Why the heck aren't all the "old" series/movies available to buy anywhere?

It takes more than zero dollars to prepare media for a new format, like streaming.

Many old series did not have contracts that covered streaming, since it didn't really exist at the time.

Many old series had music licensed for a specific format, and they would need to renegotiate those contracts for the new medium.

That is why some series have made it to streaming but with replacement music or are only available to buy but not be included in netflix or hulu as part of a subscription. Others haven't made it because the company either thinks they won't make their money back or they are working on something that they expect will make more money first.

(This is more for OP and other readers than the author of the comment I’m replying to)

A classic example being WKRP in Cincinnati which was a relatively low budget sitcom when it was produced. It was shot on videotape instead of film and took advantage of a special licensing rate for music when added to videotaped programs, which let them include a lot more contemporary rock music that would’ve aired on a rock station in the late ’70s. However, the licenses had a limited time allowance so while the show was originally in syndication with that music, by the ’90s it was replaced with similar sounding stock music. Early releases of the show for home media also didn’t have the original songs. Shout Factory put together a box set of the show and went back to the music owners to try to form new licensing deals, but even they couldn’t clear every song.

Music isn’t the only factor; similar issues pop up with all sorts of rights issues and royalties. When shows were made in the ’50s no one really had the idea of reruns and syndication. Before the ’80s there was no real idea of home viewing, and even then in the days of VHS tapes the idea of putting an entire show on tape for home use was pretty out there. Only fitting 1-4 episodes on a tape meant a season alone might take up a whole bookshelf, never mind a full series. It really wasn’t until the 2000s that there was a normal expectation that a show for broadcast would also go into syndication and be sold/rented to home viewers. So a lot of contracts with actors, writers, directors, etc. didn’t cover how royalties would be paid on these newer releases. Sometimes those rights have been sold in the interim as well, so it requires a legal team researching what rights need to be secured and who currently owns them to make sure all the payments are planned. Get it wrong and a rights-holder can sue and might end up taking away all your profit, even making the venture lose money. If you’re going to release an old show, you need to be confident that there’s enough of an audience willing to pay that you can cover all those costs and still make a profit, not to mention the costs of preparing the program to a format suitable for sale/streaming.

Of course, once those copyrights expire, some of those cost concerns go away. We’re only just starting to reach that point with films (anybody want to watch Steamboat Willie?), so in another 30 years or so we’ll probably start seeing more old TV shows. If they’ve survived, of course.
- This was an excellent example!
No I’m not saying streaming but buying it
- The making money back, contracts, and music applies to sales too.
  
  The reason they don't have it for sale is because they like money.
That's why Netflix's Evangelion don't have "fly me to the moon"

Just pirate everything until they get their act together.

Can I use it with Apple TV tho? I have everything there
- Check out Infuse, it’s a pretty good front end for a home media collection.

Disney used to do that a lot, 'get it now before it goes back into the vault' in some effort to make it special/get-it-while-you-can.

Having everything available all the time would leave them with little to put on a pedestal as a coming soon limited time thing. Just one person's theory though.

Because they make more money on licensing than selling the digital copies. Companies that offer a purchase option, like Amazon, usually only sell you the right to access the media through their platform and offer no way to take it out.

Now as time has shown us they can take that away as well as you don’t actually own the digital content you purchased. For example Sony pulled titles that people bought and thought they owned from their store and offered no way to download the content.

It’s just more bullshit and corporate greed. Part of why companies aren’t selling physical media anymore is because if you can’t own something they can keep charging you for access to that thing and infinitely double dip.

NYT Lifehacker

It's simple. Big companies really hate us.

Easy. Because MRR.

(Monthly recurring revenue, EG subscription)

Everything must be recurring! That's the trend of the century.

I buy DVDs, Blu-ray, and UHD DVDs all the time. Try the thrift store, then Amazon, then eBay.

Because Digital is here and it is gonna fuck your wallet. Thanks!

does anybody even sell digital movies that you can download anymore? I thought they were all streaming sites now that you lose access to your content when they lose the license

Absolutely. Apple, Amazon, Google, Vudu, Movies Anywhere (off the top of my head).

What I recently learned is that some physical discs will come with download codes that can be used, once, on any of these services. I was gifted the Alien box set which was nice but I don’t have a Blu-ray player. The code allowed me to add the films to my iTunes account.

Now, how long I can watch those movies until a license runs out is another question. I’ve yet to find a way to download a movie to disc for backup. Because, technically, you don’t buy a movie, you buy the license to watch it. This is even the case for physical discs.

You're going to need to be more specific. What movie are you looking for and on what platform?

I mean, can you give an example or two?

There's probably not a single answer for everything. Depending on what you consider "old" there's a chance no one saved a copy.

It might be that contracts were better back then so the studio wouldn't make much releasing it.

Chuck, for example. It’s available in the US afaik but where I live, it’s available only in streaming on prime video. The blu rays aren’t available at all either
- If it’s on physical disc in one region but not where you live, it might be possible to purchase that disc and ship it to your home. While it might be region-blocked on the disc, there are ways to bypass that with certain disc players or converting them on your computer. The legality of bypassing region-blocking may vary depending on your jurisdiction, but from a technical standpoint it’s certainly possible. It’s probably less legal liability than going straight to piracy (especially compared to the liability from torrenting where they try to claim someone’s engaged in illegal distribution).
- So it's a region locking thing.
  
  That sucks for everyone. I remember back in the day when vpns got new regions, and there was so much more available.
  
  But physical media needs to be physically produced. It's available in DVD and I think it came before Blu-ray even so you're kind of asking a lot here
- Does this work where you live? https://www.justwatch.com/us/search?q=Chuck

🏴‍☠️ 🦜

Some series were available on DVD but are no longer. Places like eBay, thrift stores, and used book stores sometimes have good selections of TV on DVD.

Some are on Youtube, if its a series try putting in the season and complete, or if its a playlist, get an app like Airy that can download complete playlists

It's not profitable or it's risky.

It costs money to produce, archive and distribute older or more obscure media in the current sales infrastructure, and you'd have to get the rights from whoever owns the rights, so it's just a big hassle that costs them too much money that they don't know they're going to make back.

Or they do know that they'll definitely not make it back.

Whereas they know if they sell Frozen five they're going to make money on it.

It was all on Netflix until the studios reinforced their evil.

Printing physical media and distributing it is a huge cost, since physical media use has declined in recet times the supplychains they used to rely has gone.

This has increased the cost.

Compare that to digital infrastructure and you have a cheaper alternative that has scalable solutions.

There is no need to print or really distribute physical media any more, you get the finnished movie/episode as a digital file, you upload it to the cloud shortly before release, wait for it to automagically get cached in the regions, and set the timer for release. The streaming service will automatically change the $video.enabled variable from $false to $true, and millions of people will be able to watch it at the same time.