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Amazon To Cease Sale of Apple TV and Chromecast
Mark Wilson writes: As of 29 October, shoppers will no longer be able to buy Apple TV or Chromecast devices from Amazon. Citing compatibility issues with Prime Video, Amazon emailed marketplace sellers to inform them it is not accepting new listings for the two media devices, and any existing listings will be removed at the end of October. The move indicates not only the importance Amazon places on its streaming Prime Video service, but also that it views Apple and Google as serious rivals. The two companies have yet to respond to the news, but it is unlikely to be well-received.
Their terms of service and privacy policy make Google look downright disinterested in collecting its users data by comparison.
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If you want me to use your instant and prime video options, the correct course of action would be to make the available everywhere, not to remove products that you refuse to support (and given that I've seen Chromecast apps knocked out in a weekend there's really no excuses). Oh, and make it so that shared prime actually shares all of the prime features instead of just shipping. It's incredibly stupid that prime videos don't work on my phone because my wife's Amazon account has the primary prime account.
How couldn't this be a base for a an anti-trust lawsuit against amazon ?
Is Amazon big enough that this will open the eyes of federal regulators?
I wonder how amazon would feel if Apple said none of their products could be sold through amazon.com, given that they're often in the top 5 sellers of their areas.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
I had been hoping Amazon Prime video would be added to AppleTV. Guess this means pretty much no way that's going to happen.
Or perhaps this is Amazon's way of getting it added... AppleTV can come back to Amazon as soon as PrimeVideo is added to AppleTV.
What something to replace the Amazon Fire TV and Amazon Fire TV Stick that have been out... since April 2014 and November 2014 respectively?
I'm surprised it hasn't happened earlier.
Over the last three years, Prime Video has become an important part of Prime. It's important that the streaming media players we sell interact well with Prime Video in order to avoid customer confusion.
I really wish companies would drop the BS when announcing things like this. Customers aren't going to be confused. Amazon doesn't want to sell products that compete with their own, fine. I just wish they didn't pretend like they were doing this to make customers happier.
I have 70Mbps high speed cable it but has a 350Gb cap
I found your problem...
Perhaps sending Bezos into space is actually a really good idea, along with it being a solution to the problem.
What app revenue cut? The Prime Video app is free.
Oh, you mean "in-app purchases"? That makes sense for Candy Crush, but no sense for Prime Video.
Amazon is not going to give Apple 15% of that income any sooner than Apple would do the same in reverse.
Does the FireTV have an iTunes app?
The problem is actually Amazon's DRM system.
Amazon Prime uses Adobe FlashAccess for it's DRM to prevent copying of rented and purchased content (forget that I could just hook up an LVDS emulator as my "LCD Display" and copy it all anyway).
ChromeCast and Apple TV don't support FlashAccess because they don't support Flash.
On the other hand, I have a friend who just bought a Samsung TV on clearance, and it's Amazon Prime video quit running because it started demanding that the Flash version be updated in the TV, which would be great, but it's an embedded system with no way to do that without updating the browser, and Samsung is somewhat notorious for not updating hardware once it's been sold.
Mostly because it would cost them their ability to write firmware for a new television set, were they to take their television team, and put them on updating an older product that they're not even manufacturing any more, and that won't get them into the consumer's wallets anyway, unless they started charing about half the cost of a new TV for the firmware updates.
Amazon needs to drop their proprietary system, or insist that Adobe (1) quit changing their DRM implementation, or (2) provide the updates as plugins that *can* be downloaded to any TV, based on the fact that they are running ARM processors. #2 is problematic, since a port of Chrome is the browser used on most of these (the source code costs Samsung nothing), and Chrome quit supporting non-sandboxed third party plugins not purchased through the Chrome App store and/or Google Play.
So Amazon is pretty screwed here.
So Amazon is jeopardising their own reputation as the one-stop online shop where you can buy any popular goods and items in existence -- just because they want to sell more of their own video streaming gadget? They must be terrified of their competitors.
Yes, it's not "free" the same way education and healthcare aren't (and never will be) "free." But you end up saving a lot of money and getting the added convenience of 2-day shipping. So if you use it enough, then maybe your first 10 or 12 expedited orders are "prepaid," but everything after that it is free (to the customer anyway - someone's paying). So yes, not quite free, if you want to be pedantic about it, but more like "buy 10, get as many as you want."
Stupid sexy Flanders.
A critical difference however: neither Fox nor CBS sell the means of access.
Amazon is showing textbook Conflict of Interest.
It's getting worse, and Amazon is hardly the only culprit. Netflix original series are a problem, despite many of them being awesome shows.
How much longer until "meet the new boss, same as the old boss."
This signature is false.
I watch Amazon Instant Video, using Chrome, pushed across a ChromeCast to my TV.
When Chrome brought out the new ChromeCast, I bought one immediately just to get the 5GHz version, if nothing else (my 5GHz channels are dead, but the 2.4Ghz are jam-packed).
Fuck that up for me, Amazon, and I will just cancel the Prime subscription and not trust any software or online service from you again. I won't stop buying physical products, but you can forget all the add-on shit. No way I'm having my video library (which is 50% Amazon, 50% Google Play at the moment) tied into a format that I am denied playing how I like even though there is NO TECHNICAL BARRIER as far as I'm concerned. It works today, it should work tomorrow. If it doesn't, I'll reconsider how I use your service.
P.S. Why you'd buy a ChromeCast from Amazon anyway, I can't fathom. Bought from the Google website yesterday, have a delivery waiting for me at the post office today - not bad given that everyone was buying them. Same experience when I bought a Nexus for my daughter. Amazon is great, but you don't buy everything from Amazon just because it's convenient. It still has to be a good deal that you can't get elsewhere.
I'm sure the DOJ will be filing suit against Apple for this very shortly.
I don't see it as a COI. Amazon sells stuff, including streaming services, that is their Primary Interest. If a hardware vendor chooses not to support the streaming service Amazon sells, why should Amazon sell the hardware? My corner grocer stopped selling a cream cheese made from yogurt and that space is now filled by it's own brand of similar (but lesser value) yogurt cheese... that's OK because they own the store, not me. I wish they would sell what I want, but they don't so if really I want it I can shop elsewhere. Not every store has to sell every product. Other stores sell the products, and if the products are good they may soon be selling more of them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_of_interest
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
Amazon is free to produce their own app for Chromecast or Apple TV. This is probably more an issue where they want to push people into buying their own devices instead of Apple or Android devices.
Furthermore, Amazon does not have a fundamental right to refuse to sell anything it wants. Certain refusals similar to this one are outlawed (see here). According to the FTC's website there, if a company is refusing to provide a product in a strategy to acquire or maintain a monopoly, then it's illegal. I don't know whether this applies in this case (IANAL), but it certainly is a practice that harms consumers, and therefore should be outlawed.
This has nothing at all to do with selling stuff and nothing to do with appliances or applications. This is all about who gets to be the global publishers of content, who gets the lions share of content profits, who takes 30% for doing fuck all (realistically managing a marketing engine is pretty much doing fuck all except adding massive cost to the end user).
So they are all in it, the ISPs, the internet backbone companies (may ex incumbent telcos), the online sales companies and existing publishers. The people excluded being the people producing the content, thou shalt not direct publish else thou wilst be destroyed by the DMCA and court costs. They are all fighting for monopoly domination of that 30% for doing fuck all and seeking to extend it out to 50% and even 100% ie huffington post you should be thankful for the exposure and ha ha fuck you.
Nothing to do with end users or content producers and everything to do with locking in publishing monopolies.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Point of order: You can actually install Amazon App store apps through the Amazon (Store) app that IS available via Google Play. And yes I know that is a horrible sentence to parse. I think you do still have to have "third party sources" turned on for your Android device, but the Amazon App store is not 100% required.
Apple doesn't offer access to its content for non-Apple set top boxes and it doesn't offer even an option of non-Apple hardware for much of anything, but people still eat Apple's shit with a smile on their face.
I own most of the major STB devices aside from Apple's, but in my opinion the larger, not-Stick FireTV is the best of breed option. It works with services I'd actually want to use. It's responsive in its UI and can be used for light gaming. It's open enough to support non-Amazon apps if you're willing to sideload them. If Amazon wants to push its position in that market,I think I'm OK with that.
If Google really wants to push the issue, killing Amazon's API key for Youtube access on FireTV devices would probably be a strong bargaining chip, but having used both Chromecast and Nexus Player as well as Google TV hardware, I think STB devices are still an afterthought and besides, there are still plenty of places to buy them.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
I can't comment on Apple TV, but Chromecast is pretty much open, there's nothing stopping Amazon from writing an app to stream to Chromecast. I'm kinda bewildered to be honest they're blocking it.
(For those who have experience: What is the situation with Apple TV? Is Apple open to any app provider, and do they allow app makers to use their own methods of funding, or do they demand a cut of any payments?)
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
The amazon video app is only in the amazon app store, not the google play store. But as far as I know, this is amazon's choice. They want to encourage android users to install the amazon app store so they can sell apps to the users; their video app is a carrot.
I recently tried to get the amazon video app. After 30 minutes of apps pointing at web pages pointing back at the same apps, I deleted the amazon app store and decided that I didn't need to watch amazon prime videos after all.
This is a dick move by amazon, but it's well within their rights. If they want to try to prop up their video service by not selling competing products, no problem; both apple and google have online stores.
(IANAL)
As near as I can tell, that's the only accurate statement in your entire post.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I had the same experience with trying to try out Amazon Prime videos. I gave up before I got to watch a single video, and I didn't renew after my Amazon Prime trial ended because of video being not worth the effort. Mission accomplished, Amazon?
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Man, do you guys NOT understand anti-trust laws at all.
There is NOTHING that mandates a retailer must sell a competitors product. How in the world would that be an anti-trust law. If so, does Verizon have to sell AT&T phones and contracts? Are Ford dealers required to sell Chevy's?
Goodness gracious the stupidity on Slashdot is enormous today. They're not even trolls, they're more like ignorant orcs.