The Streaming Service Formerly Known as IMDb TV is Rebranding To 'Amazon Freevee' (theverge.com) 39
After launching as "IMDb Freedive" back in 2019, IMDb TV quickly faded into the background of the ongoing streaming wars that parent company Amazon had already established a respectable foothold in. While that initial rebrand never quite managed to put the fledgling platform and its content on the map, Amazon's just announced its plan to reintroduce the streamer yet again under new branding ahead of a massive content push. From a report: Going forward, IMDb TV will be known as "Amazon Freevee," a name meant to emphasize that the ad-supported platform is free to viewers. In a press release detailing its vision for Freevee's future, director Ashraf Alkarmi framed the service as a supplemental platform meant to appeal to consumers interested in watching "premium" series and films with significantly fewer commercial interruptions.
Hahaha (Score:2)
significantly fewer commercial interruptions
So now not only do you pay $150 a year for Prime so they can include this tacked on service, it isn't even ad free.
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Prime is an environmental joke, with trucks running all over the country to deliver a box of paperclips or a bag of chips.
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Prime may be saving the environment by replacing trips to the store by individuals with a van that only drives a few hundred feet per delivery.
What it replaces is important (Score:5, Insightful)
Before
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Sue drives from her house to the store (2 miles), then back (2 more miles)
Bob drives from his house to the store (2 miles), then back (2 more miles)
Dan drives from his house to the store (3 miles), then back (3 more miles)
Becky drives from her house to the store (4 miles), then back (4 more miles)
Total miles driven: 22 miles
After
___
Amazon van drives from the warehouse Sue's house (3 miles)
Amazon van drives eight houses down to Bob's house (0.2 mile)
Amazon van drives six houses down to Dan's house (0.1 mile)
Amazon van drives three blocks to Becky's house (0.6 mile)
Total miles driven: 3.9
Having one van make one trip for four households to get their stuff reduces driving by 80%.
So, do you *actually* care about the environment, or is it more important to pretend that your first guess was right, the environment be damned?
Re:What it replaces is important (Score:4, Insightful)
But the Amazon van makes the tour much more often than people would drive to the store, and the warehouse isn't nearly as close, because for it to be efficient, it needs to serve a much greater area. I am not convinced that "free shipping" is an environmental benefit. "Free" rarely is. This is compounded by free returns (to the landfill).
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My city has about a dozen fulfillment centers - it's not that far away. It's closer than the sporting goods store or other stores I might drive to. The Amazon van is also dropping off other people's items *on the way* to my house. The distance that matters is the extra distance they drive from the last delivery to my house. That's generally going to be less than half a mile or so.
Yeah it ends up having one vehicle on the road is less emissions than a dozen vehicles.
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My city has about a dozen fulfillment centers
Mine doesn't have one. And I know Amazon Prime junkies who get daily Amazon deliveries. They pay for "free" shipping, so they're going to use it. They would not head out individually for the things they get delivered individually from Amazon. Counting each Amazon delivery as one trip saved is dishonest. Besides, the mile counter increases if there is meaningful competition serving the same area. Save the environment by creating a monopoly?
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-the Devil's advocate
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> am sure there is a benefit, it's just not as big as some claim it to be. If Sue, Bob, Dan, and Becky only ordered in groups of once per week then the savings would be potentially very good.
Do you not do Amazon Day?
https://www.amazon.com/gp/help... [amazon.com]
There is also some advantage that I don't go to the sporting goods store, and the hobby shop, and AutoZone, and the hardware store. It's one trip instead of three or four.
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The general idea is right, but the local numbers are 120 miles to the Amazon warehouse and six miles to the hardware store. And there is no such thing as an Amazon van.
There is UPS, Fed ex, and the post office. Amazon is no replacement for the hardware store, but for anything that can wait a week it works fine. Except shoes, since Payless packed up finding shoes has been a chore.
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Which part of Antarctica do you live in?
There are a dozen Amazon fulfillment centers in my city.
> no such thing as an Amazon van
I suppose most of the US has been hallucinating, because we all see them pull up and drop off our stuff every week.
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That's a nice fantasy, one straight out of Amazon's marketing materials. Unfortunately the reality is nothing like that.
How it works in reality:
Amazon van drives from the warehouse Sue's house (3 miles)
Amazon van drives eight houses down to Bob's house (0.2 mile)
A separate Amazon van drives from a different warehouse to Sue's house (5 miles).
That separate van continues to Bill's house (0.4 miles)
A third Amazon van then drives to Sue's house a-fucking-gain because Sue was busy ordering last night.
My personal
Calm Down (Score:2)
It's $139 dollars a year and IMDB movies with commercials existed on Prime before the recent price increase. All this article is about is a rebranding so calm down.
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I believe this is free to the public. IMDB TV already is. The article doesn't have the word "prime" in it.
Branding it with Amazon will help push Prime sales for sure, but I'll take "otherwise unedited" content with commercials.
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Prime video is available by itself for something like 9 bucks a month. Similarly, netflix, hulu, disney+, paramount+, and on and on, all offer some stream plan with prices that hover around ten bucks a month.
Personally, I would rather pay ten bucks a month than watch ads. So, "add supported streaming" has no value to me. Once upon a time, "cable" was the dominant option, and it cost WAY more than ten bucks a month, and still showed you ads. The current streaming market is outright superior.
It is a bit o
Amazon is hiding this service quite well (Score:2)
For a free-ad supported service, is pretty well hidden. No mention of it on amazon's main page, no SEO results yet, not easily discoverable in amazon menus, like the content menu, or others...
Nope... Nothing. I wanted to take it for a spin, and maybe recomend it in some forums and chats where I am a moderator, but nope.
And this is not an isolated incident. Is the standard MO of Amazon.
I set up Alexa on a PC as a Parlor trick... If I ask alexa to play a(some) very specific song(s) from a very specific artist
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I just went onto my Prime Video account and 8 recommendation rows down (not counting ads) I had a recommendation row titled "IMDb TV
Popular movies and TV – Free with ads" with a bunch of movies from them listed. For the last couple years I've seen IMBD titles with ads listed every single time I've browsed the site for something new, they're usually listed a bit down the main page.
I'm actually incredibly surprised anyone would have a problem finding them in fact.
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I just went onto my Prime Video account and 8 recommendation rows down (not counting ads) I had a recommendation row titled "IMDb TV
Popular movies and TV – Free with ads" with a bunch of movies from them listed. For the last couple years I've seen IMBD titles with ads listed every single time I've browsed the site for something new, they're usually listed a bit down the main page.
I'm actually incredibly surprised anyone would have a problem finding them in fact.
[emphasis mine].
And herein lies the crux of the matter. This was/is supposed to be a ad-supported service open to anyone. I do have an amazon acoount, but I do not have prime. Some people do not even have Amazon Accounts. This service was/is supposed to be open to all commers... At some opint, it was available from IMDb's web page...
So...
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Look it up on a smart TV, FireStick, Roku... search for "IMDB TV". Download it and install. You're welcome.
I have chromecasts (plural), PC and Macs (again, plural) all of them connected to non-smart TVs(plural). I also have Plex. Plenty of choices. Any sugestions?
Please remember this is a service intended to be free/ad-supported, and not tied to Amazon. Perhaps as a gateway drug to amazon content and services? Otherwise, how do you convince people with other devicies to join amazon if there is no "try before you buy" option?
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From my anecdotal experience, there are at least a few (several?) free ad-supported services available... IMDB TV, Tubi TV, Roku TV app, Samsung TV plus (only on Galaxy devices and Samsung smart TV's), etc. If for some reason you can't get IMDB TV to work, there are several other choices out there that offer much the same redundant content.
I am well aware of the other sources. My origibnal comment was that amazon people are trying their best to hide their free-ad-supported service, drivimg userts towards the competition, sellf-fullfilling the profecy of their downfall. Re-read my original comment if not clear enough.
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I am well aware of the other sources. My origibnal comment was that amazon people are trying their best to hide their free-ad-supported service, drivimg userts towards the competition, sellf-fullfilling the profecy of their downfall.
Then let them? You seem emotionally invested in Amazon for some reason. I couldn't give less of a shit whether they make this service succeed or fail. Amazon as a company will chug along just fine. From a streaming content perspective, there are plenty of free, ad supported services to fill the gap if this fails.
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I am well aware of the other sources. My origibnal comment was that amazon people are trying their best to hide their free-ad-supported service, drivimg userts towards the competition, sellf-fullfilling the profecy of their downfall.
Then let them? You seem emotionally invested in Amazon for some reason. I couldn't give less of a shit whether they make this service succeed or fail. Amazon as a company will chug along just fine. From a streaming content perspective, there are plenty of free, ad supported services to fill the gap if this fails.
I am not "emotionally attached to Amazon". As I said in another comment, while I do shop at Amazon 4 times a year (bulk orders, first one of this years yesterday night (eGPU enclousere and memory for my Mac, Candy for me)), I do not have prime/video/music, etc...
But, as Amazon is/are the new owner(s) of of MGM, I want the Free service of Amazon to suceed, lest the MGM catalog end up behind a paywall inside Amazon Prime Video...
Peace!
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Ah, my mistake. I misunderstood what you were saying.
That is strange that there isnt a convenient way to use the service via a web browser. Perhaps when they complete the rebranding that will change.
I never understood... (Score:2)
I mean, I like IMDB to look up movies and actors and history and stuff.
I just never understood why they needed their own streaming service?
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I mean, I like IMDB to look up movies and actors and history and stuff.
I just never understood why they needed their own streaming service?
IMDb did not need their own streaming service.
It was IMDb's Parent Company, Amazon, that needed a Free-Ad-Supported free streaming service that did not need an amazon account or an Amazon Prime subscription.
They Borrowed the IMDb brand to emphazise the separation, creating IMDbTV. That branding (coupled with a severe lack of promotion) did not work out quite well.
So in 2019 they rebranded to IMDb Freedive. That did not result (due to lack of exposure). So they are rebranding once more to Amazon Freevie. But
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The absolutely terrible name will also contribute to the eventual demise, I'm sure.
Should have named it "Prime with commercials". (Score:2)
'Amazon Freevee' (Score:2)
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more like "Amazon Ads R' Us"
You mean, like OTA TV? i.e. the TV you capture using a VHF and/or UHF antenna
It's not "free" if there is advertising. (Score:1)
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I don't disagree with you, however, I've been watching Relic Hunter on IMDB tv and I don't really find the ads to be that bad. I think people are expecting US levels of advertising (2 minutes of ads per minute of show), whereas even as a Brit (where the amount of ads allowed per hour are regulated on commercial TV) I find it fairly unobtrusive.
You get 3 or 4 ten second ads per episode which I really don't find annoying at all (even though they are mostly really bad Audible ads). Obviously I'd prefer them co
I have a love/hate relationship with IMDB TV (Score:2)
I hate the number of commercials they insert.
To be honest, they don't show as many commercials as, say, Pluto. FFS, Pluto sucks on so many levels but the biggie is a show that took an hour on broadcast TV 40 years ago still takes an hour. Um, you're showing 30-40 y/o stuff? I can't imagine it's costing you anywhere near the production budget for a new show, so, um, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?
Hey, let's pick on Pluto! Why not. Co
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> I hate the number of commercials they insert.
Even more that they're totally wrong for the audience and repetitive.
I tried watching a scifi show and the ads were for tampons and kids' juiceboxes, repeated at least three times for each show. Like they had only 4 advertisers. And they probably should have been selling ads for geeky items.
Over a 24-episode show, they probably showed that juicebox ad 50 times. I wonder what they're telling their advertisers.