The only subscription service that I pay for is tidal for music (pays artists more than Spotify, same cost) and that's only because maintaining a local library of music is too much of a pain for me right now. I may slowly build a local music library of only music I like, but I love listening to new artists so the $10 per month is worth the convenience.
YouTube? Ublock origin
Movie/tv streaming? Self hosted media library, plus some random services that are provided through my phone bill at no cost
File storage? Stored with my movies and TV on some hdds in raid
Amazon? Its not hard to find other retailers (or direct providers) with better prices and no subscription needed. Sometimes have to pay for shipping and it's slower, but worth it
I do go for YouTube premium but that’s my primary source of entertainment nowadays and it does result in more money in my favorite content creators’ pockets (apparently more than ad-based revenue according to some sources at least). Plus YouTube music is included in that and is actually quite good.
Yeah had the same feeling about tidal as well. Settled for Apple Music since they offer hifi and a nice interface. Spotify still has the best playlists but it’s getting feature bloat and the quality isn’t up to par
The best deal you will get is Apple Music. Especially if you are a classical music fan it is unbeatable. But another HiFi one that isn’t apple, is qobuz, although the song selection isn’t as wide as spotify or tidal or apple music. But they do pay artists a lot more and they have a webstore for purchasing FLAC and MP3s if that’s what you like.
I haven't had any issues with it, the quality isn't as good as self hosted flac files (unless you want to pay for the highest tier, I assume) but it's at least as good as Spotify imo. Big selling point initially was Plex integration though
If you have at least 6tb of storage space and good internet, the RedTopia torrent is more than enough to fill out a personal music library. That + SoulSeek for whatever new stuff shows up in my feed is everything I could ever need. Streamed anywhere onto my phone through Plex or PlexAmp