Example 1:
Right during the pandemic, TFI (French TV) put up all past seasons of its show ‘Star Academy’. It was something I have been trying to get hold of but did not have any luck. As soon as it popped I thought I got it all. (2 years ago). Today I found out I was missing the first season (8 in total) and went to try to grab it. ALL seasons have now been removed. I am quite pissed at it!
Example 2:
A user upscaled Britney Spear music videos using AI. The results were mind blowing. I grabbed all the videos I could (official ones are 480p/720 p max limited). Less than 1 week later, the content was gone…forever.
Example 3: (Non YT)
Not YT. Koh Lanta (French equivalent of Survivor) is aired on french TV (TFI again). As soon as the season is over, they take it down. You are unable to rewatch/watch it if you missed the air/stream time. ALL past seasons are also not available and that spans to about 20+ years of contents and 30+seasons. Same applies to US Survivor but to a lesser extent. And you need to keep paying to ‘stream’ it.
Conclusion:
Always archive media you want to rewatch/collect. Streaming is not your friend. It is just another way of controlling content distribution, tying you up to the ‘subscription’ slavery model instead of owning your contents and worse, down the line downright CENSORING or MODIFYING contents to fit whatever garbage narrative is currently en vogue.
Stay focused brothers!
I also want to add that you can use an extension that automatically submits pages that you go to on your computer to The Wayback Machine so that, even if it is deleted, you can easily find the artist and song by searching on Wayback Machine. The easiest way to archive it for someone who doesn’t have a lot of technical knowledge is to turn the extension on, mute your computer, and then let your entire playlist run on 2x speed (or whatever the fastest is) while you sleep.
Is this the easiest way of backing things up? No. Is it possibly more convenient to download the media for your own collection? Yeah, but if your technical knowledge is limited or if you don’t currently have access to a lot of storage space, this could probably be of use.