silverrenard

The problem isn't going to go away. Not because people are completely unwilling to pay a streaming service (people are subscribing to them all the time) but rather two major reasons. The first is cost related, but it isn't an unwillingness, but rather an inability. With nearly everything becoming subscriptions that renew monthly/yearly, the cost of such services, while minute compared to other things, is an added cost that many can't justify adding to the growing amount of things they are already having to shell out for (shelter, food, car, school, etc...). If they can find it for free, then that is a cost they no longer have to incur. The second reason is there is no true competition. After Crunchyroll bought up Funimation and shut down it's streaming service, no real competitor emerged (no, Netflix is not a direct competitor, despite claims to the contrary by Crunchyroll itself I am sure). Without anyone directly competing, Crunchyroll is free to charge whatever they like, gatekeep whatever anime does not suit their tastes, or whatever studio doesn't agree to their hosting fees just doesn't get their items shown. For these reasons alone, beyond the general greed of some just refusing to pay for anything, these sites will continue to pop up over and over, finding new ways to circumvent any efforts made to prevent them. There may be delays, there may be temporary losses in content as shifts occur, but they will continue to come back.