@RedOak
Vikings Season 4 Part 2 is not free w Prime. They want $34 for it.
Do you expect it to make it to Prime? I’ve seen stuff that was on Prime Video be removed.
Remind me periodically or I’ll forget. Looks to be s great show tho.
@f00l Really? Vikings was one of the reasons we thought about keeping prime. The major reason for rejecting prime was it would not stream in HD to chromecast. or PC, because they were afraid I was going to steal the content. (really in this day?) They were helpful and pointed out a TV on amazon that would play the content in HD, gee, thanks.
No Amazon instant vid content streams in HD to PC afaik. I am surprised about the chromecast not doing it.
Will it stream HD to a Roku, which prob has an Amazon app built it? It would surely stream in HD to a Fire Stick and some of those are way cheap, aren’t they?
I ask because if Prime would be worth it to you except for the HD to pic and HD to chromecast limit, couldn’t you fix that cheaply w a roku or fire stick? Or do you prefer streaming to a pc and want HD on that?
I wonder if the limits on streaming in HD are initiated by Amazon, or imposed by the content distributors?
Right now all of Vikings except series 4 part 2 in free on prime. You could get that on DVD or BR from Netflix or the library couldn’t you? Or buy a copy, watch, sell?
@f00l isn’t the Amazon “current series” pattern to either not carry or post with a rental fee when the episodes are fresh… and then to go free for a period of time? Occasionally, then to go rental again after another period of time passes?
We watch Prime (or did ) on a full range of devices, from PC, HTPC, Roku, Smart DVD, Smart DVD, tablet and laptop.
Haven’t noticed any of those having particular problems with HD. If there are HD issues, it tends to be that someone else is streaming or gaming in the house. #TooCheapFor20Mbit.
I often stream on a second PC monitor under the illusion I am getting something constructive accomplished at the same time on the other monitor!
I often stream on a second PC monitor under the illusion I am getting something constructive accomplished at the same time on the other monitor!
I do that sometimes. It doesn’t work if I have to concentrate. It’s a good way to watch stuff I care about only a tiny bit, but mostly I just have a pile of “watch someday” stuff.
I’m sure the content that’s free on Prime isn’t random - and I’m sure the content selection is complex, since both Amz and the distributors want to maximize profit. Beyond that have no idea.
@f00l Just fyi, I’ve been watching Downton Abbey free on Amazon. I think with Prime. I do the same thing with movies while doing other computer stuff. I have ‘seen’ many movies that I haven’t really seen.
@RedOak Or, go to: Accounts and Lists > Your Account > Manage Your Prime Membership and scroll to the bottom of the left column, where you will find : End Membership. That will get you one of those “Are you really really sure you want to do that?” pages, but if you indicate (so heartlessly ) that you really, really do, then it will end immediately, on the spot, no grace period, final. Really.
@RedOak Then you do what you did; or you turn on the renewal notification that sends an e-mail 3 days before they charge for renewal, and cancel before it renews. And if you don’t get the e-mail, or it goes to your junk folder, or it comes during a long weekend bender debilitating illness that leaves you unable to read e-mails - and it renews … then cancel it and get a refund. There are many paths that lead to the same (Prime membership) end, Grasshopper.
@RedOak The benefits still work until they expire, even if you cancel it early. Source: Just did that myself the other day, still was able to use it for the last few days
@spitfire6006006 how confident are you the continued benefits were not simply the result of hitting the batch Prime cancel cycle just right? Confidence would be inspired if those benefits lasted for several months.
@RedOak not sure. It did say ‘benefits will continue to blabla date of expiration’ but it was only a few days. It might have even said so before the last click (It tries to convince you about 7 times to not cancel or drop down to the ‘streaming-only’ plan before finally allowing you to)
@spitfire6006006 According to this page you may cancel immediately or when the cycle ends. http://www.digitaltrends.com/movies/how-to-quit-amazon-prime/
Such a timely topic, yesterday I opted for the notification renewal email. For the past two years there has been a special around the end of January for a year of prime for (I think) $72. I’ll wait for that or pay only for months I’ll use it more.
That’s the same reason we did not move our 40,000 digital photo collection from Adobe Albumn/PS to Google Picassa. Where is Picassa anyway?
We made a bet that nobody did photos like Adobe and would be more permanent. And we liked their tagging at the time. Albumn at the time was a freestanding product. The price? Fairly painful backup procedures.
@RedOak YES. For some reason I trust Amazon, not Google. I spent so much time building my Google Lively 3D chat room and then they killed it! I was so mad.
We try diversify our digital footprint as much as practical. With browsers (all three), email accounts (all three), I even have three FB profiles - one personal, another personal commercial, and the third for my LLC.
The impossible hurdle is the data consolidators - very difficult to get around them connecting it all together… this is starting to look like it should spawn a new Topic…
The Data Consolidators will find and connect all, and it might take them 20 sec. The reason to have separate “faces” or emails or browsers and the like is either for personal organization, or for your public presentation.
Recent additions to Prime benefits have been keeping me busy. The Audible Prime channels alone are worth it, for me. Today I noticed that they have added ‘Twitch Prime’, games, characters, skins, and loot. I’m not a gamer; does anyone use it? https://twitch.amazon.com/prime
@callow No idea. This morning Amazon Prime sent an email that says, in part: 'ADDED Twitch Prime: Ad-free viewing on Twitch, a free Twitch channel subscription every month, exclusive access to free game content, and more.'
They also reminded me that there is a free weekly Prime newsletter, so I have subscribed. It may be similar to Audible, where your login screen asks whether you have a login or whether you want to login as a Prime member, which doesn’t require a separate account.
Audible used to have non email logins at its inception. For some reason I have two accounts with different books in each account. I think it was because I wanted a second discounted iPod.
The Amazon bought audible but the sites were completely separate.
A few years back, when they introduced whispersync for voice, they tried to force everyone to change the audible login over to their regular Amazon login. I finally give in and did it. This was long before the combo e-book and audiobook discounts.
But some audible members got really stubborn and simply refused to make the change and unify the accounts. Audible/Amazon finally quit trying to force the issue and let them alone. So if you never unified your audible and Amazon accounts, and you originally created an audible login with a username only, you can still login that way.
Every US Amazon account is now good on audible without creating a new audible matching account. non/Prime members don’t get all the free stuff.
@f00l But that whispersync is pretty cool. I just read/listened to American Gods. Read it on my tablet, listened to it in my car, read it a little on my phone. It synced pretty well.
I hated Audible because the credits didn’t roll, and I wasn’t good about getting my two bucks a month. Month after month I just lost what I’d paid for.
Now that Amazon owns them I can buy the Kindle book cheap when it’s on sale and buy the Audible “add on”, often for less than half what the book from Audible alone costs.
If I was getting more than two Audible books a month, then, yes, the subscription would be a better deal. But I don’t, and now I don’t have to pay $15-$20 for the Audible books.
@craigthom
I like whispersync much as a usability thing.
The credits roll now, tho there is a limit to how many will roll. I thought they rolled in the old days too.
Basically, 6-12 months worth of rolling. Haven’t checked in a while.
If you lost credits, and called in and asked nicely, they would restore them to your account, as long as you didn’t ask all the time.
@f00l Ten years ago the credits wouldn’t roll. And I missed a lot of them. I just wasn’t using the account.
I’m happy with paying $7 to $13 for individual audio books using the Kindle+Audible method.
That works even better for classic books, by the way. I got free or 99 cent PD versions of several classics and then caught the Audible add-ons on sale for $1.99, so I got professionally-produced audio books for cheap.
Free ones are available at Librivox.org, but the quality varies so widely there.
@craigthom
Yeah. I listened to Pamela and a bunch of Defoe and the 1st half of Clarissa from Librivox. Got thru them but the narration quality was brutal.
(I didn’t realize the 2nd half of Clarissa hadn’t been recorded yet thru Librivox until after I was well into the book already. Still have never finished it. )
I thought I remembered rolling over credits in audible way back when? I joined in about 2002? I got my first IPod that way. But back then, audiobooks being harder to get one’s hands on, esp unabridged audiobooks, and having only a tiny library, I used to count the days till I had more credits to spend.
I do remember losing a few credits to rollover limits, and calling in about it. They always restored the lost credits.
Now I own audiobooks to keep me listening for years.
Also fun fact: They now sell prime on monthly plans, too. You don’t need to get a full year anymore. It is more expensive, but if you only want it for a bit (I got it pretty much for xmas gifts) it’s not bad, and less of an upfront investment
This is my first year of Prime. I got it mostly for the unlimited photo storage, and then did nothing with it. Still on my to-do list. Wasn’t getting any use out of Prime video till I got my Roku last week, since then I’ve been using it a lot. A bit annoyed with them, even though it’s not really their fault–last Friday I placed an order, due to Sunday and MLK day it was set for delivery yesterday. When it didn’t come I went to track the package and it said it was put in my mailbox on Monday. WTF? There was no mail delivery Monday. I looked around for it again and called Amazon. I told them that there was obviously something wrong, as a box containing 6 boxes of tea and a 10 pack of 12"x18" foam sheets would never fit in my mailbox. They refunded my money and now I’m going to have to reorder and maybe they’ll be here by Friday. I’m low on tea but I have enough for a few more days, but I need the foam sheets for a project I’d planned to do today. Now I’m going to have to put it off till next week.
@f00l I thought about that, but the notation “your package was left in the mailbox” was strangely specific. I’m thinking it might still turn up, though.
@moondrake Check with your local post office. Some were delivering Amazon on Monday. The city near me delivers Amazon 7 days a week. Most post offices have a gps location attached to the delivery scanners. If you give them the tracking number maybe they can find it. If nothing else, it lets them know there is/was a problem.
@speediedelivery I have to go to the post office in a little while to pick up a small ebay package from Thailand, it’s a PIA, they send everything registered mail. I’ll ask about this package.
Many PO’s scan items as “delivered” when they arrive at the PO, long before they make it onto a delivery truck.
We have a really horrible local PO, but have not run into that scenario. If you believe it is happening, capture several specific examples and report it to the national USPS support line (they have a much fancier name for it). They have solid internal audit trails and will quickly see the physical impossibility of a package arriving at the local PO and getting delivered immediately.
I have had surprisingly good results with them the national support folks… that is, when you do not let them pan you off on your Regional USPS office. Put a stop to that attempt by “I’ve already tried everybody locally with no luck. They seem to have a different delivery process than the rest of the USPS.”
@RedOak
I dont like the national USPS line. I start with the postmaster at that location.
Then next stop is the county USPS Consumer Affairs Office. USPS employees, not outsourced. They track complaints and I always insist the local postmaster call me to discuss the prob. That always fixes it.
If you call the national line they will track the complaints and aggregate the stats. This is an outsourced #. Local PO’s don’t like getting bad stats tho.
@f00l Great to hear you have a wonderful PO. You don’t know our local PO. They are notorious in our city. They do not answer the phone. It goes to VM. And they never return calls left on that VM. It really is that bad. We sometimes get the same carrier repeatedly if we’re lucky, but far from regularly. (The story of what happened when our city’s USPS service moved from a PO within biking distance to one many miles away is not pretty.)
USPS Consumer Affairs Office
That would be the “fancier named” folks I’ve had good luck with. They don’t let the issue whither like our local PO.
@RedOak
First, figure out which PO is the delivery PO. (Might be quite far from your local one. It will be a big one.).
Next
See if you have a local distribution center or County main PO. In house Consumer Affaors will likely be at one or the other location. Get the local phone #.
If you call and no one is available, the call forwards to the national hotline. Hang up and try back later until you get someone local.
Detail your complaint and demand the the Postmaster at your delivery PO (may not be the nearest PO) call you back.
You should get a phone call within 4-5 days. If you don’t, call the local consumer affairs back again. You now have one more complaint. Reiterate your old complaints and add non-response to the list.
Keep doing that. They keep the stats. If you complain a lot and other people find also, the local stats will start to look really bad. Also If you get non-response, ask the local consumer affairs how to escalate.
If they don’t fix things, keep complaining. Alternate local and national calls to hit the local stats hard.
Or
If you have time, go to your delivery PO. Demand to see the postmaster and deal with your complaint that way.
@f00l@RedOak Where you are makes a big difference. It shouldn’t but…
Write down specific dates and times. Do not wait hoping it will fix itself. It might show up but where was it and why? If the tracking says delivered, you should have it.
Some people misunderstand the tracking when it says delivered to the post office. Fedex and UPS both show a delivered scan when they drop ship to USPS. The wording is supposed to be getting changed for clarity.
My district is watching this issue and tracking complaints. If you do not report it steps cannot be taken to fix it for the future.
The national 800 number takes your information and sends it to the local post office. The consumer affairs office is the place if you can’t get problems fixed locally. In my area, they are located at the district office about 2.5 hours away.
We have a couple carriers that often make mistakes. Most people come in and do not want to talk to the postmaster, they want to just drop off the wrong thing to get fixed or they fix it themselves. They don’t want to get the person in trouble. Unfortunately that means the person does not always do a better job or believe they made a mistake. If it is an occasional thing, nobody is perfect but the same problem consistently needs attention.
Sorry for the soapbox.
TLDR: Report USPS delivery problems with as much detail as you can. Be persistant until issue is resolved.
@speediedelivery I get where you are coming from. But I’m cautious about starting trouble for someone who knows where I live and is a member of the group from which “going postal” was coined.
@moondrake
In this case, if you can be home during delivery, try catching your mail person and talking to them.
Or try going to the local delivery PO and speaking to someone in management there. That way you can convey your attitude and empathy as well as your account of the problem.
My probs w the local PO were related to how that station was managed (mail could sometimes take a few days to get into PO boxes; and sometimes no one would answer the Will Call door, even for paying corporate customers, during hours when they said they would; and a few employees were habitually rude and hostile to customers), rather than delivery issues.
@f00l I did ask my regular mailman about it but he was not tasked with the holiday delivery. I kind of feel sorry for the guy as he’s friendly and polite and I’ve embarassed him three times now running him down on foot after he zoomed past my house when there were no deliveries, but I had outgoing mail. I keep telling him that’s what the flag on the mailbox means, if it’s up there’s mail, but he just looks at me blankly. I asked at my post office and they looked for it and didn’t find it, gave me the postmaster’s phone number but I haven’t had a chance to call.
@moondrake I track deliveries of electronics and other desirable items. Today I had some speakers arriving, out for delivery. Substitute driver handed me a letter, said sorry, no packages for me. I went back in, printed the tracking info, chased him down in my car. Big show of astonishment, much searching. No, he didn’t know where it was. But wait! He could call the station! They could have somebody else bring it to my house! Just wait 20 minutes and he’d get back to me. Suspicious me, I followed his truck, waited while he apparently decided he wasn’t going to get to keep the speakers, and ‘found’ the package. I took it without comment. Monday I will go in to the station and file a report.
@moondrake There is a stupid rule that carriers are not required to stop for outgoing mail if they do dot have mail to deliver. It does not sound like the reason in your case since you are getting a blank stare. Normally if a carrier sees the flag up they will stop anyway. I think the rule is for places where the carrier would not drive by if they did not have mail but it is not printed that way.
If you want to send the tracking to a random internet stranger, I could check for gps location for you. The information would show your address. My email is my user name here at gmail. The local post office would know who worked I could see a scanner number and employee code.
@speediedelivery Thanks! The tracking location says it was delivered to my mailbox. I’m planning to call the postmaster on Monday about it. That’s an interesting and completely stupid rule I’d never heard. It actually presents a benefit in getting daily junk mail. So we’re supposed to drive to the post office to send our mail? When I was working I’d take it to the mailroom as they had pickups 4x a day. But now I’m retired getting mail out is a pain. I know that rule isn’t the problem, as I rarely go a day without mail and a few times he’s just placed the incoming mail on top of the outgoing mail. I’ve put a brass plateholder in my mailbox so I can stand the outgoing mail up right in front of the box where he can’t overlook it and that’s helped a lot.
i still have prime. and today i verified that my subscribe and save delivery for cat food is all in stock (i dont even think i need prime for subscribe and save?). if they start screwing up my cat food, then we’ll talk. i dont use prime video, photos or music. i now wish they offered a shipping only service that was cheaper, even by a little.
When did Prime become 5 day shipping? I re-ordered the stuff that USPS lost and it won’t be here till Monday. I’ve already waited a week for this stuff.
@moondrake we were occasionally (post holiday rush) running into longer than 2-day shipping before we let Prime lapse. Frustrating when you’re hooked on near instant gratification! Sometimes even Sunday delivery.
Gotta restart Prime so we can hopefully get a month or so of Prime for the delays.
Have heard Amazon has grown stingy with the free months. Perhaps I can spin the story - “we let our Prime expire due to slipping service - even after the holiday rush…”
The good thing about Prime Photos is that RAW storage is free. The bad thing is that their tool doesn’t automatically upload stuff. I’ve got my photos on my home server and on Carbonite, but it never hurts to have another copy.
I’m sure there are third party programs that will upload my photos, but once a month I just drag everything off my hard drive into the app.
The other inconvenience is that all my phone videos are in my Lightroom menu structure, but video storage counts in Amazon Drive, so I have to go through and delete all the videos after uploading. I could selectively upload just the DNG files, but that would be a pain in the ass. There’s no way in the app to filter uploads when dragging a folder.
@sammydog01 Fffffffuuuuccckkk. Thanks. It was the peeks inside that did it. So the weeks ahead aren’t totally a bleak, terrifying view of - never mind. Hope they pick me too!
@sammydog01 I got a welcome ‘…due to limited quantities you may have to wait a bit, but don’t worry, your request has been received for this delicious Dash Button. We will send you an email when your button is ready for purchase, so keep an eye on your inbox. It’s the beginning of a very sweet friendship.’ Since Amazon is building not one but TWO monster warehouse centers here in the city, it would seem reasonable that they use local items and ship from these centers. The area has some serious candy, chocolate, bakery and other goody shops, so if does buy local as well as ship local, it could be interesting.
But if you don’t have Prime, I ask you: what is the supposed value of having a world?
@f00l Admittedly withdrawal feelings are gradually setting in.
And I’m not sure what I’ll do if we get a Camel alert that cannot be ignored.
Would you mind letting me know when the next season of Vikings shows up on Prime?
@RedOak
Vikings Season 4 Part 2 is not free w Prime. They want $34 for it.
Do you expect it to make it to Prime? I’ve seen stuff that was on Prime Video be removed.
Remind me periodically or I’ll forget. Looks to be s great show tho.
@f00l the entire rest of it was free so one can hope.
Amazing series. That Viking dude’s (the king) eyes. He can shoot knives with them. Actor doesn’t need lines.
He’ll show up in some great movies in the Future.
… a fall back option for free - our library buys all the good series.
@f00l Really? Vikings was one of the reasons we thought about keeping prime. The major reason for rejecting prime was it would not stream in HD to chromecast. or PC, because they were afraid I was going to steal the content. (really in this day?) They were helpful and pointed out a TV on amazon that would play the content in HD, gee, thanks.
@caffeine_dude
No Amazon instant vid content streams in HD to PC afaik. I am surprised about the chromecast not doing it.
Will it stream HD to a Roku, which prob has an Amazon app built it? It would surely stream in HD to a Fire Stick and some of those are way cheap, aren’t they?
I ask because if Prime would be worth it to you except for the HD to pic and HD to chromecast limit, couldn’t you fix that cheaply w a roku or fire stick? Or do you prefer streaming to a pc and want HD on that?
I wonder if the limits on streaming in HD are initiated by Amazon, or imposed by the content distributors?
Right now all of Vikings except series 4 part 2 in free on prime. You could get that on DVD or BR from Netflix or the library couldn’t you? Or buy a copy, watch, sell?
@f00l isn’t the Amazon “current series” pattern to either not carry or post with a rental fee when the episodes are fresh… and then to go free for a period of time? Occasionally, then to go rental again after another period of time passes?
@RedOak
I don’t watch enough vid to know Amazon’s patterns w Prime.
But I know that Sherlock and Downton Abbey were once free on Prime and aren’t now. Do they change out their catalog as Netflix does?
@caffeine_dude @f001
We watch Prime (or did
) on a full range of devices, from PC, HTPC, Roku, Smart DVD, Smart DVD, tablet and laptop.
Haven’t noticed any of those having particular problems with HD. If there are HD issues, it tends to be that someone else is streaming or gaming in the house. #TooCheapFor20Mbit.
I often stream on a second PC monitor under the illusion I am getting something constructive accomplished at the same time on the other monitor!
@f00l Amazon streams HD to both Roku and Fire, but if the content is not free, then the HD usually costs more.
@f00l haven’t noticed series dropping out, but they definitely do occasionally shift to paid.
Movies do come and go.
Would be interesting to see Amazons algorithms, if they aren’t random.
@RedOak
I do that sometimes. It doesn’t work if I have to concentrate. It’s a good way to watch stuff I care about only a tiny bit, but mostly I just have a pile of “watch someday” stuff.
I’m sure the content that’s free on Prime isn’t random - and I’m sure the content selection is complex, since both Amz and the distributors want to maximize profit. Beyond that have no idea.
@f00l Just fyi, I’ve been watching Downton Abbey free on Amazon. I think with Prime. I do the same thing with movies while doing other computer stuff. I have ‘seen’ many movies that I haven’t really seen.
@KDemo
It was free in the beginning, and then it seems I remember looking it up later in the series, and the most recent series were not free.
Now they all seem to be free. Perhaps it became free later, but sometimes my memory is garbage.
Anyway, good. I think I have a few seasons to go when I get around to watching it again.
@f00l - I am just finishing season 2. Didn’t realize I may run into charges later. Don’t know what I’d do, because I’d rather not pay.
@KDemo
Get the later seasons on BR or DVD from a friend or the public library.
A tip:
Amazon likes it when Prime auto-renews and long ago removed the option for it to not.
So contact customer service and request that they manually turn if off.
(If you were thinking pointing the renewal to an expired credit card will do the trick… no. They’ll auto-search until they find one that works!)
@RedOak Or, go to: Accounts and Lists > Your Account > Manage Your Prime Membership and scroll to the bottom of the left column, where you will find : End Membership. That will get you one of those “Are you really really sure you want to do that?” pages, but if you indicate (so heartlessly
) that you really, really do, then it will end immediately, on the spot, no grace period, final. Really. 
@rockblossom But what if I don’t want to end it prior to it expiring? I like Prime.
I just don’t want Amazon getting all cozy thinking I want to auto-renew regardless of their price hikes, even after I croak.
@RedOak Then you do what you did; or you turn on the renewal notification that sends an e-mail 3 days before they charge for renewal, and cancel before it renews. And if you don’t get the e-mail, or it goes to your junk folder, or it comes during a
long weekend benderdebilitating illness that leaves you unable to read e-mails - and it renews … then cancel it and get a refund. There are many paths that lead to the same (Prime membership) end, Grasshopper.@rockblossom too complicated.
I’ll restart Prime and immediately request CS cancel the autorenew.
Nothing to remember later.
@RedOak The benefits still work until they expire, even if you cancel it early. Source: Just did that myself the other day, still was able to use it for the last few days
@spitfire6006006 how confident are you the continued benefits were not simply the result of hitting the batch Prime cancel cycle just right? Confidence would be inspired if those benefits lasted for several months.
@RedOak not sure. It did say ‘benefits will continue to blabla date of expiration’ but it was only a few days. It might have even said so before the last click (It tries to convince you about 7 times to not cancel or drop down to the ‘streaming-only’ plan before finally allowing you to)
@spitfire6006006 According to this page you may cancel immediately or when the cycle ends. http://www.digitaltrends.com/movies/how-to-quit-amazon-prime/
Such a timely topic, yesterday I opted for the notification renewal email. For the past two years there has been a special around the end of January for a year of prime for (I think) $72. I’ll wait for that or pay only for months I’ll use it more.
@callow
If you see a discount on Prime available to current subscribers, please notify us here ASAP.
The world is still here, but we have a reality show TV host as president.
Thanks a lot.
@PocketBrain
President Barack Obama is a reality show TV host?
I am so proud of you.
/giphy 3 cheers
@Cerridwyn It won’t last!
@Cerridwyn
I can’t do this because long ago I committed to buying and uploading all my music exclusively through Amazon instead of iTunes.
@phatmass you’re trapped!
That’s the same reason we did not move our 40,000 digital photo collection from Adobe Albumn/PS to Google Picassa. Where is Picassa anyway?
We made a bet that nobody did photos like Adobe and would be more permanent. And we liked their tagging at the time. Albumn at the time was a freestanding product. The price? Fairly painful backup procedures.
Isn’t Google the abandoner?
@RedOak YES. For some reason I trust Amazon, not Google. I spent so much time building my Google Lively 3D chat room and then they killed it! I was so mad.
@RedOak And yes, same with Picassa. I have yet to find another photo app that lets you easily “optimize” so many photos so quickly.
@phatmass
We make our calls based upon experience, right?
We try diversify our digital footprint as much as practical. With browsers (all three), email accounts (all three), I even have three FB profiles - one personal, another personal commercial, and the third for my LLC.
The impossible hurdle is the data consolidators - very difficult to get around them connecting it all together… this is starting to look like it should spawn a new Topic…
@RedOak
The Data Consolidators will find and connect all, and it might take them 20 sec. The reason to have separate “faces” or emails or browsers and the like is either for personal organization, or for your public presentation.
@f00l yep.
@RedOak I always thought Fox was the abandoner. Buffy, Firefly, Millenium, episodes of 24, XMen series Hellfire, etc.
@moondrake Can’t speak to any of those other than 24. I loved 24, but 24 was fully played out… by sometime early in the last season at the latest.
Recent additions to Prime benefits have been keeping me busy. The Audible Prime channels alone are worth it, for me. Today I noticed that they have added ‘Twitch Prime’, games, characters, skins, and loot. I’m not a gamer; does anyone use it? https://twitch.amazon.com/prime
@OldCatLady Ooooo, shiny! I have to try this.
@OldCatLady I’m a gamer but I didn’t know that it existed
@spcial_snwflake
/giphy gamer
@sammydog01 Antonio Banderas must be at the top of giphy’s hit list. I approve.
@OldCatLady Can you use Twitch Prime if your Amazon and Twitch accounts are different emails?
@callow No idea. This morning Amazon Prime sent an email that says, in part: 'ADDED Twitch Prime: Ad-free viewing on Twitch, a free Twitch channel subscription every month, exclusive access to free game content, and more.'
They also reminded me that there is a free weekly Prime newsletter, so I have subscribed. It may be similar to Audible, where your login screen asks whether you have a login or whether you want to login as a Prime member, which doesn’t require a separate account.
@OldCatLady
Audible used to have non email logins at its inception. For some reason I have two accounts with different books in each account. I think it was because I wanted a second discounted iPod.
The Amazon bought audible but the sites were completely separate.
A few years back, when they introduced whispersync for voice, they tried to force everyone to change the audible login over to their regular Amazon login. I finally give in and did it. This was long before the combo e-book and audiobook discounts.
But some audible members got really stubborn and simply refused to make the change and unify the accounts. Audible/Amazon finally quit trying to force the issue and let them alone. So if you never unified your audible and Amazon accounts, and you originally created an audible login with a username only, you can still login that way.
Every US Amazon account is now good on audible without creating a new audible matching account. non/Prime members don’t get all the free stuff.
@f00l But that whispersync is pretty cool. I just read/listened to American Gods. Read it on my tablet, listened to it in my car, read it a little on my phone. It synced pretty well.
I hated Audible because the credits didn’t roll, and I wasn’t good about getting my two bucks a month. Month after month I just lost what I’d paid for.
Now that Amazon owns them I can buy the Kindle book cheap when it’s on sale and buy the Audible “add on”, often for less than half what the book from Audible alone costs.
If I was getting more than two Audible books a month, then, yes, the subscription would be a better deal. But I don’t, and now I don’t have to pay $15-$20 for the Audible books.
@craigthom
I like whispersync much as a usability thing.
The credits roll now, tho there is a limit to how many will roll. I thought they rolled in the old days too.
Basically, 6-12 months worth of rolling. Haven’t checked in a while.
If you lost credits, and called in and asked nicely, they would restore them to your account, as long as you didn’t ask all the time.
The whispersync-for-voice pricing is winderful.
@f00l Ten years ago the credits wouldn’t roll. And I missed a lot of them. I just wasn’t using the account.
I’m happy with paying $7 to $13 for individual audio books using the Kindle+Audible method.
That works even better for classic books, by the way. I got free or 99 cent PD versions of several classics and then caught the Audible add-ons on sale for $1.99, so I got professionally-produced audio books for cheap.
Free ones are available at Librivox.org, but the quality varies so widely there.
@craigthom
Yeah. I listened to Pamela and a bunch of Defoe and the 1st half of Clarissa from Librivox. Got thru them but the narration quality was brutal.
(I didn’t realize the 2nd half of Clarissa hadn’t been recorded yet thru Librivox until after I was well into the book already. Still have never finished it.
)
I thought I remembered rolling over credits in audible way back when? I joined in about 2002? I got my first IPod that way. But back then, audiobooks being harder to get one’s hands on, esp unabridged audiobooks, and having only a tiny library, I used to count the days till I had more credits to spend.
I do remember losing a few credits to rollover limits, and calling in about it. They always restored the lost credits.
Now I own audiobooks to keep me listening for years.
Also fun fact: They now sell prime on monthly plans, too. You don’t need to get a full year anymore. It is more expensive, but if you only want it for a bit (I got it pretty much for xmas gifts) it’s not bad, and less of an upfront investment
@RedOak
Sez who?
@f00l still feeling really good. And incredibly relieved. About to turn Prime back on tho, probably Friday.
@RedOak
I guess you’re right then. The world is still here.
This is my first year of Prime. I got it mostly for the unlimited photo storage, and then did nothing with it. Still on my to-do list. Wasn’t getting any use out of Prime video till I got my Roku last week, since then I’ve been using it a lot. A bit annoyed with them, even though it’s not really their fault–last Friday I placed an order, due to Sunday and MLK day it was set for delivery yesterday. When it didn’t come I went to track the package and it said it was put in my mailbox on Monday. WTF? There was no mail delivery Monday. I looked around for it again and called Amazon. I told them that there was obviously something wrong, as a box containing 6 boxes of tea and a 10 pack of 12"x18" foam sheets would never fit in my mailbox. They refunded my money and now I’m going to have to reorder and maybe they’ll be here by Friday. I’m low on tea but I have enough for a few more days, but I need the foam sheets for a project I’d planned to do today. Now I’m going to have to put it off till next week.
@moondrake
Many PO’s scan items as “delivered” when they arrive at the PO, long before they make it onto a delivery truck.
@f00l I thought about that, but the notation “your package was left in the mailbox” was strangely specific. I’m thinking it might still turn up, though.
@moondrake Check with your local post office. Some were delivering Amazon on Monday. The city near me delivers Amazon 7 days a week. Most post offices have a gps location attached to the delivery scanners. If you give them the tracking number maybe they can find it. If nothing else, it lets them know there is/was a problem.
@speediedelivery I have to go to the post office in a little while to pick up a small ebay package from Thailand, it’s a PIA, they send everything registered mail. I’ll ask about this package.
@f00l @moodrake
We have a really horrible local PO, but have not run into that scenario. If you believe it is happening, capture several specific examples and report it to the national USPS support line (they have a much fancier name for it). They have solid internal audit trails and will quickly see the physical impossibility of a package arriving at the local PO and getting delivered immediately.
I have had surprisingly good results with them the national support folks… that is, when you do not let them pan you off on your Regional USPS office. Put a stop to that attempt by “I’ve already tried everybody locally with no luck. They seem to have a different delivery process than the rest of the USPS.”
@RedOak
I dont like the national USPS line. I start with the postmaster at that location.
Then next stop is the county USPS Consumer Affairs Office. USPS employees, not outsourced. They track complaints and I always insist the local postmaster call me to discuss the prob. That always fixes it.
If you call the national line they will track the complaints and aggregate the stats. This is an outsourced #. Local PO’s don’t like getting bad stats tho.
I don’t have probs with them anymore.
My postmaster knows me by name.
@f00l Great to hear you have a wonderful PO. You don’t know our local PO. They are notorious in our city. They do not answer the phone. It goes to VM. And they never return calls left on that VM. It really is that bad. We sometimes get the same carrier repeatedly if we’re lucky, but far from regularly. (The story of what happened when our city’s USPS service moved from a PO within biking distance to one many miles away is not pretty.)
That would be the “fancier named” folks I’ve had good luck with. They don’t let the issue whither like our local PO.
@RedOak
First, figure out which PO is the delivery PO. (Might be quite far from your local one. It will be a big one.).
Next
See if you have a local distribution center or County main PO. In house Consumer Affaors will likely be at one or the other location. Get the local phone #.
If you call and no one is available, the call forwards to the national hotline. Hang up and try back later until you get someone local.
Detail your complaint and demand the the Postmaster at your delivery PO (may not be the nearest PO) call you back.
You should get a phone call within 4-5 days. If you don’t, call the local consumer affairs back again. You now have one more complaint. Reiterate your old complaints and add non-response to the list.
Keep doing that. They keep the stats. If you complain a lot and other people find also, the local stats will start to look really bad. Also If you get non-response, ask the local consumer affairs how to escalate.
If they don’t fix things, keep complaining. Alternate local and national calls to hit the local stats hard.
Or
If you have time, go to your delivery PO. Demand to see the postmaster and deal with your complaint that way.
@f00l @RedOak Where you are makes a big difference. It shouldn’t but…
Write down specific dates and times. Do not wait hoping it will fix itself. It might show up but where was it and why? If the tracking says delivered, you should have it.
Some people misunderstand the tracking when it says delivered to the post office. Fedex and UPS both show a delivered scan when they drop ship to USPS. The wording is supposed to be getting changed for clarity.
My district is watching this issue and tracking complaints. If you do not report it steps cannot be taken to fix it for the future.
The national 800 number takes your information and sends it to the local post office. The consumer affairs office is the place if you can’t get problems fixed locally. In my area, they are located at the district office about 2.5 hours away.
We have a couple carriers that often make mistakes. Most people come in and do not want to talk to the postmaster, they want to just drop off the wrong thing to get fixed or they fix it themselves. They don’t want to get the person in trouble. Unfortunately that means the person does not always do a better job or believe they made a mistake. If it is an occasional thing, nobody is perfect but the same problem consistently needs attention.
Sorry for the soapbox.
TLDR: Report USPS delivery problems with as much detail as you can. Be persistant until issue is resolved.
@speediedelivery I get where you are coming from. But I’m cautious about starting trouble for someone who knows where I live and is a member of the group from which “going postal” was coined.
@moondrake
In this case, if you can be home during delivery, try catching your mail person and talking to them.
Or try going to the local delivery PO and speaking to someone in management there. That way you can convey your attitude and empathy as well as your account of the problem.
My probs w the local PO were related to how that station was managed (mail could sometimes take a few days to get into PO boxes; and sometimes no one would answer the Will Call door, even for paying corporate customers, during hours when they said they would; and a few employees were habitually rude and hostile to customers), rather than delivery issues.
@moondrake I can see that point. I just get frustrated with poor service. The word is right in the name. Good help is hard to find in my little world.
@f00l I did ask my regular mailman about it but he was not tasked with the holiday delivery. I kind of feel sorry for the guy as he’s friendly and polite and I’ve embarassed him three times now running him down on foot after he zoomed past my house when there were no deliveries, but I had outgoing mail. I keep telling him that’s what the flag on the mailbox means, if it’s up there’s mail, but he just looks at me blankly. I asked at my post office and they looked for it and didn’t find it, gave me the postmaster’s phone number but I haven’t had a chance to call.
@moondrake I track deliveries of electronics and other desirable items. Today I had some speakers arriving, out for delivery. Substitute driver handed me a letter, said sorry, no packages for me. I went back in, printed the tracking info, chased him down in my car. Big show of astonishment, much searching. No, he didn’t know where it was. But wait! He could call the station! They could have somebody else bring it to my house! Just wait 20 minutes and he’d get back to me. Suspicious me, I followed his truck, waited while he apparently decided he wasn’t going to get to keep the speakers, and ‘found’ the package. I took it without comment. Monday I will go in to the station and file a report.
@moondrake There is a stupid rule that carriers are not required to stop for outgoing mail if they do dot have mail to deliver. It does not sound like the reason in your case since you are getting a blank stare. Normally if a carrier sees the flag up they will stop anyway. I think the rule is for places where the carrier would not drive by if they did not have mail but it is not printed that way.
If you want to send the tracking to a random internet stranger, I could check for gps location for you. The information would show your address. My email is my user name here at gmail. The local post office would know who worked I could see a scanner number and employee code.
@speediedelivery Thanks! The tracking location says it was delivered to my mailbox. I’m planning to call the postmaster on Monday about it. That’s an interesting and completely stupid rule I’d never heard. It actually presents a benefit in getting daily junk mail. So we’re supposed to drive to the post office to send our mail? When I was working I’d take it to the mailroom as they had pickups 4x a day. But now I’m retired getting mail out is a pain. I know that rule isn’t the problem, as I rarely go a day without mail and a few times he’s just placed the incoming mail on top of the outgoing mail. I’ve put a brass plateholder in my mailbox so I can stand the outgoing mail up right in front of the box where he can’t overlook it and that’s helped a lot.
i still have prime. and today i verified that my subscribe and save delivery for cat food is all in stock (i dont even think i need prime for subscribe and save?). if they start screwing up my cat food, then we’ll talk. i dont use prime video, photos or music. i now wish they offered a shipping only service that was cheaper, even by a little.
@meh correct, I had s&s for years w/o prime.
@meh
That’s a thought, but then Amazon wouldn’t be moving toward their sneaky attempt to take over the world, profit be damned.
“Alexa, how much money did we make last year?”
(Actually, 'just took a peek and, amazingly, Amazon seems to be making a bit of money, occasionally.)*
When did Prime become 5 day shipping? I re-ordered the stuff that USPS lost and it won’t be here till Monday. I’ve already waited a week for this stuff.
@moondrake we were occasionally (post holiday rush) running into longer than 2-day shipping before we let Prime lapse. Frustrating when you’re hooked on near instant gratification! Sometimes even Sunday delivery.
Gotta restart Prime so we can hopefully get a month or so of Prime for the delays.
Have heard Amazon has grown stingy with the free months. Perhaps I can spin the story - “we let our Prime expire due to slipping service - even after the holiday rush…”
@RedOak It’s annoying, if I want to wait a week I can buy stuff from US sellers on EBay cheaper.
I HATE AMAZON…
The good thing about Prime Photos is that RAW storage is free. The bad thing is that their tool doesn’t automatically upload stuff. I’ve got my photos on my home server and on Carbonite, but it never hurts to have another copy.
I’m sure there are third party programs that will upload my photos, but once a month I just drag everything off my hard drive into the app.
The other inconvenience is that all my phone videos are in my Lightroom menu structure, but video storage counts in Amazon Drive, so I have to go through and delete all the videos after uploading. I could selectively upload just the DNG files, but that would be a pain in the ass. There’s no way in the app to filter uploads when dragging a folder.
Amazon Prime now has a dash button for a box of artisanal goodies called Surprise Sweets. I asked for an invitation to buy one. Pick me, pick me!
@sammydog01 Fffffffuuuuccckkk. Thanks. It was the peeks inside that did it. So the weeks ahead aren’t totally a bleak, terrifying view of - never mind. Hope they pick me too!
@sammydog01 I got a welcome ‘…due to limited quantities you may have to wait a bit, but don’t worry, your request has been received for this delicious Dash Button. We will send you an email when your button is ready for purchase, so keep an eye on your inbox. It’s the beginning of a very sweet friendship.’ Since Amazon is building not one but TWO monster warehouse centers here in the city, it would seem reasonable that they use local items and ship from these centers. The area has some serious candy, chocolate, bakery and other goody shops, so if does buy local as well as ship local, it could be interesting.
@OldCatLady I got one too! We also have a big warehouse in town- maybe that’s the qualification.