Living in Germany, but I'm an american. Signed up for Crunchy Roll. Most the shows my friends are recommending are region locked. The remaining ones are mostly German-dubbed only, with no subtitles. Most don't have original Japanese either.
Only a handful I want to watch actually have subs or English dubs.
It's not like I don't want to pay for this stuff but when it's a huge conditional tree of if I'm going to have a good experience, with no other (non-pirate alternative), what do you do?
Meanwhile, Spotify doesn't have this issue. Happily pay for that, despite not being a fan of how the company operates.
It's really not that bad. CrunchyRoll has _almost_ everything, especially since Sony bought Funimation and AOD shut down. Some of the real Blockbusters miss sometimes (Oshi no ko, Cyberpunk, Pluto, etc.) because those are the ones that are worth it for Netflix, Amazon and Disney+. CR is great for someone watching a lot of anime. If you want to watch the one or two big shows each season you might not find them there though. I rarely find anything I can't watch in Japanese with english subtitles.
(Old stuff is often missing too. if you're after that those I understand what you mean.)
The anime situation in Germany is years behind. Germans are famously moralising against piracy but this seems to be a case where they do it anyway because it’s just impossible to find anime otherwise
The problem is that I have to pay for another thing just to watch the thing I was already paying for.
Piracy almost always is caused by a lack of convenience, namely:
"I get the service, have a (sometimes very) limited selection of stuff, and have to pay for it, and if I want that other thing I have to pay for another entirely different service"
or
"I get anything I want with a little hassle, but for free"
Until they start blocking VPNs like other streaming services? Piracy is a solution that doesn't end up a cat and mouse game. Sounds like op is paying for the content but it's region locked, so the dumbest form of pushing your customers to piracy.
Only a handful I want to watch actually have subs or English dubs.
It's not like I don't want to pay for this stuff but when it's a huge conditional tree of if I'm going to have a good experience, with no other (non-pirate alternative), what do you do?
Meanwhile, Spotify doesn't have this issue. Happily pay for that, despite not being a fan of how the company operates.