Kodi reveals why TV streaming addons are breaking and users are furious

If your Kodi addons have suddenly stopped working then you’re not alone. A quick visit to social media reveals plenty of users facing the same issues with many venting their frustration as they try and fail to launch and load content on the TV player.

So what’s happened? Back last month Kodi released its latest 19.0 “Matrix” update to this software which includes new features such as refreshed look and beefed-up security.

However, it also made a change that has impacted a number of addons that are still using older software. At the time of launch, Kodi did warn users that their Kodi player could be impacted with the team saying, “hopefully, your favourite addons will still function, but we’re at the mercy of third-party contributors to update their work.”

Since the launch of 19.0 “Matrix” release, Kodi has been inundated with users moaning that their addons no longer work and with so many complaints it’s felt the need to explain its reasons behind the change.

In a new post on its blog, Kodi said: “Since we released 19.0 “Matrix”, we’ve been hearing a lot of noise about how people’s addons have stopped working.

“Kodi’s addons traditionally ran in Python 2, which was first released in October 2000. We announced in January 2018 that we’d drop Python 2 support from Kodi in version 19.

“The move seems to have taken people by surprise. Operating systems have dropped support for Python 2; it’s a huge security risk, as it (and its libraries) are unmaintained; you shouldn’t be using it unless you really, really have to.”

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So, it seems unless developers update their addons to work on the new version of Python many simply won’t work ever again.

In a bid to calm its users down, Kodi has released one fix which is to basically stick with the older version of its software and not upgrade to 19.0 “Matrix”.

“If you really want to, you can stick on Python 2 with whatever addons you choose – stay on 18.x “Leia” and never update your operating system, as a future patch or wholesale upgrade is likely to remove Python 2,” Kodi confirmed.

This does of course come with its own set of problems as you won’t be upgraded to the latest security patch which could put your devices at risk.

It’s also highly likely that most of the addons that no longer work are probably illegal so it might be a good idea to stop using them anyway.

In recent years Kodi has tried to distance itself from this online activity.

In a post on its blog titled, ‘In Defence Of Our Good Name’, the TV player said: “We do not support media piracy, we support the best media player possible for everyone and provide a media centre, not “free TV and movies.”

“One important point of note is that whilst Team Kodi produces media centre software, one thing that we do not provide is actual media,” Kodi added.

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