Amazon rumored prepping free ad-supported version of Prime Video [u]

Raising a potential threat to Apple's TV plans, people wanting to watch Amazon's movies and TV shows may soon be able to stream without paying for a Prime subscription, which normally costs $99 per year. [Updated with official denial from Amazon]

Amazon is currently in negotiations with networks, movie studios, and other media outfits about programming, which would be free but ad-supported, according to AdAge sources. To date Amazon has largely avoided inserting ads into Prime Video, the main exception being this season's NFL games.

The company could share both audience data and ad revenue, and link content payments to the number of hours spent watching, according to anonymous executives.

"Amazon is talking about giving content creators their own channels, and sharing ad revenue in exchange for a set number of hours of content each week," one of the executives elaborated.

Amazon is reportedly interested in the back catalogs of studios, and improving its libraries in children's programming as well as genres like "lifestyle," travel, and cooking.

Apple is rumored to be preparing a handful of original TV shows for 2019, including a reboot of Steven Spielberg's "Amazing Stories" and a morning show drama starring Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston. The company is allegedly rejecting any pitches with risque, HBO-style content, despite that network's success with shows like "Game of Thrones."

In the meantime Amazon has yet to launch a promised Prime Video app for the Apple TV. Its absence could be helping sales of Roku streamers and Amazon's own Fire TV.

Update: "We have no plans to create a free, ad-supported version of Prime Video," an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement to AppleInsider.

16 Comments

zroger73 787 comments · 13 Years

About 6 years ago

Can't we just get the damned Amazon Video app for Apple TV already?

mattbookair 172 comments · 14 Years

Word

bloggerblog 2507 comments · 16 Years

That's a great idea, I would only use Amazon to watch a few episodes of The Grand Tour, so ads are tolerable in that aspect.
I wish Apple would do the same, I would watch more movies from iTunes if they were ad driven as well (a break to use the loo).

ihatescreennames 1968 comments · 19 Years

bloggerblog said:

I wish Apple would do the same, I would watch more movies from iTunes if they were ad driven as well (a break to use the loo).

You could just use the “Pause” button, right? ;)

I know it’s one of my annoyances but I hate “free but ad-supported”. If there are ads then I’m paying with my time and maybe my attention. Yes, it may not cost money, but it isn’t free.

My wife likes The Blacklist on NBC. We have an ad-free sub to Hulu but The Blacklist isn’t there so we watch it using the NBC app on TV and there are ads. It’s so obnoxious. They can’t be skipped and if she can’t finish an episode one night and we continue it another night we end up watching the closest ad block on both days. Even more annoying. Don’t get me wrong, I understand the model for ad-supported television and that’s not what I’m complaining about. My complaint it that we pay for Hulu with on ads, a service that is supported by NBC, but NBC has chosen not to put that show on Hulu and instead force ads on that show’s viewers.