Jellyfin and Jumbles For Music Discovery
I live in a place where electricity is quite expensive and not always reliable. When my previous home server was destroyed by lightning it reinforced that my strategy of using dedicated hosting providers and VPSes for a lot of my own needs was the right move. I can't even begin to guess when I bought my lifetime Plex Pass, but over the years I watched it change from being a better XBMC to a worse Netflix. The final straw for me was when Plex decided they were going to block Hetzner users for piracy1. As my Plex server was a Hetzner auctions dedicated server deal I was affected by this. I didn't feel like playing hosting provider whack-a-mole to keep access to my media, so I migrated my Hetzner server from Plex to Jellyfin.
The View From Jellyfin
Jellyfin definitely feels a little less polished than Plex but once you're used to it you don't really notice. Pretty much anything I wanted in Plex has a jellyfin equivalent. A fundamental difference is there's no centralization. There's no Plex-specific login even for streaming on a local network. This means the only person tracking the media you view/listen to is you, which frankly should be the default all along.
The Android apps Findroid and Finamp are perfectly fine and I'd highly recommend people who are big on mobile try them out.
Jellyfin's web interface works fine in most modern browsers. I can play Jellyfin content in HaikuOS with Falkon (which is the browser I use Jellyfin with the most), or Firefox or Chromium on OpenBSD. I can, with some fiddling get mp3 streams to play on the Amiga 4000 or Mac Mini but to be honest I'm not sure why I would (aside from streaming audio to bathroom bluetooth speakers from the Amiga).
Using Jellyfin For Music Discovery
We have a lot of jumble sales, they're a big part of the social calendar. I started making an effort to always buy CDs when I go there, often for 50p each. I've rescued whole libraries and keep them with the CDTV. I also rip the CDs and upload them to my server for Jellyfin to stream back. I also buy a fair amount of music on Bandcamp - although I would happily switch to an alternative that pays artists more. This all gets uploaded to the dedicated server which then streams back down to me. Because I'm deliberately not fussy at the jumbles I have more media than I normally would choose to listen to and much of it older, but still new to me.
It's pretty easy to set up Jellyfin to display a random music view using the sorting and filter arrangement. I just pick an album at random and put it on, then add to favourites if it's good. I periodically go trim my favourites and record the best to Minidisc. I tend to use Minidisc more than CDs at home for listening and take them with me when I travel. I find Minidisc is in that sweet spot around sound quality, single-purpose, lack of screens, and physical space requirements. I had considered getting an early iPod, doing it up and putting Rockbox on it but Minidisc ticks my boxes just fine.
Results
Most days I'll switch to the albums tab, click random albums without looking at who it is and then favourite anything I like. I recently installed JellyStat to get an idea of what I replay most. This approach brought me a world of music I'd never have seen. I spent several weeks listening to Dubioza Kolektiv's back catalogue, same with Windows96, interspersed with Marty Robbins and Johnny Cash. My collection is eclectic, spanning Legowelt to Herbie Hancock but that's how I like it. There's no algorithm here. I'm not going to be recommended 5 bands that sound the same or stuck in a rut with only Coldplay to get me through the day. And if something is really terrible, I can delete it... Or maybe save it should one day the mood take me for some Throbbing Gristle.
Announcement - which is of course total bollocks. Pirates reselling large-scale Plex access will just move providers, while people who have small personal streaming setups are forced to move until the next set of blocks come out. As TFA mentions, Plex are in effect saying, "If you want to pirate, do it at home".↩