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+---- Thread: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon (/showthread.php?tid=108124)
Re: RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - jpavlocak - 2013-04-26
(2013-04-26, 19:26)Citizen_Seven Wrote: As much as I would like to believe to the contrary, I suspect the general public wouldn't care. The existence of the cell phone industry is proof of that, general acceptance of devices being purposefully locked out of walled gardens, or nerfed in functionality. I mean, really, people are willing to pay extra fees to cell phone companies to use wi-fi on their own devices, or pay to monitor their own usage. If that's generally considered "acceptable", I doubt there would be much outcry over a company changing a protocol that just so happens to break unsupported (but worked previously) devices.
Morpheus needs to set them free from the matrix before a revolution can be mounted. :P
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - Citizen_Seven - 2013-04-26
Heh. Well, I always tell people "It's your damn phone|tablet|whatever. You paid for it, you carry it around. What you put on it is your own damn business and your carrier should not get a say or a cut." Inevitably, the response is resignation: the benefit of having phone|tablet|whatever connected to the network/internet is ultimately worth it to the vast majority of people. I can't say I understand it, but that seems to be the reality.
This business with Amazon is pretty much parallel: you paid for the content, what you play it on is none of their damn business. I suspect the ultimate outcome will be the same: people will pony up to buy approved devices to use the service, or even when their still functioning devices are EOLed in the future. Lather rinse repeat.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - snmp - 2013-04-27
or just pirate it. they dont realize it but thats the only option they are leaving people who legitimately pay for their service. you make it inconvenient for them to stream media to the devices they want, the savvy will just find another way to stream it whether it be legal or not, smart move amazon, netflix and the like, you are all idiots. when are these people going to realize you CANNOT control the flow of information, especially when i have purchased it. greed moves you and your downfall.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - DonGateley - 2013-04-27
I don't think Amazon itself particularly wanted all this. We can really thank the content providers for forcing it. Amazon's upcoming device is a way for them to continue distribution with full power to negotiate with and to satisfy the content providers without having to twist the arms of other distributors of the content in order to stay in the business. As nothing more than a fully sanctioned spigot I'll bet it comes so cheap that it will be really hard for anybody to complain about it.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - rodalpho - 2013-04-28
Piracy isn't really a replacement for amazon or netflix. They're enormous libraries you can browse and pick something to watch. When you pirate, you tend to search for a specific title. Additionally netflix and amazon don't get content quickly, they don't have even second-run movies. Piracy competes directly with hulu, not netflix or amazon.
That said, it still makes zero sense why amazon would block paying subscribers from their service.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - locoguano - 2013-04-29
(2013-04-28, 22:19)rodalpho Wrote: Piracy isn't really a replacement for amazon or netflix. They're enormous libraries you can browse and pick something to watch. When you pirate, you tend to search for a specific title. Additionally netflix and amazon don't get content quickly, they don't have even second-run movies. Piracy competes directly with hulu, not netflix or amazon.Not true. 1channel is piracy and the selection is much larger than a legitimate service. Not all piracy is "downloads".
That said, it still makes zero sense why amazon would block paying subscribers from their service.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - dugan26 - 2013-04-29
Hi guys please excuse me here - from what I am reading in this thread .... Amazon plugin is no longer working in XBMC? because of a "bug" that they are fixing? Is that the case? I use to use it few months back - then went on last night and get the play back failed error.
Is this is a done deal ?
Re: RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - MoeDee - 2013-04-29
(2013-04-29, 18:29)dugan26 Wrote: Hi guys please excuse me here - from what I am reading in this thread .... Amazon plugin is no longer working in XBMC? because of a "bug" that they are fixing? Is that the case? I use to use it few months back - then went on last night and get the play back failed error.
Is this is a done deal ?
No .. no bug... Intentional switch to use DRM by amazon.
Or in other words: amazon prime only allowed on sanctioned / approved devices/software.. supporting DRM...
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - dugan26 - 2013-04-29
got ya - so it does not work in xbmc anymore
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - Doctor3D - 2013-04-29
While I'm bummed out that this stopped working (My favorite plugin), I don't blame amazon. This plugin was not a legitimate\authorized way to stream content from Amazon in the first place. The irony is this was the only one of the good plugins that didn't do something 'wrong.' Both the Youtube and Hulu plugins, for example, remove the ads - which cuts the revenue from all the content curators.
But, still, XBMC was never a 'supported' device. They have grown significantly within the last few months, and their newer partners may be pushing them for DRM in order to obtain their content.
Such a shame though...I seem to use this plugin more than just about anything and that's with over 2500+ DVDs all ripped to HDs...I still liked the service as it always had stuff I hadn't seen.
I`ll probably pick up a Roku or something..everything is going digital - and set-top boxes that are authorized to stream from all these services popping up is really the best way to watch online content.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - mikefreeman - 2013-04-30
(2013-04-29, 19:52)Doctor3D Wrote: I`ll probably pick up a Roku or something..everything is going digital - and set-top boxes that are authorized to stream from all these services popping up is really the best way to watch online content.
Honestly, I have to disagree. I have my HTPC setup with Linux and XBMC. I spent a fair bit of money on it. It has worked wonderfully. I want to use it. YouTube, Hulu, tons of other addons, and most importantly my TV tuner/PVR run through it. I can even run video games and any other computer programs I want to run through it (can't do that with a silly set-up box). It's a seemless, unified GUI environment that I never have to switch away from. I don't want to have to get yet another box to have to switch TV inputs and get used to multiple UI's for one stupid service. And if that box ends up not supporting another service I want to use, do I need yet another box? My TV doesn't have unlimited inputs.
No. The "best way" is not for me to buy yet-another-device, but for content services and producers to get their heads out of their low, dark places and realize that DRM hurts their customers and doesn't prevent piracy (in fact promotes it), and that the more ways they can get content to their customers, the more customers they will have lining up to pay for their service. They need to open their content back up so that it can be viewed on whatever devices the customer wants to view it on.
When I first started using the Amazon plugin, I had some minor issues, and contacted Amazon support for help. While the person who replied back said the XBMC addon wasn't officially supported, they also said that they knew it was possible, seemed ok with me using it, and helped find the best way to get help for it. I was very happy with the level of support I got from them, despite using something they didn't officially sanction. I was given the impression that while it wasn't supported, it also wasn't shunned. That gave me hope in the company, and I proudly supported them, bought almost everything from them, told everyone I knew to use them instead of Netflix. I was a regular Amazon evangelist! I started buying up the movies I wanted to watch that weren't on their "free" list. Now, suddenly, I don't have any usable way to watch any of the movies I purchased the access to. My young kids also used their hard-earned allowance money to get movies, and don't understand why they can't watch them anymore. Contacting Amazon support now is an ever-deepening downward spiral of disappointment. They will not let me watch movies I bought the rights to watch. And no, I don't want to buy a much more limiting and limited device just to do it more inconveniently. So, until they unblock the access, I will no longer buy anything from them. Until then, I will tell everyone I meet to never use their service.
They're losing me and many others, not because we don't use an officially-supported device, but because they and their product sources have put their own selfish business strategy ahead of their customer's needs and wants. Sadly, the old "the customer is always right" mentality no longer exists. It's now, "the customer will use what we demand, or nothing at all." And they get away with it.
I saw a post with Jeff Bezos standing on stage with a presentation behind him saying, "We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices." (underlining was like that on the presentation) But, obviously their underlining and wording belies the truth: the operative word isn't "use", it's "our".
Re: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - teresa - 2013-04-30
You would think companies would understand that if people cannot use amazon or Netflix on their various devices, they are forcing people to alternatives like icefilms etc. I let my 8 year old buy a movie on amazon with his allowance and now he cannot watch it. I am glad I did not buy much with them. I along with others will have to seek alternatives.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - varanasi - 2013-04-30
(2013-04-29, 19:52)Doctor3D Wrote: While I'm bummed out that this stopped working (My favorite plugin), I don't blame amazon. This plugin was not a legitimate\authorized way to stream content from Amazon in the first place. The irony is this was the only one of the good plugins that didn't do something 'wrong.' Both the Youtube and Hulu plugins, for example, remove the ads - which cuts the revenue from all the content curators.
But, still, XBMC was never a 'supported' device. They have grown significantly within the last few months, and their newer partners may be pushing them for DRM in order to obtain their content.
I am not saying this to attack you, but amazon does not commit to continue to support "supported" devices. Nor do the amazon prime terms of service distinguish between "bad" ways to watch and "good" ways to watch. People using this plugin paid subscription fees to amazon. Theey weren't, to my knowledge, doing anything bad or wrong.
Moreover, Amazon may very well make another "bug fix" that makes watching prime impossible on a currently "supported" device. Is it really likely that amazon will continue to support third-party hardware and software forever? Or even for, let's say, three years? I expect that in the future amazon will simply remove devices, even those purchased from amazon, from their supported list unilaterally.
I think there are two big problems here and both are created by amazon behaving badly. First, amazon streams using a proprietary, closed technology that now requires a closed proprietary product to watch it. They are no longer actually selling a streaming service alone. Amazon is now selling a streaming service and various watching devices. It's also a way for amazon to leverage its market power into areas outside the online services area. If you think there is some value in having free markets, you should probably be in favor of open standards for watching even closed content. (Of course, one can be against closed content as well for various other reasons.)
Second, amazon makes unannounced changes that harm chunks of their subscriber base. This change screwed not only xbmc users but linux and android users. It also made it impossible for many of those users to watch things that they believed they had "purchased." If a company or person knows that someone is buying something from them relying on a misconception based on things the seller has said, it's fraud. I'm not saying that amazon committed fraud, but I suspect most people who "bought" a movie from amazon believed that they had purchased something akin to a movie on a dvd not something that would suddenly disappear like the sucker's cash stake in The Sting.
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - bkimbel - 2013-04-30
Is there any way this plug-in could be modified to launch a browser that would view the video? That way we could still navigate using Bluecop's great GUI. Maybe if the addon wrote the URL to a file or something like that, and then use Advanced Launcher to start the browser?
RE: [RELEASE] Amazon Prime Instant Video plug-in addon - DonGateley - 2013-04-30
Amazon does not produce content. It merely distributes it for profit. The recent video channel deprecation simply must be due to requirements of of the content producers and not Amazon itself which only stands to lose from these new restrictions. If Amazon can find a way to satisfy these producers while still supporting the prior range of re-distributers like XBMC and browsers (HD) it will almost certainly do so. If not, I really don't think that Amazon can be held accountable for the dictates of a paranoid content industry.
If this contradicts anything I might have said here before, that's because I've given the situation more thought.