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Amazon introduces new online streaming service

March 2, 2011 + Over the Edge

Move over Netflix you've got competition

HANNA PETERSEN
NEWS EDITOR

amazon.com

ee) and you're done:

Amazon just gets better and better!

People who pay for Amazon’s premium membership, which
guarantees free two-day shipping, are now also being
provided with an online streaming service similar to Netflix.
Amazon has around 5,700 titles instantly available to the
million or so people who subscribe for the service.

The titles are a select of movies and television shows.
However, Netflix is still able to provide customers with close
to 20,000 titles for only $8 dollars a month, whereas the
premium Amazon membership is much more costly. But
with another bidder on the market for streaming rights, movie

ONLINE SOURCE

studios may be able to demand more for licensing rights,
which could lower the service’s profit margins and possibly
raise the dirt-cheap prices.

Streaming services are now easily available and accessible on
any internet connected device which include various TV’s set
up to connect to the internet automatically, blue ray players,
video game consoles, cell phones, and Mac products. It is
easy to see that the future of television services may be in for
a change all together. The big names in cable and satellite
providers may also be facing new competition as the world

of online streaming evolves into larger catalogues and low
standard pricing.

With Amazon announcing their new instant video service, this
is exactly the direction it seems online streaming is taking, at
least in regards to the much larger catalogue. Amazon only
has a few thousand titles compared to Netflix. At the moment
Amazon is not able to provide customers with more current
content than their rival either.

If Amazon customers want to watch more current content
through Amazon’s services they will still have to pay more
to rent or buy newer content. Netflix relies heavily on movies
that are at least a few years old to fill their libraries as well;
however, the company has recently been spending more to
acquire the rights to show more movies closer to their DVD
release dates.

With a new era of competition beginning in the online
streaming world, one can only assume a race to acquire new
titles will follow.

A spokesperson from Amazon commented that the company
was “just getting started” and that this was “day one” for them.
However, if Amazon does not eventually make their online
streaming service available to more than just their premium
members, than it is unlikely that many online streamers
will make the switch from the dirt cheap Netflix to the more
expensive Amazon services for less content. On the other
hand, this is new territory for Amazon and changes once the
streaming service kick-starts are to be expected.

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