Key Takeaways
- Due to licensing agreements, your favorite shows may not always be available on streaming services.
- Physical copies are of better quality and often contain extras or special features.
- Displaying physical copies of your favorite shows can be a great conversation starter and a way to ensure entertainment during a power outage.
If you really love a show that’s streaming on a subscription service, don’t miss out on the opportunity to buy the DVD or Blu-ray, or you may never enjoy it again.
Your show won’t be available forever
There are thousands of shows available to stream across dozens of services, but these shows are in almost constant rotation. When your license expires, your current service may choose not to renew your contract, and no one else may be interested in watching it. That way, your show will be nowhere to be found. King of the Hill Was it pulled from Netflix, leaving fans in limbo before eventually being picked up by Hulu?
Either way, unless the show is owned by a streaming service, it’s always questionable whether anyone will want to pay to watch it, and the more obscure or unpopular a show you like is, the more likely it is that it won’t be available any more.
You may not be seeing the best version.
Despite advances in streaming compression and faster internet speeds, online video still falls short of the quality of disc-based media. If you want to watch the best looking and sounding version of your favorite shows, you’re better off watching the version mastered for DVD or Blu-ray. You’ll get the best quality and perfect consistency. It’s easy to think that the quality you get from streaming is good enough, but I think that’s often because people have forgotten how good Blu-ray and DVD picture quality can be.
One of the big drawbacks to content offered on streaming services is the lack of extras or special features. While some digital movies and shows purchased directly from retailers like Apple TV come with extras, they still don’t have all the content you’d get on a DVD or Blu-ray disc. If you really love a show, it’s worth taking a closer look at what went on behind the scenes.
Show your love for your favorite shows
One of the saddest consequences of the rise of all-you-can-eat streaming services is the loss of personal media collections. In the past, if you visited someone at home, you could tell what kind of person they were just by looking at their VHS collection. A quick glance at the shelves could tell you so much about a person that it was easy to start a conversation or even a friendship.
So why not bring a little of that back into your life? When you buy your favorite shows on disc and put them up where people can see them, you’re not just getting a copy of the show; you’re getting a talking point and a great piece of decor all in one.
You never know when the rain will come
Online streaming services rely on many systems working so you can press a button on your remote and have a program start seconds later. If you’ve never had a blackout, it’s only a matter of time before your power, internet, or the service itself goes down. Buy your favorite shows on disc so you can enjoy them on rainy days.
I don’t know about you, but I have a lifelong love of certain TV shows and I’ve made it my mission to own at least hard copies of the shows that mattered most to me. In some cases, it’s a race against time because I don’t know how long those discs will be available, but I try to grow my collection a little bit each month.
