this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2023
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[–] [email protected] 195 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I refuse to pay for ads to be delivered to me. Seeing them unpaid is bad enough and I avoid it at all costs. But I will not pay for ads.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 year ago (11 children)

I've returned to the high seas, eye patch and all.

I found a seedbox provider that is fairly cheap and works well. I have a long standing rss feed for new shows so next step is going to be getting it setup to auto download for me. I can do it locally but spectrum is hard core with the dmca notices and I don't want to risk losing my account.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (7 children)

Have a look at the **arr range of apps

Sonarr and Radarr with NZBGet, usenet indexer and a cheap unlimited news server provider, and you're laughing. I have everything downloading automagically as soon as its release, loads right into Jellyfin - all on a copyright notice keen ISP and never have any issues because im not sharing anything up, its all down with usenet

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago (4 children)

I have Spectrum as well, but using a VPN w/ dead switch turned on has worked thus far. They really are ruthless with dmca though. Hate Spectrum with a deep, deep passion, and not just because of that, but everything else. There's a competitor rolling out fiber everywhere in my city though, so I will soon be ditching them, thankfully.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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!

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[–] [email protected] 127 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

🏴‍☠️🏴‍☠️🏴‍☠️🏴‍☠️🏴‍☠️

yo ho, a pirates life for me

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 year ago (18 children)

Would help if they still made content worth pirating.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I liked The Boys and Tales From The Loop. Couldn't tell you anything else they made though

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[–] [email protected] 105 points 1 year ago (3 children)

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

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 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.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (5 children)

People lived with it for years with cable.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Cable started out without ads too. That was why you paid for it.

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[–] [email protected] 91 points 1 year ago (3 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago

My ISP already offers a streaming package, you pay monthly for a package of streaming apps. It's literally cable with extra steps

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago

cable […] in multiple apps

These ppl really reinvented cable, but worse

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[–] [email protected] 59 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Finally, that's what everyone has been eagerly waiting for ...

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, what we were always missing after fleeing cable, was the ads that really made each show worth it.

Why can't we just have nice things?

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (3 children)
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[–] [email protected] 58 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (3 children)

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

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[–] [email protected] 41 points 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.

[–] [email protected] 40 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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..

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago

I hate this. Let me hide everything that isn't included.

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 year ago (8 children)

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)

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 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?

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Is that new? When I cancelled last year a couple months into my year long subscription I got the money back for the unused months. No problem, easy too.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 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.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 year ago (3 children)

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

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Lol that’s a nope from me, dawg. I’ll bail on that once I start seeing ads on a thing I pay for.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 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.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I just cancelled. Was thinking about doing it during the last price hike but never got around to it. Good thing they announced it now since it was going to renewed on the 15th of October.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago

It already fucking has one!! And I have prime!! what the fuck

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago

yar har fiddle dee dee

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago

"We aim to provide a meaningfully worse experience than the sailors of the seven seas are getting," Amazon insisted.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So glad I cancelled Prime a few months ago. Turns out, I’m still getting free shipping even without it and I didn’t find Rings of Power worth pirating.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Time to ditch Prime.

TBH, it was a long ago, but this is the last straw.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago

Amazon Prime hasn't been good for years. There's no reason to pay for it.

If amazon was smart they would have not included their streaming service in their free shipping subscription but now it just feels like an expensive bloated product with minimal value.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

At the bottom of article…

Users will have the option to buy an ad-free subscription for an additional $2.99 per month, while the current prices will give them the version with ads.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Translation: Amazon is raising the price of Prime by $3/month. For comparison, Prime Video is currently $9/month.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago

Meanwhile, me, pirating like a chad

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

Wow, that’s actually really shitty. They should have just raised the prices by $24, and announced a cheaper version of prime with ads. Nobody would have questioned it.

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