Exciting news! The free API you were using is no more free!

I have no skin in this game but I think it sounds like they need to change their name from "open subtitles" to "closed captioning"

Edit: stupid STT

Gather all the worlds subtitles under the guise of being “open” and then bait and switch when you’re the largest subtitles database out there.

The free API had a limit of 20 subs/day, you’re not going to tell me those server costs were significant.

Why is it called "OpenSubtitles" if you have to pay for it to use it in any capacity?

REST API docs

Your consumer can query the API on its own, and download 5 subtitles per IP's per 24 hours, but a user must be authenticated to download more. Users will then be able to download as many subtitles as their ranks allows, from 10 as simple signed up user, to 1000 for VIP user.

I think it's reasonable move. They have Legacy API that cost them a lot of manhours to maitain and they decided to cut on costs and replace it with a new thing. Sadly they decresed amount of api calls from 20 to 5 [needs citation]

I think they don't have good PR guy to better communicate the change

well it has been deprecated for a few years, and they're basically asking you to play for continued support.
they have a new REST api, but you still need the old one, pay up because otherwise there's no motivation to keep it around.

So what pisses me off in these cases is this: they didn't contribute with the data. They're a convenient aggregator, I give them that, but the data came from third parties. If you want to start charging for convenient access to the data you should at least make all data before you started charging available in a bulk download for free.

Oh, are chocolate rations up to 60 grams now?

contribute to a greater cause

For the greater good, that is their pockets.

HOLY SHIT! 12 whole dollars a YEAR to keep using the deprecated API they don't want to support anymore. What monsters.

Lol gotta pay for "adfree subtitles"

lol I got that emaik and read that exactly the same.

Someone should hire that author for a large corporation's pr department

What really caught my attention was OpenSubtitles going from a .org to a .com domain.

You should tip them too!

I had issues in the past with opensubtitles serving malware through fake download buttons on the site.

You had like 6 different buttons to download with only one legit.

Sent them an email and they removed them...

I hardly trust this site and really don't appreciate they use open in their name and pull up shit like this.

I wish we had some sort of P2P sub hosting... So we don't have to deal with sites like opensubtitles.

Image Transcription: Email

OpenSubtitles

Dear Redacted,

Exciting news! OpenSubtitles.org is undergoing a transformation, retiring the original API by the end of 2023. Fear not, as this paves the way for the advanced OpenSubtitles.com REST API. We also understand, in some scenarios there is no way to use new API yet, so original API will be avaliable from New Year only for VIP Users.

Change is Good: Introducing the 20% Black Friday Treat!

Celebrate with us! Enjoy a 20% discount on a one-year VIP subscription until November 24th, 2023, so you can use original API. Elevate your VIP experience on both www.opensubtitles.org and www.opensubtitles.com. Instead of 15 USD per year you can get this deal for 12 USD.

VIP Advantage: Unlock Exclusive Benefits

• Usage opensubtitles.org API
• Ad-Free Web Experience
• Direct Download Links
• Higher Download Limits
• Ad-Free Subtitles
• User Profile Visibility
• Contribute to a Greater Cause

Seize this limited-time offer and become a VIP member today. Enhance your subtitle experience - ad-free, seamless, and with higher download limit access.

Site owner and whomever in marketing wrote that. Pure psychopathy, IMO.

They should rename the site to PaywalledSubtitles.

Exciting News For People Who Hate You

A proper REST API sounds like exciting news to me, and I’m sure anyone who needs to interact with their APIs..

Will the new API be free?

Anger is a form of excitement.

If nobody gives them money, they'll revert back.. But people will give them money, so they won't.

Have you even read the email? It's still free

I'd pay 3$ per year for 50/day downloads. That will more than cover the operating cost of my extra load on their servers.

Are you by chance using K9Mail?

I mean to be realistic, Whisper (the audio to text AI ) linked with chatGPT can subtitle anything in real time, translated in any language, in very high quality...

Itt: People doom posting without understanding what the change actually entails

Wow, from "We're just requiring registration" to "fuck you pay us" in a day. How brazen.

Reminds me of another website that rhymes with schmedddit

Wait... "Ad-Free Subtitles"? I have never even used or heard of this service, but that just feels like an "insult to injury" or "annoy you into paying" abuse? Am I wrong?

Please tell me that this is not some auto-subtitling service that is going to cause ads to be inserted into the subtitles for other ads or something? Like, how do ads in subtitles even work?

This happens like two weeks after I finally install the opensubs vlc plugin.

Also got this and was like wtf are you trying to hype up here?!

“We’ve just realised that the free offering that got us this far couldn’t possibly make any profit for our shareholders, so we’re making a drastic course correction to make it temporarily seem like we’re a real business so we can hopefully sell to big corp and make it somebody else’s problem.”

https://forum.opensubtitles.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=18389

what about vlc player?

https://giphy.com/gifs/harvey-korman-aKZij6fdoGtOw

Treat?

Love how nobody actually read their statement here.

Permanently Deleted

I mean, it is a black Friday treat, so...

Let's be clear in one thing:

• There's no free lunches.

That's it. Everything in the Universe, including you, has a "price" on energy. Now outside of all crony-capitalism craziness, we should all consider having a open, distributed, fair price Internet and it's resources.

I'm calling Louis.

Yarr, this be objectionable, but inconsequential.

It's $15/year. Not exactly breaking the bank.

Since Twitter~>X the internet enshitification has accelerated so much…