Prime is adding ads to their streaming service

Are other online retailers so hopelessly sucky that you can't live without Amazon over in the states? It just blows my mind because Amazon honestly sucks compared to the more local stores where I'm at in the Nordics.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/09/amazon-jacks-up-price-of-ad-free-prime-video-by-2-99-starting-in-2024/

News broke on this a few months ago, and I jumped ship. Their failed music app is another reason I ditched their ecosystem. Kept crashing; music would pause mid-song; couldn't play downloaded music offline without a data connection.

Video service had such poor title coverage and nothing compelling for the price. As many others have said, the value proposition didn't work. Enshittification is in full swing. Sail the high seas.

The real trick is you cancel AND shop elsewhere. We get most of our necessities locally now at normal retail and I'll occasionally put an Amazon order together when I need something specific and I'll spend enough for free shipping.

I missed shopping there at first, but so much of their inventory is junk now; I feel like I actually get better quality from traditional retail. The $140/yr for Prime feels like free shipping but it obviously isn't.

An already overpriced subscription service wants more money 🤣

This is such a weird way of announcing/implementing a $3/month increase for Prime video by Amazon, and a lot more destructive PR-wise too.

And I continue adding primevideo's content to my Jellyfin server

This and the rising costs plus adding ads to 'basic' tiers and attempting to create limitations (resolutions, "screens", offline downloads) is what might push me to build a nice, large NAS. We don't want Cable again.

I wish I could just get Prime shipping and drop the video service. I may still drop the whole thing.

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Announced just after Christmas, a time when I assume a lot of people sign up for Prime so they can save shipping on presents.

What the hell do people watch on prime? I got it for Thursday night football. There’s nothing interesting on there and half the content is “rent/buy”

I canceled Prime in 2021. The expedited shipping is nice and all but it really just felt like paying rent to someone I don't like nor want or have to pay rent to.

Regarding the shipping cost:
Just collect things to buy until you are over the treshold. Helped me with overbuying stuff I don't even really need.
If you are moatly in it for the shipping: Just stop. You give them more money through that than paying for shipping.

Scamazon

Bait and switch.

I’m ditching it. The convenience has gone and content has gone. I built a wish list which is now mostly unavailable.

I need to up my game in terms of automating my torrenting and making it family - accessible.

I'd already decided to cancel Prime when they cancelled The Peripheral after renewing it. Had I not, this decision would have made the choice for me.

Embrace. Extend. Extinguish.

Everything worth seeing can be torrented anyway. I canceled a year ago and haven’t noticed a loss of anything as long as any orders are over $35 for free shipping.

The people on your man o' war
Are treated worse than scum
I'm no flogging captain
And by God I've sailed with some
Come with me to Barbary
We'll ply there up and down
Not quite exactly
In the service of the Crown

To lay with pretty women
To drink Madeira wine
To hear the rollers thunder
On a shore that isn't mine

-- Mr. Knofler Privateering

All of their ads that said "there's more to prime!" are what planted the seed in my mind that I should cancel. I don't use any of the "more" stuff, but we were paying for it anyway.

I don't miss Prime at all. You still get free shipping as long as you let you wait until you have $35 of stuff in your cart.

Hearing about this got me to reevaluate whether I needed Prime and I ended up cancelling altogether. Just a heads up, if you cancel mid-subscription (I was on the yearly plan) you get the option to cancel service immediately and refund what you didn't use. I was supposed to re-up in May and ended up getting $63 refunded.

Living in a major city where we have a Amazon warehouse, I cancelled prime because they failed their promise on two day shipping. 2021-2023, I started seeing packages take as long as 5 days. Now, half my orders take that long. What is the point of that's the whole ad pitch?

they still do free shipping on orders over like 30 quid

Guess I'll be putting Helluva Boss on my Plex server.

Meh.

My prime was already cancelled because they billed me in early January, when that extra $100 could be used on Christmas gifts, so it always snuck up on me.

I didn't use it enough to justify it anyway.

Freevee is Amazon prime video junior with ads, and that's already free. WTF, is Amazon thinking or not thinking?

It is super easy to cancel. You even get a partial refund if you want it gone today. Wait a couple months and see if you really miss it. Join the piracy gang. Ultimately, you are the product and Internet streaming has turned into cable TV. Take back what little privacy you have left.

I have never found anything particularly worth watching on Prime. Well Good Omens but that's not enough for a whole service.

$5 to my local pbs station a month and get passport = the only streaming service i need

Canceled a few months ago.

I thought about torrenting both series of Good Omens out of spite when I found out about this

Prime is SGD2.99/month in Singapore (~USD2.26). For that you get free next day (sometimes same day) shipping, Prime Video, Prime Gaming, access to buy Amazon Fresh groceries, and probably other stuff I’m forgetting. Singapore also has low import duty which means access to a lot of Amazon US products which also come with Prime shipping, albeit they usually take a week or two to deliver.

It’s very obviously predatory pricing and I assume one day it’ll go through the roof like it has in the US but it’s interesting that Amazon can do this, right?

What made decide to cancel Prime was realizing that Amazon was adding a markup to prime products that effectively cancelled out any shipping savings. But also prime video offering was crap where I live.

That and Amazon being a terrible company that I didn't want to support anyway.

I had mine cancelled and reupped cause I literally buy things I need randomly and sometimes never hit the free shipping. Most of my stuff is farm related fixing things, so I definitely hit the price I pay...still really annoyed that it's $140 a year now, but I get my money out of it....

Fuck you bundle Amazon day ship option...

With this Amazon is taking a page from Nintendo's play book.

prevent paying more for shipping by not using amazon at all.

They'll keep an ad-free option for another $2.99/month per https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/entertainment/prime-video-update-announces-limited-ads

Is it possible to have Prime, but without Prime Video? I don’t give one iota of a fuck about their shit ass streaming service.

I don’t even pay for prime for streaming. Watched a movie or two on there when it was something I wanted to see and found out it was free on Prime. Otherwise, I use it for the expedited shipping. I did briefly cancel in 2021, but the spouse complained. We split it now anyway, so it’s cheaper. Overall, though the quality of products offered on Amazon has gone way down hill. If the product is something that doesn’t need to be quality, it’s fine, but if you’d have to replace the item if it is not quality, you’re better off skipping Amazon. The value proposition is declining.

What does this mean for shows and movies that I purchased? Will they have ads unless I pony up? If I cancel Prime will I lose access to them?

Looks like Amazon wants to close off this year with yet another rent-seeking episode. Thankfully I don't use Amazon, but my parents still pay for Prime specifically for their streaming service, so this is going to be very annoying for them :/

I’ve literally never streamed a single video from prime and don’t plan to. The deals for prime members and shipping alone save me more than the yearly cost. The instant their yearly cost outweighs shipping fees I’ll cancel in a second.

I was rooting for Prime Video but they don't even have any Premiership football from next season, so it's an irrelevant service now

It was already bad enough when they advertised for their own shows at the beginning of episodes...

Anyway, I stopped subscribing to Prime years ago, didn't want to give my money to Amazon unless I have no other place to purchase some items.

I paid for 15 days of Real Debrid and other than running into a lot of non-English streams it's been great. If I can get it convenient to download shows automatically (I've heard of ways to integrate with arr services) I might start cancelling services.

This is one of many reasons why I'm selling my Kindle Paperwhite and getting a Pocketbook Ink Pad 3 Color. Amazon is the Apple of retail, which drips down to even the ebooks. I do, however, have to consider my wife's comfort when ordering stuff, but otherwise, ready to pull the plug on Bezoz and his gang.

I have it for the shipping otherwise I'd cancel. I'm certainly not watching the stuff on there with ads.

This year, I bought a Costco membership and ditched Prime. Fuck Amazon.