Amazon Prime Tier Rates to Avoid Commercials

Jules

Jules

SF VIP
Will you pay the extra to avoid watching commercials on Amazon Prime shows?

“Amazon Prime Video users will see ads on shows and movies from early next year unless they subscribe to an ad-free tier that would cost more, the tech giant said on Friday.”

“The company said the advertisements will be introduced in the United States, the U.K., Germany and Canada in early 2024, followed by France, Italy, Spain, Mexico and Australia later in the year.”
Source: Reuters/CBC
 

No! & Heck No! Was able to cancel my Amazon back in May '23. DD moved in with us in July, she had Amazon that I volunteer to cover. Placed my lowest limit card for my orders, (she has her own). Use the free shipping, but the extra isn't worth the poor selections on Video to me or mine. I hope it screws with their tracking.
 
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I won’t pay extra to be commercial free. There are so few shows worth watching, I’ll just suffer through. In Canada, I think I read that they’re also going to raise the minimum free shipping.

Just looked up. This only applies to certain zip codes.

”To qualify for free shipping, non-Prime members typically have to purchase an order totaling at least $25. On Monday, the e-commerce giant said it has raised that minimum to $35.” CNN, August 28th.
 
We use Amazon Prime primarily for shipping. We don't watch Amazon Prime Video, as we don't have our huge TVs attached to the Internet. Instead, we buy DVDs of whole series (all the seasons) that we're interested in and play/replay them when we want.

We can watch TV with a cheap antenna we bought.

I usually check any series we're interested in on YouTube before buying.
 
I doubt if I'll pay extra, the commercials don't bother me (some are funny) and I already watch a lot of the freevee stuff on Amazon Prime that has commercials.

On the other hand, I HATE ads on YouTube. I guess I'm inconsistent.
 
I had Prime for years and never watched any of the shows, used the Kindle, or used anything else they offered Prime members. I cancelled it four years ago because it was just an extra expense that I really didn't need. The yearly cost for free 2-day shipping (when it actually comes in 2 days) is worth it if you place a lot of orders and that's important to you. I rarely need to have something in 2 days, and my orders are over the minimum required for free shipping. So, that works fine for me.
 
Seems like a mistake to me. Amazon hasn't helped themselves as their catalog has retracted, though that's mainly due to clawback by IP owners starting their own streaming services.

That also places them under pressure to further explore funding their own production arm. Acquiring MGM wasn't free for them ether.

I'm not sure who will pay more aside from those "sharing" (wink, wink) one account with "family" (wink, wink). To them the additional cost spread over many users doesn't matter. Others will tend to be disgruntled and consider dropping Prime.

I think this is bad. Amazon was actually a force that was keeping others honest but it is less so year by year. The same 'investors" who drove cable TV prices out of sight have turned their beady eyes on streaming now, and want to milk it for the last dime.
 
I think people are crazy to subscribe to a streaming service. People moved away from cable TV because the prices just kept going up. Now streaming is doing the same thing.

The outrageous thing is they still get ad revenue above your monthly subscription fee.

Any monthly fee service is depleting your potential savings account growth.
 
I have Prime for now. Not sure if I'll keep it or not. If the landlord keeps going up on the rent I will need it for that I think. I won't pay extra to go ad free.
 
OldFeller said:
The outrageous thing is they still get ad revenue above your monthly subscription fee.
Click to expand...

Well, that started with cable TV though, right? Obviously, relayed broadcast channels would retain any ads, but cable operators started to add in their own ads and loaded up cable-only channels with ads as well.
 
OldFeller said:
People moved away from cable TV because the prices just kept going up. Now streaming is doing the same thing.
Click to expand...
I tried to warn people about this over the last few years, I believe the goal is to "finish off" cable in favor of streaming, which means not only will the streamers raise their rates higher and higher, but the internet providers will start raising costs for the kind of bandwidth you need to stream. The end of cable will mean you'll pay a hell of a lot more and get a hell of a lot less.

And now that they're using AI to generate scripts and soon, actors, so in a few years it won't cost them anything to generate the sort of tripe people line up for. Record profits for the win!

Hate to sound like a negative nelly but I've seen this coming for years now.
 
It's what I like about streaming over cable or others. With streaming you can cancel or pick and choose what you want, stop for a month or 2 . Ads don't bother me too much but the locked in choices you have with cable are the show stoppers. Amazon Video is for a year (more if you want pay monthly).

Give me my own choices don't fill the gaps with home shopping or by religiously/political biased programming. I control what programs are available & of interest to me, not anyone else. There's enough free ones if it becomes a problem, or you always have the public library to go to for TV shows or movies, ours has an extensive selection.
 
NewlySenior said:
The internet providers will start raising costs for the kind of bandwidth you need to stream.
Click to expand...
So far my ISP is locked at $45 for life. I have one TV that streams my shows & I can only watch one show at a time. If the prices start rising I'll cancel & spend my time at McDonald's for free wifi. But at my age the time left might not be a problem.
 
I took a look around. Now it looks like Amazon might be one of the last to have ad-free and no-ads tiers. Others have already announced or even instituted them.
 
I just checked Amazon to see what I’d want to watch. There sure aren’t many things. I enjoyed Goliath and Bosch. Really like Yellowstone but will not pay to see the latest seasons. Now I don’t watch any show that says to try Season 1 for free.

Amazon and others would save lots of money by not paying huge stars to act in exotic settings. Many of these shows aren’t even worth watching.
 

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