• prole@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Even as a child, when we had cable, I would ask my dad why we still had to watch commercials even though we pay for the service. I understood why stations like CBS, NBC, or ABC may have needed ads as they were free over-the-air, but surely paying for cable should mean no ads, right?

      Never had a good answer. It’s pretty fucked up that we collectively allowed them to pull that shit on us and put up with it for like 3 decades.

      • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        There was a brief and glorious time when Pay Cable was billed as being ad-free. You would still see promos for other shows and channels between shows, but there were no commercial breaks!

        • bassomitron@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Oh shit, I forgot about that being a thing. Wow, how the fuck did society get so accustomed to dealing with that BS? Granted, we almost broke out of it when streaming became mainstream, but it looks like we’re about to get a screwed right back into it.

  • Carter@feddit.uk
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    1 year ago

    How do people think paying for a service and still being served ads is acceptable?

    • AdamEatsAss@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Hulu has a lower price tear that includes ads. It makes it more affordable for some people. If they had started out with ads I would be less upset, but for a big company like Amazon it just seems like they’re trying to make even more money off of the consumer.

      • Kernal64@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Hulu DID start out with ads. When they launched it was an entirely ad supported service. Hulu+ didn’t come until years later. After several years of running two tiers of service, free ad supported and paid ad free, they dropped the free tier. Now, years later, we’re back to ads with Hulu, but this time you pay for the privilege.

      • dangblingus@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Right, but the business model is totally different. You’re paying your cable provider for access, you’re not paying to watch the TV shows. The TV shows were financed by broadcaster advertising revenues among other streams of income. With Amazon, you’re paying for access and to fund their programs. Ads are just greedy and anti-consumer for a vertically integrated platform like Amazon Video.

      • Obinice@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Cable wasn’t really a thing here in the UK, we’re not primed for their bullshit.

    • PlatinumSf@pawb.social
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      1 year ago

      To be fair, Prime Video has always just been a free perk attached to prime (and with all the other ‘perks’ combined you could basically consider it free). For example I get an extra 3% back on all my Amazon orders by being a prime member. At the current cost of prime and just with the home supplies I order w/ subscribe and save, it pays for itself. That’s not to say I’m happy with this, but in actuality they’re fairly well positioned with the product to make this move and have most of the user base be merely disgruntled.

      • Swiggles
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        1 year ago

        Not really. They increased the price massively with the launch of Prime Video and it got even more expensive over the years. It used to cost per year what it is now per month. It was never a free perk.

  • cooopsspace@infosec.pub
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    1 year ago

    It’s literally a race to the bottom on streaming services before we eventually end up with cable in an app. Or rather multiple apps.

    Fuck I hate this timeline.

  • Obinice@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Better not be advert breaks in the service I PAY FOR, or else I’m out.

    I’m not paying anybody to serve me adverts. Ever.

    Their application is already god awful, and their database is built incredibly poorly (what idiot decided that different seasons of one TV show should have entirely separate listings in the database, often making it hard to find?!).

    AND, they’re constantly trying to shove extra paid stuff down my throat, like something called Paramount+, in the thing I’m already bloody paying for.

    I’m already at the edge of my tether with these people for their crappy service. If they introduce advertisment breaks into a service I’m paying for? That would be a direct insult, and I don’t stand for that sort of thing.

    • 2ncs@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      their database is built incredibly poorly (what idiot decided that different seasons of one TV show should have entirely separate listings in the database, often making it hard to find?!).

      Likely this is legacy from when you would buy each season as a DVD set

  • GuerillaGorillas@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Wow, first they destroy Prime Music to push you to pay extra for Music Unlimited and now this? I have no idea what the value of Prime even is now unless you order online frequently, which is harder and harder to justify with all the shady and low quality sellers polluting the site.

  • Polar@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    People use prime video? I find that half the shit I click on, it tells me it’s not included with prime and I have to buy it…

  • Got_Bent@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’ve been planning on cancelling prime at the end of the year. This closes the decision making process for me.

    I’ve been sticking to Pluto and Tubi lately. Yes, they have ads, but they are entirely free and have enough content to keep me entertained for the duration of my ever decreasing television watching habits.

    (End of year because due to terms and conditions, there is no benefit to cancel early)

      • Got_Bent@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        My experience with prime delivery in 2023 is that it has gone from two days to four days to two weeks to completely lost fuck you trying to get a refund.

        Further, I stopped using eBay in the late 2000s because everything there became “fell off a truck in China” quality. This is what a vast percentage of Amazon product has become.

        This is the crux desire to cancel.

        • Vyvanse@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          eBay has its uses, especially when you’re trying to find used genuine parts for whatever you’re working on, but other than that both eBay and Amazon seem to be flooded with Chinese crap

      • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Same, I often forget that prime video exists, I pay for prime so my wife’s packages arrive quicker and I get a free twitch sub monthly

      • Pirate_lemmy_arrrrR@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        I canceled last time they raised the price and started including football. The only thing prime is really good for is if you like making a bunch of little purchases frequently. I honestly don’t miss it at all. When I do buy something, you get free shipping on anything else you buy for the next 24 hours. That ends up covering the little stuff I might have forgotten on the original order and prime shipping was rarely 2 days anymore anyway, so what’s an extra day or two wait.

  • Beryl@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    The enshitification will continue until there isn’t any cent left to transfer to the shareholders.

  • XTL@sopuli.xyz
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    1 year ago

    Prime already has ads and they are obnoxious. They are their own ads. Is outside ads the new development or what? New tiers?

  • just_change_it@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Remember folks who are currently subscribed: They do not give prorated refunds for full year subs. When you cancel the service ends immediately. Setup calendar reminders or eat the sunk cost now because Amazon Prime is just a typical subscription entrapment scheme that will only get harder and harder to cancel, like a gym membership.

    Edit: Thanks /u/@firadin - Cancel now, you don’t lose anything and the membership simply won’t renew on your renewal date.

    • firadin@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      That’s not accurate, they don’t stop your benefits when you hit the cancel button. I just cancelled today and have my benefits until the end of my yearly subscription in November.

      • just_change_it@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Wow, you’re right. I just ended mine.

        Their website has an asshole design. They make you click through two pages before telling you the truth.

  • Tischkante@discuss.tchncs.de
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    1 year ago

    This isn’t even really normal entshitification, they added videos and some music cheap Spotify knockoff to their fast delivery flat rate. Nobody asked them to.

    Then they slowly raised the price, essentially locking everyone that just wanted free fast delivery into a video streaming service and kept increasing the price.

    They did this to force existing subscribers into their “new” business idea of a video streaming service, when they couldn’t yet compete with the competition back then. Good news for them, their competitors are shit now.

    Now they can include advertisements in it too and add more expensive advertisement free tiers. Essentially increasing the price again, but hiding it so people can’t ask for subscription fees back in Europe.

    Do they really think most people have forgotten they just wanted a fast delivery flat rate? They will never offer their delivery flat rate without video and all that stuff again, only if a legislature would force them.

    • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      And increasingly I’m finding that they’re making me place a minimum order size to get the free shipping. You know - like shipping was without prime.

    • YⓄ乙 @aussie.zone
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      1 year ago

      Trillion dollar company doesn’t care. You’ll get ads and they will take your money. Like it or not.

  • kingthrillgore@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Just in time for me to finish Invincible and fuck off

    They aren’t doing it because they have to, they’re doing it to make money.