Back in the ye old days, you didn’t just pick what show or movie you wanted to watch. You turned on your television set and flipped through whatever channels you had until you found the least objectionable fare. Then you either settled in with your snacks or maybe you flipped around catching parts of different shows.
It’s a strange thing to be nostalgic about. After all, most of us now have a subscription to at least one streaming service where we have access to more movies and shows than we could watch in a lifetime. We can choose amongst the many titles according to our whims, like a bunch of spoiled kings.
But behold, the age of channel surfing has returned. A new website called All The Streams is allowing everyone with an internet connection to watch Hulu, Netflix, HBO, Amazon Prime, Showtime and Disney+, all for free.
The catch? You don’t get to pick what’s on.
For instance, as of this writing, Daria is on Hulu, and Parks and Rec is on Netflix. You don’t pick the show, you don’t pick the episode. Just like in the ’80s, what’s on is on, and the most you can do is change the channel.
Well, that’s not entirely true. There’s also a request line. You can text a number found in the lower right-hand corner with suggestions. Who knows, they might even put on your favorite episode of The Office.
The site comes from a strange group that calls themselves MSCHF. They’ve done things like producing a fake pair of Nike shoes supposedly endorsed by Jesus Christ, and produced Times Newer Roman, a font that looks exactly like Times Roman except that the letters are 5-10% wider.
All these projects might seem a bit odd, but there’s some brilliance behind the madness. The Jesus-endorsed shoes went for $1,425 and sold out. Times Newer Roman is perfect for college students who want to fulfill those pesky page requirements on term papers with the fewest number of words.
MSCHF might not be all about making money, but according to a recent New York Times article, the Brooklyn-based company “has raised at least $11.5 million in outside investments since the fall of 2019.”
As far as All the Streams.FM goes, MSCHF founder Gabe Waley knows the site is probably not long for this world. He told BuzzFeed News that his company will comply with any takedown notices they receive from the various streaming services.
That seems like an easy call, but when it comes to describing the company behind the site, Waley had a harder time. “Yeah, I don’t really have a good description of that,” he said in the interview with BuzzFeed. “Art might be a good frame of reference? Internet culture?”
If you want to check out All the Streams.FM, you’d be well advised to do it sooner rather than later. Disney it infamously litigious, and it’s doubtful the other companies are going to find the site particularly amusing. It’d be a smaller miracle if it’s still around by the end of the week.
Until then, happy surfing. Black Panther is on Disney+ right now if you want to try and catch the last half.
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