Yay!
An even shittier version of Amazon Video with ads? Sign me up!
Amazon is preparing an online video-streaming service that will be stuffed with ads – and undercut rivals Netflix and Hulu Plus, it has been reported. The New York Post cited unnamed sources in reporting that Jeff Bezos' behemoth is readying a cheap version of the web telly service you get with a $99-a-year Amazon Prime …
I'm still baffled by why Amazon think it a good business decision to boycott chromecast. I'm not buying an Amazon branded dongle for my telly when the one I've got works perfectly. And as a result, when I'm renting a movie at the weekend, I'm using the Play Store for no reason other than Amazon won't let me watch what using the device of my choice.
Never in a million years would I want a streaming service with ads I can't skip. I'm sick to death of ads. Netflix won't be losing me as a customer. I already avoid 4OD and the like. I've reached the point of preferring to go without rather than spending 10 minutes an hour or more getting repetitive ads shoved down my throat.
4OD is terrible! It also keeps having random errors on my TV (other catchup services work fine) - which means that last time I used it the experience went like this:
3 adverts, 15 mins of program, error in 4OD, restart program -- 6 adverts, 10 mins program, advert break, 5 adverts -- 10 mins program, error in 4OD, restart program -- 6 adverts, fast forward past first ad-break, can't fast forward without watching adverts, 6 adverts. Give up.
So instead of my current Netflix service with no ads which works nicely with my Chromecast, I'd instead be paying for an Amazon service with unskippable ads, no Chromecast support, and which appears to be an extra over and above the current Prime video offering (which I dropped due to lack of Chromecast support, or indeed any Android support apart from Amazon's own devices). Wow, how could I refuse?
Ads aside, at least in my experience Netflix has always performed better technically than Amazon. Don't get me wrong, Amazon still beats everyone other than Netflix (Hulu, PBS.org, etc), but when you get around to prime time (9 - 11 PM here in the US), you know you're almost always going to be treated to the spin of death and have to refresh. That rarely happens for us with Netflix, whose tech seems to do better than others during with constrained bandwidth or duriing peak demand periods. Once they started using HTML5 DRM as an alternative to Silverlight I was able to rip out a pile of Rube Goldberg work-arounds on my Linux media box in favor of Google Chrome with a web agent editor plugin. Although we cut the cord years ago we still watch a few movies or TV episodes a week. Right now most of that content comes from Amazon because Netflix is apparently not able to get it (mostly, I think, due to collusion between the studios -- Amazon doesn't need to make a profit while Netflix does, putting the latter at a disadvantage in rights negotiationsai). Still, we maintain our monthly Netflix subscription because of the content they do have that interests us, and as a way of supporting competition in the field.