Amazon has been met with fury today, as the retail goliath launches its new pricing tiers for Prime Video.
It’s been a busy month in the Connected TV (CTV) space and the arrival of opportunity on the world’s biggest retail site would seem to be another win. But with such a backlash against this move, are we witnessing a doom-laden prophecy for the future of this industry?
How Prime peeved its subscribers
Prime Video ads were introduced to US subscribers last week and have now been launched in the UK. A rollout to other countries is imminent.
Unlike Netflix and Disney, which launched cheaper ad tiers last year, Amazon’s new tier is actually the more expensive one.
The standard Prime membership will become the ad tier and users will have to pay an extra $2.99 for no ads. Even then, Amazon explains there may still be the occasional promotion trailer before a movie or TV show.
So far, members’ reactions have been overwhelmingly negative.
Users have taken to X to voice their frustrations, labelling Amazon and its Founder Jeff Bezos as ‘greedy’.
