Amazon Prime to have ads 2024

[jimborae]

One of mine is the TS-664, i.e. the 6-bay version of the same, and yes, the 4GB v 8GB thing was an issue. However, for me, was it a killer issue? .....
....If I was reviewing their kit, it's a point I'd make - these changes will actively suit some users, and distinctly not suit others. Be careful to determine which camp you, dear reader, fit into before buying. The overall package is very impressive, and the software certainly good if you need/want it, for certain users.

Sorry maybe I wasn't clear with the QNAP 464 and the second PCI-E slot. It should have worked but mine, and many others was faulty, due to some sort of hardware failure. The retailer and QNAP were quite prepared to swap it for another unit but by that point I'd lost faith and was n't willing to take a risk of another faulty unit or it failing further down the line. So no con just a faulty batch probably.

Re Synology - yeah the focus of their prosumer/SOHO units seems to definitely be moving away from Intel and onto AMD, which if you're just doing storage/file serving is fine and understandable but anything home media server related is not good at all, like wise they're attempts to lock you into overpriced proprietary hardrives, SSD's and RAM is just a joke.

So yep my 920+ will be my last Synology NAS till the hardware & company direction changes somewhat.

[Saracen999]

Has anyone with Prime actually seen ad's (other than the usual rubbish) yet?

As I understand it, they'll be putting them before and, far worse in my view, during films and TV series, and it apparently started 5h Feb. However, so far, I've not had a single one, and I've been using Prime a fair bit the last few weeks, determined to watch a few films I had my eye on, and even more, finish a couple of TV series. And so far, not one single advert.

My suspicion is that because I'm still in the month of Prime subscription that was active BEFORE ad's officially started, though that ends in a day or two. I rather expect that as soon as it renews, ad's will start. In which case, my best time to cancel Prime is before renewal. But if there's some delay in starting the ad's, I'll let Prime renew.

For anyone that hasn't heard me drone on about it over the years, I am hugely antagonistic to ad's inside programs. It destroys the flow, destroys the ambience and kills my interest stone dead. I've taken the time (a lot) and tne expense (about £1400 in total) over about 25 years, to record broadcast TV to HDR, and edit adverts out before watching the film/programme, for that exact reason.

I'm peeved with Amazon, not so much about £3/month (though it does amount to a 33% price hike, if we look at like-for-like service provision) but for the way they presented it. What really frosted my conkers is the "we haven't changed the price" remark, the deceitful, disingenuous <bleeps>. Unless you count reducing the service and keeping the price the same, yes you are, Amazon. Suppose you have a gym membership (for example) that you actually use, and they anounce that they're keeping the price the same but now, you can only use the service for the first 21 days in a 28 day period, and if you want the full 28 days it's going to cost 33% more .... "but we're keeping the price the same". Or when you put a gallon of petrol in your car, the price is the same but you'll only get 3/4 of a gallon for the money, now, and if you want the full gallon .... and so on.

It's deceitful, and THAT is what's given me the right hump over it.

What is NOT, under any circumstances, going to happen with me is watching stuff on Prime with adverts during the programme. Hell will freeze over first. So my options are to pay the extra, or cancel Prime. Or, I guess, carry on with Prime and just not bother with Prime Video.

It's not the £3. To be honest, that makes no real difference. If they'd just announced a price rise due to costs, well, whatever. But, there's not actually much on Prime I'm bothered with, or not that I haven't already watched. If they offered an option for Prime without Prime video (y'know, seeing as how the video service is obviousy so damned expensive to run) at a lower price, like used to be the case before they stuffed Video into Prime whether we wanted it or not, I'd take that. But they haven't. Instead, they've tried to con us by cutting the service, to something that renders Prime Video utterly valueless to me, and pretended it's not a de-facto price rise. And, as is obvious from this rant, I'm not happy about it and don't feel inclined to pay up, because of how they went about it.

I'm just a bit surprised the ad's haven't already started .... for me. Anyone else getting them yet?

[Jonj1611]

I have been watching Rings of Power lately and there was 1 ad about 30 seconds long at some random part of the programme

[Saracen999]

I watched all episodes of Mr & Mrs Smith, and I think 3 films (Constantine, one of the Tesident Evil series and .... can't remember) and so far, zip, zilch, nada.

Maybe I've just been lucky (so far).

[AGTDenton]

I have been watching Rings of Power lately and there was 1 ad about 30 seconds long at some random part of the programme

That's disappointing, sounds like no effort to put an ad in a sensible place like a scene change, very similar to YouTube where midway through a sentence an ad will appear then you have to rewind once the ad is done because it completely distorts your focus.

Hopefully they don't add the 30minute ads that appear on Youtube either. Makes the whole viewing experience completely pointless when sometimes you haven't noticed and 10 minutes in you think what is this gobbledygook.

[Jonj1611]

The advert was mid sentence in a really stupid place as well.

[AGTDenton]

The advert was mid sentence in a really stupid place as well.

Wonderful

I watched all episodes of Mr & Mrs Smith, and I think 3 films (Constantine, one of the Tesident Evil series and .... can't remember) and so far, zip, zilch, nada.

Maybe I've just been lucky (so far).

Just made me think, if you watched this on an app like on the TV or phone maybe there's an update you've yet to receive that would activate it.

[Saracen999]

Watched it on a laptop, and using a slightly old Firefox (v.122).

One thing I did wonder about is it keeps putting up a nag screen when I go into Prime Video, about the "changes". The options appear to be "upgrade" or "Not now" and if you select "Not now", well, that's when it nags .... though SO FAR only when I first go in to PV, or somehow refresh. In other words, it's annoying but not causing an actual problem with viewing content.

There doesn't seem to be a "Don't upgrade" option, other than "Not now", in which case .... nag, nag. It MIGHT be intended for me to go into the upgrade option, and then there's an option for "leave as it is", but I don't know, because I keep doing "Not now".

Maybe, just maybe, I'm getting some leeway because I haven't agreed to anything explicitly, yet. If so, I can't see that working for long.

Or, it's because they're potentially on iffy legal ground if they change the service for the worse, part-way through the period (month, in my case) already paid for, when they started the ad's thing going. In which case, it'll change on monthly renewal, which is a few days later than I thought - I have about a week left. I'm sure their T&C's has them covered to change things if they want, but maybe they're just avoiding that little bit of contentiousness, by not changing mid-month. Or not. Dunno.

On Jonj's point - do you mean that the film (or whatever) carried on and you'll miss 30-secnds of action and dialog if you don't wind back, or that they pause the film while the ad is playing?

Not that I'm willing to accept either, but if it just overwrites the audio/video of the film, that's even worse than pausing mid-sentence then resuming where they paused, halfway through a sentence.

I'm now curious as to when this is going to bite me? I'm sure it will sooner or later, and no doubt sooner than later. I'm just surprised it hasn't already.

I did even wonder if my ad-blocking was preventing it? But, it's just UBlock Origin, it's nothing fancy. I can't believe they'd implement ad's at all if bypassing them was THAT simple. I just assumed they're inserted at source, in the film/TV-show stream, not in local device, app or browser and that even blocking known ad-company IPs would do nothing?

I'll (probably) watch another film tonight. Make hay while the sun shines, because I'm sure the heavy clouds will arrive shortly. At which point, I'm still very much incined to hoist the ol' 'digitus impudicus' at Amazon, and just dump Prime.

Maybe I'll give Netflix a try. Or Paramount, or something. Yes, I know some of them are probably as (or more) expensive than Prime plus the £3, but as previously covered, it's not the £3 that's annoying me

I need to work out where some shows (Game of Thrones, for instance) are showing as I haven't seen it all. Or maybe Stranger Things. Maybe Amazon have unintentionally done me a favour by p'ing me right off!?

[Jonj1611]

It's like an advert on TV, pauses the film, goes back to the point it was paused from when the advert finishes.

I was using it on the TV app.

However I haven't tried Firefox yet, I use Ublock Origin which completely takes out adverts from youtube etc. Hoping it will do the same with Amazon

[Saracen999]

Thanks, Jon. That is, of course, a far more accetable method that blanking out some of the film, etc. I did struggle to think they'd be that stupid. That said, neither are acceptable to me, but that is just me. It'd be nice if Origin solved it, but I can't believe it's that easy. I can (easily) believe Origin can block calls to external ad-servers by IP, but I can't believe Amazon would implement it that way. It'd be nice if they did, though.