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Apps Amazon prime app eta.
- Thread starter Ben1l
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I am getting my new 4K apple tv soon. Hope this comes out soon. 
Getting it free through directvnow offer.
Getting it free through directvnow offer.
I know that most of the users here won't care about it, but here in Italy Amazon is heavily advertising to Amazon Prime subscriptions using Prime Video as a bait. And last week finally has entered the club of Fire stick countries (obviously without Alexa support). Bear in mind that Italy (France and Spain too) is considered a 3rd level country by Amazon, well beyond UK and Deutschland. No Amazon Echo, Dot-Plus-Show. No Fire stick until last week. It is my opinion that Amazon will try to postpone an Apple TV app release as long as it can. The longer the wait is, the larger the number of customers relying on alternative options to Apple TV.
The Apple TV doesn't harm Amazon Fire sales as the Amazon video app is built into smart TVs making both streaming boxes non-essential to many.
From a price point the Chromecast is biggest rival to the Fire stick hence why an Amazon video app will unlikely see the light of day on Google device anytime soon.
If Apple were to stall the release of the Amazon app, it's because it would lose them content revenue. Amazon offers free movies and TV series for Prime subscribers and now in November there are sickeningly cheap offers of recent films.
Granted iTunes has an extensive 4k offering but Amazon will inevitably do the same, and if they undercut apple or keep offering the latest movies to prime customer, my spend in iTunes will defiantly plummet.
Amazon will unlikely want to share content revenue with Apple so I suspect users will have to make purchases outside of the Apple TV.
Fair and clear point. So basically you're guessing that Apple have little/no interest in releasing the app. What did happen in June? We're discussing here quoting an official statement from Tim Cook...
I ordered mine at midnight the first day it went on sale in September, based in part on Apple's sales pitch that the Amazon app was coming, "later this year". If the Amazon app does not appear in the Apple store by January 1st, return window or not, mine is going back to Apple for a full refund.
All Prime members are Amazon customers. I suspect Amazon Prime members will still watch much more on Prime Video then on iTunes.
I heard that Apple may release the Apple TV Amazon Prime App before year's end instead of February 2018! I would buy the ATV4 if that happens.
So the people that are returning the APTVs.. are you also canceling Prime? You know since both companies have a say on this matter
Nope. Of course not. I had Prime before I had the Apple TV 4K. Indeed, Prime offers far more than just streaming to video. So I wouldn't cancel Prime, even if they didn't offer video. I didn't sign up for Amazon Prime because it was coming to the ATV 4K, it's the other way around.
The point you are missing is that Apple told me that the Amazon app was coming to the Apple TV during their first fiscal quarter, ending December 31. Put another way, they advertised that a reason to buy the ATV 4K then, was because of the impending release of the Amazon app. Had Apple not made this sales pitch, I quite likely would have waited to buy the ATV 4K until such time the Amazon app appeared on it. And I would have avoided all the grief of dealing with auto format switching, and lack of Dolby Atmos. The ONLY reason I did not return it then, is because they promised the Amazon app would be released "later this year", which is the only thing it had going for it at the time, until the beta update came along with the auto format match fix.
So the way I see it, I helped drive Apple's 4th quarter profits to record highs, based on their false sales promises, and with barely a month before Christmas, have nothing to show for it, other than a few headaches dealing with technical issues Apple should have resolved before they began selling it.
The ATV didn’t push Apple’s profits that much even with the Prime Announcement. Come on you are giving that way too much credit. Apple promised it based on Amazon’s timetable to release it.
Remember Amazon could’ve released the same version as currently available for iOS and not pay Apple a penny for in-app purchases. So what’s their excuse???
My belief is this is all about Jeff Bezos’ ego.
No, because I can get it on all my other devices. The reasoning for the Apple TV UHD is I like it better than my Roku Ultra and Sony X800 for streaming, plus I can incorporate my itunes music. That being said, if it wont have Netflix and Amazon combined, I can use another device and will get my cash back. Tired of devices that only have part of the main apps, or have outdated apps.
A promise is a promise. The expectation of an Amazon app on ATV certainly pushed me to buy ATV 4K instead of Fire 4K.
Who knows. Maybe they want to wait till after Black Friday to make sure they sold as much stuff this weekend without the additional competition. It’s all ridiculous they haven’t released it yet no matter what the reason is.
Well in Amazon's case, I'd expect them to wait until after Cyber-Monday.
It really has to happen before Christmas if it's going to happen before the end of the year. However, since Christmas is on a Monday, that actually gives them an entire weekend to maximize last minute gift sales, of the type in which Amazon specializes. In which case, maybe we don't see the app appear in the App Store until Boxing Day? It's four full weeks from Cyber-Monday to Christmas ... It's pretty awful, and petty for a company run by a man worth $100 billion if they end up dragging this out that far just to make an extra buck ...
I highly doubt this is the reason for the delay. Amazon stands to make MORE money per unit sold if they carry the Apple TV than the fire TV, and currently they are flat out losing those sales to other retailers. I have a feeling that this delay is entirely on Apple not liking some aspect of the Amazon app, and Amazon not wanting to cripple the Apple TV app in comparison to the rest of the apps they have out there. (Remember, the Amazon app is on many other platforms that all "compete" with Amazon, such as Playstation, Xbox, Tivo, etc)
Apple has been pretty hostile to anything it deems as competition for a long time, vs Amazon has for the most part embraced the competition in many areas (Alexa capabilities built into other speakers, etc). If I am going to lay blame anywhere, historically it has been Apple that has proven time and time again that they deserve the blame for this.
I tend to agree with you. However, I'm willing to believe it's a little from column a and a little from b. My current theory is that the Amazon app required native SDR/HDR and framerate switching (assuming it's just a port from the Android TV OS, which on my Sony 900E is part of the System files -- not a freestanding app downloadable from Goggle Play). Apple is feverishly prepping the release of tvOS11.2 which will support those features, and who knows what else. Since the ATV should have had that ability from day one, and it was introduced so quickly into beta after the release, I tend to think Apple pulled it at the last minute, which killed the Amazon App with it.
If that's true, we're looking at the Amazon app along with the 11.2 update, in the next couple of weeks ... Either way, Apple promised it "later this year" back in September, and it's up to them to make good on that sales promise regardless whose fault the delay is ...
Remember that the App Store goes unupdated for around 10 days over Christmas (no App updates, no price changes) so there is now less than 4 weeks before the clock essentially runs out.
I wager that the Amazon app will be out no later than 8 days after cyber Monday.
You might be right, and we all might be wrong. I just don't think that Amazon would do it JUST to increase sales of a product that they most likely already lose money or break even on, especially when it means they are losing sales of a product that likely has pretty large margins like the Apple TV. On Wednesday, I tried to search the deals on Amazon for the FireTV stick, and was instead presented with the Roku options (the FireTV Stick didn't go on sale until Thursday).
I understand that the app store isn't "free" to run, but I also think it is quite unfair to demand a 30% "tax" on everything in any app. Prime membership is already a loss leader for Amazon, and with anything digital the content creators are already setting the price with a very thin margin. I know Apple tried similar tactics with Spotify (and Spotify elected to raise prices for anyone who bought the service through the app). Apple didn't like that either, so they stopped approving updates for Spotify on the app store. Over time, something changed or was negotiated (threatened?) behind the scenes to allow updates to continue.
I cannot find a way to contact Amazon about this, if there is a way, it is buried so deep, I cannot find it anywhere on amazon's website, including the "help" section.
When you go to their twitter is says "Service: @AmazonHelp"
...I contacted @AmazonHelp, here is their lame excuse of a response:
Of course, there is no way to DM @AmazonVideo. The only thing I know for us to do is bombard their twitter by tweeting to them:
"@AmazonVideo WHERE is the Amazon Prime Video app for Apple TV?!? …you have 35 days left to get it out by end of year as promised, hurry up!"
When you go to their twitter is says "Service: @AmazonHelp"
...I contacted @AmazonHelp, here is their lame excuse of a response:
Of course, there is no way to DM @AmazonVideo. The only thing I know for us to do is bombard their twitter by tweeting to them:
"@AmazonVideo WHERE is the Amazon Prime Video app for Apple TV?!? …you have 35 days left to get it out by end of year as promised, hurry up!"
This is the response I received.
"Unfortunately, I cannot provide the exact time frame about the availability of Amazon video app for Apple TV. I'm sorry as the Amazon video app isn't available for Apple TV at this time.
Please understand that the availability of Appstore apps depends on our agreement with content provider. We're constantly working to improve our Appstore experience. However, I've taken your words as feedback regarding the availability of Amazon video app for Apple TV and forwarded to our Appstore team for future improvement."