Amazon is Now Primetime

This past weekend, while I tried in vain to relax, Amazon shook hands with Fox Broadcasting to bring more than 11,000 titles to its streaming service. Besides the popular stuff like 24, Arrested Development, etc., I’m looking forward to In Living Color, and Married … With Children. There are some gems in Fox’s television catalogue, and there are some duds (That 80′s Show?) This comes as great news for Amazon who is poised to challenge Netflix for streaming supremacy. According to TechCrunch, CEO Jeff Bezos says, “I have big news for Amazon Prime members – we’ve just signed a deal with Fox to add a broad selection of movies and TV shows to our unlimited instant streaming service later this fall. The new additions from the FOX library include 24, Arrested Development, The X-Files, Ally McBeal, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and – available on digital video for the first time – The Wonder Years. We now have deals with CBS, NBCUniversal, Sony, and Warner Bros, and adding Fox will bring the total to more than 11,000 movies and TV shows available for unlimited instant streaming.” Price-wise, Amazon will charge $79.99/year, which breaks down to about $1.35 less per month than Netflix. Exclusivity isn’t a major factor as only The Wonder Years are an Amazon exclusive. What is going to be a threat for Netflix isn’t merely a cheaper price. Amazon is just warming up. They are likely to add more and more content and continue to do so. Prime subscribers also get free 2-day shipping, so this comes as perfect timing as the holidays are a mere 8.5 weeks away. Time to save that pocket change! An additional threat comes from the fact that Amazon isn’t just a video streaming service. As written on CrunchBase, “Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) is a leading global Internet company and one of the most trafficked Internet retail destinations worldwide. Amazon is one of the first companies to sell products deep into the long tail by housing them all in numerous warehouses and distributing products from many partner companies. Amazon directly sells, or acts as a platform for the sale of a broad range of products. These include books, music, videos, consumer electronics, clothing and household products. The majority of Amazon’s sales are products sold by Amazon, with the remaining amount from third-party sellers.” This means that the potential customer pool is MASSIVE. With folks defecting from Ebay to go to Amazon, with Prime subscribers getting free shipping, and with more and more retail moving online, this is going to play out like a very well-written soap opera. We were all wondering how the fall out from the Netflix announcement this summer (see: The Confession) would affect the streaming landscape. With Dish network pissing away an opportunity with Blockbuster and now Amazon putting ink to paper over the weekend, I’m gonna get my popcorn ready… About SeedCornPPC: Seed Corn Advertising is an online Advertising Network based in Los Angeles, California committed to establishing new business development partnerships and to grow your search network and ours. Learn more about SeedCornPPC by visiting us at http://www.seedcornppc.com/