I’d seen rumours online but got the email this morning.
EDIT: seems like there won’t be ads for everyone straight away.
Live events, such as sports, and content offered through Amazon Freevee will continue to include advertising. Customers in the Republic of Ireland, Channel Islands, and Isle of Man won’t see ads in their experience at this time.
To be fair, coupling free shipment with video was strange to begin with. So, they are decoupling it a bit. I do not care about Amazon video, why should I pay for it at all?
when they do fully separate the two unrelated services and people have separate charges for each, they'll soon realize how many people only watched it because it was tacked-on in the first place.
Well, it was already possible, at least where I live, to get prime video only. Especially helpful since Prime doesn’t have any faster shipping where I live anyway. That’s the subscription I had, but I cancelled them a while ago already, so I don’t know how this decision impacts subscribers like that
They probably needed to adjust costs for inflation, so not increasing the overall prime and instead increasing just the video portion is good in my book. People should not pay for services they do not use.
Same but Disney+ because they’re young but since they’re not ours and we only babysit then on weekends, if we decide to move I’ll be able to also cancel that…
I cancelled Prime as soon as I got this email. It was set to renew in February so perfect timing. I also sent them an email to provide some feedback about the change:
I cancelled my membership as soon as I received notification that you would be including ads to a PAID streaming service. I cannot believe that you think asking for more money per month to have an ad free experience is ok. The world is going to shit because of greedy corporations like you. I hope you go bankrupt and Jeff Bezos goes looking for the Titanic in a poorly made submarine.
Do you really think anyone reads your useless commentary to them? I bet this is outsourced to some AI which then gives a summary of all the comments made when canceling for further planning enshittification. No matter what you type - you help them.
Exactly what I did too! Sadly, most Americans would gladly continue paying for their lessened experience. When faced with potentially losing a tiny bit of content, most Americans will gladly pull down their pants.
100% agree. The reason we are in this situation is because people are so fucking complacent. They downplay/justify these shitty practices repeatedly and corporations just get away with worse and worse shit.
The last straw for me was no more free returns. I cancelled my prime but it doesn’t expire for a few months. A buddy of mine is doing the same. It’s no longer worth it.
I dropped Prime before any of this happened. I was paying mostly for the two-day shipping, which became increasingly longer than two days.
What made me quit it was when I ordered two of the same item from the same seller, but one shipped from the seller and one direct from Amazon. Both were listed in stock. The one shipped by the seller arrived in three days. The one shipped by Amazon had not yet shipped after the first week. I even contacted the seller, who suggested I cancel, but Amazon wouldn’t accept my cancelation, so I had to wait more than two weeks for it to ship.
Turns out I was a fool to be paying Amazon all that time for a sub-optimal service. And I’ve saved so much money ever since when I can’t just buy things with free shipping. In fact, I rarely buy anything from Amazon at all anymore.
So this? This tracks with the direction they’ve been heading for a long time, and it doesn’t surprise me one bit.
I’ve had free prime for years, I signed up for a free trial on an empty visa gift card. Every time I log in, it complains that they couldn’t collect payment, but it keeps giving me prime benefits, I’m coming up on 2 years like this.
Honestly, I would love to believe everyone here, but I remember Netflix last year with eliminating password sharing and how everyone lost their collective minds about it. I thought dam Netflix will really get it this time, then it turns out Netflix was right and they actually gained subscriptions from doing it.
They actually lost subscribers in major markets. The added subscribers were in developing markets and had nothing to do with the changes in plan costs — developing market prices are comparatively dirt cheap.
But Netflix PR was good at spinning this as a win.
Frankly the no more password sharing thing was kinda justifiable. Fair is fair, actively making the service worse and telling you that it’s for the bettering of the service when it’s clearly not on the other hand…
Netflix punished me, who does not share a password, by making it impossible to sign into a TV while on a trip because it wasn't at my 'home location' without switching the location. That isn't an option when the rest of the family is still at home and wants to watch too.
Plus Netflix had already said that sharing a password was cool with them, so it was a reversal of something that they were completely fine with when it was increasing their market share...
That whole password stuff would at minimum make me change my subscription. That multi-screen plan is way too expensive to not be able to use it away from home.
I wonder how many people downgraded though. I’m sorry, but even if I’m using their premium 4 screen plan in one household, I want the option to take it with me or let someone in another house watch something without hassle.
I personally canceled when they got rid of the cheapest option and replaced it with an ad option and a way more expensive base ad-free option. They also auto enrolled me into the premium package as the “closest” to their old cheapest plan.
Fuck em. I’ll enroll for a month when the next Sandman comes out and that’s probably it.
My parents and mil still use our Netflix, once they start charging extra I will cancel. To be fair I would’ve cancelled years ago, they are the only reason I keep the service.
Then do t use it. This is a new way to access free content. Sure it doesn’t have any suggested shows, but that’s because it does t host any shows in house. It aggregates sources. Also the project is open source, feel free to post your issues there. Open source projects only grow with the collaboration of their communities.
If you want pictures you could check out Stremio with the Torrentio addon, although I’d recommend also getting a Real-Debrid subscription for faster streaming.
If you’re interested but confused here’s a reddit thread with detailed instructions.
Why was it odd? I don’t follow mainstream media, I don’t know show names, I don’t know actors/actresses names, I don’t follow their jobs etc… so a site that wants you to specifically look for a movie or show title doesn’t actually work for me at all.
I usually watch shows/movies I see recommended by people (either online or in real life) rather than stuff recommended by an algorithm, but that’s just me. Whenever I’ve tried algorithmically suggested TV or movies, it’s kinda been bad (which is surprising considering I love Spotify’s suggestions)
The thing is I don’t think a majority of people pay for Prime for Prime Video. I obviously have no statistics for this, but I think Video is just a “bonus” on top of the shipping. I don’t know anyone who uses Prime Video as their main source of streaming.
Can confirm, of the 6 people I know with prime, only one actually cares about the video. They all got it for shipping and easily buy enough that the free shipping paid for it, so I don’t fault them at all. Heck, I‘ve had to inform a few of them that they even get video and other services at all.
I have never once accessed wherever they put their media. I don’t even know how to get to it or what shows they offer with the exception of the shows I have acquired via the high seas that says amzn or something in the files title.
Even the shipping sucks ass from them…they offer nothing to justify the cost.
Well, the total user base here is in the tens of thousands, even assuming there was even 100% agreement on that, that still amounts to less Netflix subscribers cancelling than they have in a single small town in the us.
I think people here (and reddit and other social media) forget that most people just kind of do their thing and don’t make posts online about this stuff.
I would love to, but I use Fresh for groceries because it’s literally the only grocery delivery service that doesn’t infuriate me. I wish someone would make a competent competitor to this service. I have tried literally all of the competitors in my area and had to bounce on them.
I’ll be paying and having no second thoughts about it.
I know you all LOVE to scream “shiver me timbers” at the drop of a hat but for me it’s just to much hassle. At the end of a long day at work I don’t want to have to figure out if my torrents are properly managed or use potentially questionable websites.
What I want to do is come home, press the microphone button on my shield remote, tell it what I want to watch and let it go. No hassle, no fuss, I don’t care about anything so incredibly much that if it suddenly wasn’t available then I NEED to have it at any cost. To me that kind of “have to have it right now and at all times forever and ever” mentality is just as bad as the rampant blind consumerism that the majority of humanity seems to embrace. If I want something that bad I’ll find a way to purchase it physically.
I mean this is just cuz you don’t kno how lol. I honestly find it significantly more convenient having literally all of my media on Plex vs. across 5 different streaming services that all charge too much, still give you ads, have inconsistent libraries, and pull shit when you’re in the middle of watching it.
That’s unfortunate. Prime video had some shows that were good and it had a really cool feature where you got information about the actors on your phone while you were chromecasting. Everyone with lines got a card with their name, characters name (if it’s revealed) and what they are known for. Video was the only part of the company that I am not actively boycotting but I guess its piracy all the way now.
I unsubscribed. I find myself using Amazon less and less for shipping anyways, so now I definitely don’t feel the need to stay subscribed for streaming either.
Have not seen that in the Netherlands but I’m still dropping it. Haven’t seen anything we enjoyed watching for months (and Prime delivery still takes a week in most cases).
Consider: Pirate everything. It’s just a race to the bottom. The average you can charge for an ad tiered service will just continue shifting up as each streaming service gently increases their ad-free prices. If it was ~$15/mo avg before this, now Netflix sees the avg price go to $15.57/mo. If you’re going to increase the price by 57¢ you might as well make it a nice round $1…Then Hulu sees the average go to $16.13 so then they need to increase their prices. So on and so forth until we’re back to paying $60/mo like we did for cable TV.
And here’s the kicker. They’re legally obligated to do this because they could be sued by shareholders for not trying to make more money. And that’s without mentioning that they actually prefer people to watch the ads because they generate more revenue from sponsored advertising. Pirating is ethical and cool. Paying subscription fees to trillion dollar corporations is cringe.
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