troubleshoot browser extensions and DNS settings and PiHoles and all that.
Edit: Absolutely insane that people are upset that I pay for a service I make use out of, lmao
It’s funny to me that people have such a problem with YouTube Premium. There are a LOT of reasons to criticize YouTube/Google, but YouTube Premium is about as close as it gets to the platonic ideal of a video subscription service. It completely banishes any ads you’d get without paying, and it provides the creators you watch with more value than someone watching without premium. If showing ads is unacceptable, and paying to not see ads is unacceptable, then what’s the alternative? People have to make a living, and servers don’t run on magic.
I had did a premium trial and totally agree. I am always suprised by the people who expect a service as big as youtube to be entirely free.
I subscribe to YouTube Premium because I do watch a lot of YouTube plus you get YouTube Music included. I wanted to switch to Spotify but after years without seeing ads on YouTube, I don’t think I can go back.
It also pays the creators better than ads ever did or ever will.
Sure you could pay them all individually, but that gets tedius real fast when you like hundreds of channels.
Yeah, I’ve got a lot of channels I subscribe to. I don’t know the total count right now, but last I checked it was 100+. Some of them are daily/weekly uploaders, but I think a majority of them are much less frequent. If I had the means, I’d rather financially support those creators directly, but that’s just impossible for me right now. So at the very least, I’m making my views more valuable to them.
