Back in 2020, when we were all stuck indoors and slowly losing our minds, Teleparty (then Netflix Party) brought us digital relief. It enabled us to sync up shows with our friends, chat along live and pretend that staring at a laptop screen together was the same as hanging out. Netflix was booming, everyone was still sharing passwords freely, and movies – with cinemas shut – were suddenly cheap and everywhere. Streaming was thoughtless and easy.

Fast-forward a few years, and that dream’s gone sour. Streaming feels less like a golden age and more like a long, expensive hangover. Prices are up, quality’s down and content’s scattered across so many platforms that even trying to remember where your favourite show lives can be a struggle. The result is that piracy – the old-school kind – is making a comeback.

Visits to pirate sites have jumped from 130 billion in 2020 to 216 billion in 2024.

At least some of the reasoning is simple: streaming giants have been following the mantra of what internet critics call “enshittification” – the slow, inevitable process where platforms start out good, then become bad, then become unbearable. Yet that’s the plan: to become so locked into our lives that we can’t escape them. Private equity takeovers have loaded studios with debt, forcing them to crank out quick profits. Streaming services are throttling video quality, slapping on more ads and tripling subscription costs. Some UK households are now paying close to £700 a year just to stay legally entertained. It’s no wonder some are drifting back to the open seas for free content and a hit of piracy nostalgia.

If you’re under 30, chances are you’ve already pirated something. 76% of Gen Z say they have, compared to 67% of millennials – which basically means Gen Z learned from the best. Piracy is a way to say “no thanks” to bloated, over-monetised systems. It’s not even that hard anymore.