ESPN has become the latest content provider to join Amazon’s Netflix-like streaming service.
Before you get too excited, that doesn’t mean you’ll be able to stream live games from Amazon.com, but ESPN is about more than just live coverage.
The deal brings ESPN’s 30 for 30 series as well as documentaries that date back all the way to the start of ESPN in 1979.
Titles like Four Days in October, The House of Steinbrenner, Muhammad & Larry, Run Ricky Run, and Withou Bias are all part of the new content slate now available on Amazon’s service.
Amazon Prime is a $79/year service that started out offering customers unlimited free two-day shipping on most Amazon-inventoried items.
It recently expanded the service so that, at no additional cost, users also receive free streaming video in the same vein as Netflix, as well as access to free Kindle content.
Of course, the problem with Amazon Prime is it has a large up-front cost. $79 to join Amazon Prime is a lot different than less than $10 to join Netflix.
Of course, if you do the math, Prime ends up being cheaper at less than $7/month. And don’t forget, that includes all the other benefits of Amazon Prime too.
The cheaper versions of Amazon Prime, like the $39/year version for students, do not include streaming video access. Nevertheless, this announcement is a big shout from Amazon that it wants to seriously play in the contentious streaming video market. We’ll see what happens.
