You can still do that without prime as long as your purchase totals to $25 (and is shipped by Amazon). I just wait till I hit $25 before buying everything at the same time. Anything important or critical I buy direct and not through amazon anyway.
If you’re selfhosting then you should consider Jellyfin. It does all the important stuff Plex does without the ever-increasing bloat as they try to monetize it.
Even though I have prime, I think I've used their video service like 2 or 4 times. The interface is shit and the included media was sub par the vast majority of the time unless I wanted to pay to watch something that wasn't included.
They recently updated the app interface across the board, it is much more like Netflix or others streaming apps than it was. They’ve gotten a lot of good original content and taken over some things that were cancelled elsewhere (like The Expanse).
I don’t like this change although it seems they’re all doing it, but their platform and content are pretty good these days. They are also one of the cheaper services these days if you just do a video sub, and they don’t charge a premium for 4k.
There is something that I really don’t get. Aren’t we close to critical advertisement mass by now? With all the silly advertising at this point, Amazon, for example, must be advertising on Disney+, while Disney+ is advertising on Netflix.
If you subscribe to other channels via Amazon Prime (e.g., Paramount+ through the Prime app), they already serve you 70-90s unskippable ads. Often ads for the very show you are about to watch. It's infuriating.
If I were paying for it myself it would be totally unacceptable. Since I'm just using someone else's account, it still makes me mad but I'll tolerate it.
If you live remote, say, an hour or more from real shopping and such it’s the way to get fast delivery on anything, though Walmart does ok with this, though their “fast” is fairly unreliable. (Great for front door delivery of kitty litter, dog food, etc)
But no, most people don’t need it because most people don’t live remote.
A lot of things offer free same day shipping for me now. I’ve gotten things three hours later for no extra charge.
I usually try to shop locally or at least a smaller online business, but if it’s a more expensive item and Amazon is cheaper, and I can still get it the same day or the next, Amazon usually wins out. One thing that has also bothered me is when I order directly from a company for more money and slower shipping and it’s still fulfilled by Amazon.
There have been many items I’ve looked at or bought, mostly from small-ish manufacturers, that are only available through amazon due to the manufacturer not have the resources to handle all the logistics and web store that come with selling through amazon. I do everything I can to avoid buying from them because I can’t stand their bull shit.
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