Owning media again - Kedara.eu
Owning media again
7 Aug 2026<br>menu
This year, one of my aspirations is to rely less on the big streaming services<br>for my entertainment. Why? Well, for one thing, if we give too much power to<br>large corporations by getting overly attached to their services, that<br>leads to monopolies, inequality and ultimately, democratic decline. How’s<br>that for a positive opening?
Finding alternatives is easier said than done, because<br>Tech Morality is Hard, and I<br>would generalise that to “Corporate Morality is Hard”. Namely, keeping tabs<br>on the morality of all the companies you rely on for services takes quite a lot<br>of (ongoing) work. That said, it’s important to me to not support evil<br>businesses and lift up the good ones, and especially, support the artists<br>themselves (duh!). A straightforward (partial) solution would be to reduce my<br>reliance on (a few big) companies, so that I can more easily switch to<br>alternatives, should the need arise. In the context of entertainment—which<br>for the scope of this post means books, video (including movies/series), and<br>music—currently, the ideal solution to me seems to be buying DRM free<br>files (or physical copies); ideally, directly from the creator. Another<br>good option would be to buy second-hand and support the artists in a<br>different way.
Before I get into that, I’d like to mention that there’s one alternative that I<br>would love to use: the public library. It’s a fantastic concept which I<br>really would like to support: shared instead of private ownership. It’s<br>equitable, sustainable, and public libraries are also third<br>places that provide so much more<br>than just multimedia loans. However, due to various reasons, it’s not feasible<br>for me: for starters, I can’t go there (long<br>covid). Because I live in a rural<br>area, their physical collection is (naturally) very small (and the costs to<br>loan from other libraries is understandably quite high). They offer<br>e-books, but the international collection I’m after is very limited,<br>and music can only be borrowed from a central repository (again at quite a<br>steep cost). For me personally, I can’t justify the costs of a membership<br>(as I would almost never make use of it), but if your situation is<br>different, I’d encourage you to take this route instead.
Unfortunately, owning my media again seems to be the best solution for me right<br>now. I realise there are at least three problems with that: (a) you have to be<br>able to afford it, (b) it takes more effort and in some cases, technical<br>know-how, and (c) the material has to be available for purchase (preferable DRM<br>free). Why DRM free? Because if the files are “protected” by Digital Rights<br>Management, the company can revoke your access at any time. That’s not owning,<br>it’s renting. I’ll discuss each of these problems using my own experiences so<br>far as an example. But, spoiler alert, I haven’t figured it all out yet.
Money
First, let’s talk money. For books, I’m comparing a subscription service to<br>buying e-books or second-hand physical books. In the past, I’ve made use of<br>Kobo Plus as a subscription service: this currently costs € 12 a month. I’ve<br>also looked at the prices of the past 75 e-books I’ve bought, the average costs<br>per e-book was € 7. * I don’t have enough data to compare this to buying<br>second-hand physical books yet, but based on my current experience, I think<br>that those costs will be quite similar on average. That would mean that in my<br>particular case, the subscription service would be cheaper if I read about two<br>books per month (according to my<br>stats, I read about 2.5<br>books per month). To me, the costs are so comparable that it’s a no-brainer to<br>get rid of this subscription (which I already did a few months ago).
* Rounded. Of course, this can vary a lot and also depends on the types of books you buy (bundles, older, just released, etc.).
For music, my current subscription service is Spotify, which I’d love to get<br>rid of for various reasons. I share a Family Plan with four other family<br>members, the cost is € 18, or € 3.60 per person per month. That’s of course<br>very tough to beat, however: (a) this hurts the artists, who are underpaid in<br>this scheme, and (b) it’s only hard to beat when you continuously buy new<br>music. Once you’ve bought an album or a collection of them, you can listen<br>repeatedly for free. I’m lucky because I own a large collection of albums<br>already (passed along by my Grandpa), but they’re all in one genre. I’d like to<br>diversify, and this is a cost I’m willing to pay, while supporting the artists<br>in the mean time. I’ve only just started building my music collection again, so<br>far I’ve bought albums from individual artists, Bandcamp, and Qobuz (these<br>companies could have issues I’m not aware of as well; at least they pay the<br>artists...