Maybe you are familiar with a situation that goes something like this: you have planned a cozy night in with your partner to watch a film together. You have stocked up on your fave snacks and are both all ready to start the evening with a great film. However, it seems the two of you have extremely different views when it comes to deciding what a “good film” is.

You end up spending most of the time flipping through titles until finally agreeing upon something neither of you are particularly keen on and the exciting film night you’ve been waiting for turns out to be somewhat lackluster and not quite what you expected.

Just like the hero coming in to save the character in distress, streaming guides can provide a much-needed solution to any dilemma concerning what to watch or simply a useful tool for anyone who could use a bit of inspiration on the matter. If you are not sure which guide to choose, chances are pretty high that you will be able to find the best streaming movies and shows on PlayPilot – it gives you the what and where to watch on streaming services on a single platform. 

The Advantages of Streaming Guides

Streaming guides have many advantages including allowing users to choose favorites and find all their selected platforms in a single collection, reviews and ratings on different shows, and personalized recommendations. What this means is that you can watch all of your favorite streaming services – whether it includes Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, HBO Max, or any other – without having to switch back and forth between platforms.

Having a single platform makes it easy to find the specific title or show you are looking for since you can perform a single comprehensive search of all your streaming services. You can also combine all your watched- and favorite lists across all of your services so everything is simpler and collected in a single interface.

Other notable features include guides that present synopsis and recommendations on whatever is new and trending across various streaming services. This way, you can stay current with the newest releases so you never miss out. You can also make easy choices and spend less time searching titles thanks to personalized recommendations. 

How Streaming has Revolutionized Modern Entertainment?

It was not all that many years ago that telephones, televisions, and radios were considered to be new and fantastic inventions. When looking ten, twenty, thirty, or more years back it is clear to see how technology has made upgrade after upgrade with an impressive speed. It was a little over a hundred years ago, in the 1910s, that films started to become popular as a mainstream form of entertainment. These films did not have sound and it was about twenty years later that the “talking film” came onto the big screen.

Streaming has revolutionized the entertainment industry similar to the jump from the solent film to ones with soundtracks, or black and white television to color TV. So, how does streaming work? Streaming works by breaking down content from a movie or the like into smaller units that are called data packets. Your browser reviews these data packets, and the processing unit interprets the data packet as a continuous stream of information. 

How does Streaming Differ from Downloading?

In some ways, streaming and downloading are similar and streaming is a little bit like watching during downloading, although there are significant differences between the two. When you download a file in the conventional manner, you are requesting a server to send you multiple packets of data and you have to wait until you receive all of them before the download is complete and you can start watching.

On the other hand, you can begin to use the packets as soon as enough of them have arrived if you are streaming and not downloading. So, the basic difference between the two is how the computer receives the information and the way it is sent. There are also significant differences when it comes to speed, quality, standards, encoding and decoding, servers, file types, multiple users, and copyrights.

Both streaming and downloading have distinct advantages when one is preferable to use over the other. For example, if you are planning to go for a long flight, the better option would be to download a film so you can watch it after the plane has taken off and you have responsibly switched your device to flight mode. Another alternative would be to use the in-flight Wi-Fi or to have a look at the airline’s in-flight entertainment system.