In an age of streaming and digital downloads, I have found myself moving further and further into the realm of physical media. The sheer number of times that I have gone to watch a movie that used to be on Netflix, only to find that it has moved to a new and obscure pricey streaming service has only grown as the years go on. Streaming quality continues to go down, as prices and number of services continue to go up.
While many people have thrown out their DVD and Blu-ray collections, the certainty of ownership and access that physical copies of my favorite movies bring is worth the storage space that they take up. Being able to grab my copy of “La La Land” off the shelf whenever I want and watch it in 1080p high bitrate quality is much better than spending hours in the vicious cycle of deciding what to watch, realizing it is not on any streaming service you have (if any) and starting over. Nothing is worse than wanting to show a friend or loved one a movie only to realize that it is only available now on a service you do not subscribe to.
One alternative to physical copies or streaming subscriptions is to purchase the movie digitally. While this has some pros, such as not needing a Blu-ray player, the downside is that you must trust that the service you buy the movie on will still exist in a year, five years, or a decade. Many streaming services have gone belly up, with people losing their past purchases. This happened famously with video game company Ubisoft when they closed and deleted past game purchases of accounts that people had not signed in on for over four years. Physical media is like books on a shelf– four years from now is no problem for a DVD or Blu-ray disk.
Another great reason to get into physical media is that due to most people moving to streaming, movie disks and Blu-ray players have dropped to all-time lows in terms of prices. Blu-ray players can be had on eBay for as low as $30 and often can be found even cheaper in thrift stores like Goodwill. The same can be said for Blu-ray and DVD disks, which are usually able to be found for between $15 and $30 new, and can be had for a few dollars each at thrift stores used.
While many of the conveniences of Netflix were great at first, as more and more studios have moved content on to their own paywalled platforms, the appeal of owning your media has only grown. By owning your favorite movies, you have the power to watch what you want when you want to watch it.