Unofficial M3U8 Playlists For Pluto TV, Samsung & Plex, Shut Down By Warner

Offering movies and TV shows at no cost to the consumer has seen 'FAST' services like Pluto TV attract tens of millions of users. Consumption is also thriving via unofficial methods, including M3U8 playlists that are versatile despite their simplicity. During the past 24 hours, the most popular unofficial playlists were taken offline by Warner Bros, succeeding where earlier attempts failed.

Free advertising-supported streaming television services, such as market leader Pluto TV, The Roku Channel, and Samsung TV Plus, offer a traditional linear TV viewing experience, via an app, at zero cost to the consumer.

Despite most internet users being constantly spoiled by the availability of free content, as a value proposition FAST services are undoubtedly impressive. Had something similar been available to the public a couple of decades ago, it would’ve been fascinating to see the effect on unauthorized content consumption. Thousands of TV shows and movies for free would’ve gone down a storm.

In reality, however, propositions like FAST take time to mature and need to make commercial sense. Whether FAST services will overtake subscription services as some are predicting remains to be seen, but the formula does seem to be working.

Yet among certain consumers, platforms like Pluto TV are even better when subjected to a few tweaks. These help a good product realize its potential to become something better, they suggest. Rightsholders disagree.

Pluto TV Plays On Pretty Much Any Device

Edge cases aside, Pluto TV does indeed play on pretty much all platforms but becomes much more pliable when iOS and Android apps are ditched in favor of an M3U8 playlist. Since Pluto TV doesn’t supply a playlist, using software such as TVHeadend, NextPVR Jellyfin, or Kodi to view channels, requires outside help.

Other solutions exist but none are as popular or stable as those offered by developer Matt Huisman. His software generates .m3u8 playlist files for many FAST services; all users have to do is copy the playlist’s URL from Huisman’s site, and then paste the URL into a device that can handle m3u8 playlists. By linking to a live remote file, any updates to the playlist are also updated locally.

Or at least that used to be the case. On Wednesday, Huisman revealed that his playlists for Pluto TV, Samsung TV Plus, Stirr, Plex and PBS, have run into trouble.

Copyright Complaint Filed at Cloudflare

Posted as an issue in the Pluto TV playlist repo on GitHub, the title reveals that after receiving a DMCA takedown notice, playlists for Pluto TV, Samsung TV Plus, Stirr, Plex and PBS, are no longer available.

No DMCA complaints were sent to GitHub. On this occasion, anti-piracy outfit Markscan, on behalf of Warner Bros., sent a DMCA takedown notice to Cloudflare. Despite the length of the notice and considerable attention to detail, Markscan appears to have omitted the basics.

The allegedly infringing URL appears clearly but, after detailing its relationship with Warner Bros. Discovery, Markscan’s “proof to show that our client is the owner of certain rights to the copyright work(s)” amounts to a link to the Warner Bros. website but no mention of any copyrighted works.

The anti-piracy outfit then asks Cloudflare to intervene “to get any infringing content removed,” and to ban Huisman from using Cloudflare ever again. The notice goes on to reference a URL that doesn’t exist and then swears (on penalty of perjury) that the information in the notice is accurate.

Huisman: I Can’t Be Bothered Trying to Fight This

Since the takedown notice failed to identify any infringing content, it’s impossible to know what specific content it intended to target, if that was ever the intention at all. Huisman is in the dark too.

“To be clear, this playlist only contained: image urls and the channel urls pointed to an external domain. You can see they don’t even mention what the copyright material is,” he explains.

“However, i cant be bothered trying to fight this. The playlist stuff is just a pain in the butt anyway and I don’t want to risk what I really enjoy (Kodi addons) for the sake of some playlists.”

After DAZN targeted the playlists in January, it appears that a deficient DMCA notice filed at Cloudflare has somehow managed to finish the job. Or maybe not.

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