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Amazon Launches 'Fire TV' Media Streaming Box with Voice Search, Game Support, and More

69Mustang said:
Apologies to all for going off topic. Consider yourself lucky. My wife is borderline psychotic about finances. She works at one of the Big Banks and volunteers for a credit counseling non-profit. She says I have impulse control with tech. I disagree. I plotted for 3 months to get that Fragbox.:cool: Okay, she may be partially right. I got a buddy to buy the Fire TV for me in exchange for helping him re-build his back deck. I'll just hide the Fire TV in the garage for a couple of weeks. Nothing can go wrong with that plan... right?:eek:
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I relate in that my dad was very critical about spending on things he thought was frivolous so I got used to justifying every purchase with "I got it on sale" or "It was half price". I'm nearly 50 now and I'll still say "Hey, I'm taking a vacation in Europe next month! Was able to get the flight with miles and found a great deal on lodging, etc. etc." as if someone is going to think I'm bad for spending money on a vacation unless I point out how I'm cutting corners everywhere I can. Sickness :p
 
69Mustang said:
Apologies to all for going off topic. Consider yourself lucky. My wife is borderline psychotic about finances. She works at one of the Big Banks and volunteers for a credit counseling non-profit. She says I have impulse control with tech. I disagree. I plotted for 3 months to get that Fragbox.:cool: Okay, she may be partially right. I got a buddy to buy the Fire TV for me in exchange for helping him re-build his back deck. I'll just hide the Fire TV in the garage for a couple of weeks. Nothing can go wrong with that plan... right?:eek:
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LOL.

I bought mine....when it comes I'll explain it and say I'm using MY allowance (yes, in order to not fight about finances, we each have an allowance we can spend - no questions asked). Hopefully she doesn't see our recent bed and mattress purchase as eating all that "spending" money up!
 
Amazon should just give this box away when you join Prime for $99 then its a deal
 
laurim said:
Depends on how fewer people pay for the $99 Prime membership and how badly they want to increase their revenue in their paid rental market.
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Couldn't you say the same thing for Apple then? They should give Apple TVs away?
 
I've learned this in sales.....consumers suck.

$99 for this box is a great price. Hell, $99 for Prime is great too. I've EASILY paid for it in quick shipping costs since I've had it, not to mention the streaming I get as a perk.

People always want things cheaper....its idiotic. These businesses exist to make money for their stockholders and their employees.

Saying Amazon should *give* these away with the Prime membership is ridiculous...
 
Beat

Apple beat to the punch on the Apps and Gaming on the set top box. Seems like Apple let this one slide too long. The A7 chip is totally powerful enough to be a gaming platform and the games are already there with developers lined up to modify them the moment Apple allows them on Apple TV.

There is no reason Apple couldn't have launched a product like this six months ago. No reason at all.

Now maybe there is a reason Apple won't launch such a product. Maybe it is that the user interface of iOS (which is based around touch screen) doesn't translate acceptably to TV watching. But I feel like between using iOS devices as remotes and Siri control, there could have been a work around.
 
jrswizzle said:
I've learned this in sales.....consumers suck.

$99 for this box is a great price. Hell, $99 for Prime is great too. I've EASILY paid for it in quick shipping costs since I've had it, not to mention the streaming I get as a perk.

People always want things cheaper....its idiotic. These businesses exist to make money for their stockholders and their employees.

Saying Amazon should *give* these away with the Prime membership is ridiculous...
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Agreed. Very "entitled" some are. People pay hundreds for their tech and then balk at an app that is .99 or heaven forbid higher! And then expect the developer to update it forever without ever getting any additional revenue.
 
laurim said:
It was Amazon selling the item. For example, I just bought a toy for my grand nephew and chose the Prime, sold by Amazon. The listing has this note:

"Note: This item may be available at a lower price from other sellers that are not eligible for Amazon Prime."

I paid $12.06 and I could have paid $9.99 + free standard shipping from another seller that didn't offer Prime (there are also two other vendors selling for a little less than $12). I didn't want to wait the extra days. I suppose I could argue that since I pay for Prime, Amazon should sell it for $9.99 and give me Prime shipping but Prime has always been only on certain items, not EVERY item Amazon sells. It's a tough call. Don't know whether the price is higher to make up for Prime shipping or if it would be higher no matter what and the other vendor is just price cutting.
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Apparently the issues is this: if you look at an item, logged in with your Prime membership, Amazon quotes a higher price for the same item than when you are not logged in from a different computer (Amazon I guess checks IPs). So you are paying $80 (now $100) for allegedly "free"shipping but it seems that at least for some items the price for the item you pay is a few bucks higher also, so probably to incur the shipping cost - so for what is the Prime membership than, I ask? (Ok, free movies, which I have not yet used since Apple TV doesn't bring them - so the box would be interesting but not for yet another $100 rip-off from Amazon.

See: http://brightviolet.wordpress.com/2...e-membership-isnt-such-a-good-deal-after-all/

(screen shot from above mentioned link)
 

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Not as good as the Roku, better than the Apple TV. Why spend $99 on another fractured deviced?
 
lilo777 said:
Have you though about the following fact (from Wikipedia): "On May 20, 2008, Roku announced the first Netflix Internet video streaming receiver box, the Roku DVP."

Not to mention Windows Media Extenders and all sorts of other streaming devices.
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Roku did not take off then, and didn't come close to becoming any sort of mainstream product until well after Apple TV became more established, and as someone who deluded themselves into thinking they could make Windows Media Center servers and boxes work and actually invested money into the idea, I just want to say that everything about the experience was horrid and buggy in nearly every way imaginable. Sometimes I don't like how picky Apple could be about media with iTunes, but Windows was even worse. Maybe it's improved since, but it was a nightmare then. I truly find it silly that you're even using this as any sort of rebuttal. Talk about a product that was a total non-starter...

Just because other devices existed before the Apple TV redesign we know now does not mean they were any good. I've been playing with streaming and home servers for a long time and have worked in the home theater industry in the past and am hardly unfamiliar with the options that have been there. There was nothing that was truly compelling to mainstream users before Apple TV, and there have been few since. These players did not start taking off until after the Apple TV 2nd gen release and funny enough, the other companies started copying Apple's design once again, for a minuscule TV box you barely have to see even.
 
samcraig said:
But that (to me) still doesn't provide enough data since you're looking at amazon vs a 3rd party reseller who is offering free shipping and a lower cost. That doesn't "prove" that Amazon has raised their price to include free shipping. It's not apples to apples.
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I am not trying making a point here (I have Prime myself), just saying. The Prime membership however comes from Amazon and these are sellers that partake into the program so shipping should be covered in it as well.
 
samcraig said:
Couldn't you say the same thing for Apple then? They should give Apple TVs away?
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Like they give away iPods when students buy computers during the back to school sales? ;)

Why not? If they had a recurring subscription program like the $99/yr Prime plan, that is.

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jrswizzle said:
I've learned this in sales.....consumers suck.

$99 for this box is a great price. Hell, $99 for Prime is great too. I've EASILY paid for it in quick shipping costs since I've had it, not to mention the streaming I get as a perk.

People always want things cheaper....its idiotic. These businesses exist to make money for their stockholders and their employees.

Saying Amazon should *give* these away with the Prime membership is ridiculous...
Click to expand...

Maybe not give them away but at a lower price as a Prime membership incentive. Done all the time.
 
gri said:
Apparently the issues is this: if you look at an item, logged in with your Prime membership, Amazon quotes a higher price for the same item than when you are not logged in from a different computer (Amazon I guess checks IPs). So you are paying $80 (now $100) for allegedly "free"shipping but it seems that at least for some items the price for the item you pay is a few bucks higher also, so probably to incur the shipping cost - so for what is the Prime membership than, I ask? (Ok, free movies, which I have not yet used since Apple TV doesn't bring them - so the box would be interesting but not for yet another $100 rip-off from Amazon.

See: http://brightviolet.wordpress.com/2...e-membership-isnt-such-a-good-deal-after-all/

(screen shot from above mentioned link)
Click to expand...
\
Based on that screenshot and the link,

The difference is the source of purchase.

The 'prime' picture shows if you ordered the item directly from Amazon direct. Amazon has it in wearhouse, They ship it, and they're selling it to you.

The second screenshot actualyl shows the purchase through "Ace Photo Digital"

Because of their being a 3rd party seller involved, who has the rights to set their own prices, and their own shipping, you are not comparing like resources to eachother.

What you need to do is pull up a listing in Amazon Prime, note the price, and then load the identical amazon listing without the prime. Not from a 3rd party vendor, but direct from Amazon.

P.S., the link you have provided is a 4 year old blog post by someone who hasn't actually provided real evidence to his claim
 
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gri said:
Apparently the issues is this: if you look at an item, logged in with your Prime membership, Amazon quotes a higher price for the same item than when you are not logged in from a different computer (Amazon I guess checks IPs). So you are paying $80 (now $100) for allegedly "free"shipping but it seems that at least for some items the price for the item you pay is a few bucks higher also, so probably to incur the shipping cost - so for what is the Prime membership than, I ask? (Ok, free movies, which I have not yet used since Apple TV doesn't bring them - so the box would be interesting but not for yet another $100 rip-off from Amazon.

See: http://brightviolet.wordpress.com/2...e-membership-isnt-such-a-good-deal-after-all/

(screen shot from above mentioned link)
Click to expand...

Your examples don't show what you are saying they show. The different prices are from two different vendors. If you look on the page with the lower price, you can see the same Amazon price in the right hand sidebar. So, exact same prices on different computers. You just happened to get another vendor first when you searched for that item, which also happens to me. Might be randomized on purpose to make it fair but you can search further or look in the sidebar to see the other vendors for that item.
 
LordVic said:
\
Based on that screenshot and the link,

The difference is the source of purchase.

The 'prime' picture shows if you ordered the item directly from Amazon direct. Amazon has it in wearhouse, They ship it, and they're selling it to you.

The second screenshot actualyl shows the purchase through "Ace Photo Digital"

Because of their being a 3rd party seller involved, who has the rights to set their own prices, and their own shipping, you are not comparing like resources to eachother.

What you need to do is pull up a listing in Amazon Prime, note the price, and then load the identical amazon listing without the prime. Not from a 3rd party vendor, but direct from Amazon.
Click to expand...

Exactly - people forget Amazon doesn't sell everything on their website. Many products are sold through third parties who set prices and shipping costs.

Amazon sets a price for their version of the item and offers prime shipping. If another seller undercuts that price AND offers free shipping, you're more than welcome to use them. Amazon isn't going to undercut every third party seller on their site.....
 
gri said:
I am not trying making a point here (I have Prime myself), just saying. The Prime membership however comes from Amazon and these are sellers that partake into the program so shipping should be covered in it as well.
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I don't understand what you are saying. If the sellers were in the Prime program, they would have Prime next to the price.
 
For $99 I've ordered the Amazon Fire TV as a second device for when I want to watch Amazon Prime exclusive content. Otherwise I'll continue using my ATV. But Apple needs to do a refresh on ATV, it's looking a little tired. Amazon did all right for themselves today.
 
TallManNY said:
Apple beat to the punch on the Apps and Gaming on the set top box. Seems like Apple let this one slide too long. The A7 chip is totally powerful enough to be a gaming platform and the games are already there with developers lined up to modify them the moment Apple allows them on Apple TV.

There is no reason Apple couldn't have launched a product like this six months ago. No reason at all.

Now maybe there is a reason Apple won't launch such a product. Maybe it is that the user interface of iOS (which is based around touch screen) doesn't translate acceptably to TV watching. But I feel like between using iOS devices as remotes and Siri control, there could have been a work around.
Click to expand...

Have you noticed how many bugs have come about as iOS transitioned into the 7 era? Mavericks hasn't exactly been rock solid either. If you threw new TV product into the mix six months ago, you'd be asking for way too much trouble.

Apple knows that they're going to have the better hardware whenever they drop their product, and they also know they have a far more established app development community ready to move when Apple finally hits the go button.

And to be clear, I'm not even saying this is a bad product. I think it looks like Amazon did a real good job in many regards and they got the price right, so if it performs well, that's great. I think a standalone box is generally a much better option than the Chromecast model that Google's done, and the Fire TV does have features that will appeal to some users.

But when Apple puts out a new box, unless they completely drop the ball, which I don't think they'll do, I think it'll clearly jump way out ahead of some of these other boxes on the market. Apple has a huge reach already, they have the hardware edge, they have a huge group of developers well-versed in writing iOS apps, and they're likely to end up having the OS software edge as far as usability goes for most users. Nerds who want to do nerd things will never be happy with stock Apple, but the 99% of the market who actually buys these things tend to prefer software that's simple to use. Even if other companies are catching up, Apple has developed that reputation in consumer devices and it will give them an edge.

It'd be great to know more about what they're planning, but I think whenever we get it'll have been worth the wait. And I'm really, truly not hurting at all with three Apple TV 3s running off an iTunes server system. I've never had a smoother experience with my media.
 
Solver said:
"... one more thing. Amazon Prime will now be available on Apple TV."
(we can only hope :))
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I buy EVERYTHING from Amazon Instant Video (Looking at you, new episodes of The Walking Dead) or else I would own an Apple TV by now.
 
So then.... is this an Amazon "loss leader" like has been suggested for the Kindles - sell cheap to sell content.

Or, are they making money on the hardware?

Apple wants to make their money on the hardware.... although content is creeping up and there might be a shift in thought at the top.

But they are the same price, and granted Apple is making more on the ATV the older it gets, but they aren't big into price changes, and their upgrade should come out making money at the $99 price point.

So basically, i'm thinking Amazon will end up making money on the thing to supplement the cost of streaming.

I dunno, just random thoughts given the different take on business models.
 
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