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Look, you know the drill.

Your parents have DStv, they watch on the telly and don’t use streaming at all (which they pay for as it’s included in the subscription), and it would be rude to let that go to waste.

With DStv Premium increasing from R829 to R839 a month from April 1 this year and the price of a Woolies roast chicken reaching three figures, times are tough.

However, all that password sharing eventually caught the eye of MultiChoice, which owns DStv, and they clamped down from March 22. Each account was limited to streaming DStv on one device at a time.

The problem here is that paying customers were also up in arms because two streams at the same time often proved crucial to maintaining peace at home. Live sport on the telly, for example, and two streams for the rest of the house to enjoy.

MultiChoice has heard those cries of anguish, reports TimesLIVE, and plans are afoot to rectify this:

MultiChoice SA CEO Nyiko Shiburi said despite the pushback, the change was a big success and attracted more subscribers.

He said the service was originally meant to allow family members to watch different things at the same time in the same house, and the company is working towards easing the stream limit for such scenarios.

“We are working on a solution whereby if we determine people are in the same location, we will allow them more views.”

At present, no timeframe has been given for the implementation as it’s still “in the discovery phase of this process”. Essentially, though, multiple streams within the same household would be okay once the changes are made.

I guess it’s relatively good news if you happen to live close to the person whose password you are using but I foresee some logistical nightmares.

What if one person from the household is at work and wants to stream, and another is at home? Will the technology recognise that and allow multiple streams concurrently, or will it still be flagged?

More from Shiburi:

“We are proud that all our customers can enjoy streaming their favourite DStv channels, shows and movies anywhere, anytime on our world-class platforms. However, we were facing rampant piracy challenges due to the password-sharing option. This has a devastating effect on the growth of the local entertainment industry. We are working hard to find a solution for customers that doesn’t negatively impact the industry.”

Is DStv Now actually a “world-class platform”? From my experience, it’s prone to crashing pretty regularly.

Without SuperSport, which broadcasts more live sport than any other broadcaster internationally and keeps the service afloat, DStv would certainly struggle to retain users.

As long as they have all that live sport, though, I’ll keep paying.

[source:timeslive]