Let’s be honest: Amazon Prime isn’t exactly known for must-watch movies or binge-worthy series when it comes to original content. Sure, I can name a few: Upload was amazing, and Fleabag was great too. But Netflix is the streaming service we all have. It’s a pretty easy decision to make, with access to over 20,000 titles at the small cost of somewhere between $15-20 a month in most markets. To continue its growth trajectory and market penetration, Netflix has added a cheaper, ad-supported version (about half the price).
And this is where Amazon Prime will pounce.
Every tech company worth its salt is developing its own Generative AI tools. Microsoft has ChatGPT, Google has Gemini, Meta has Meta AI, Apple has Apple Intelligence, and Amazon has Claude via a multi-billion dollar investment in Anthropic. Netflix, however, has little other than its recommendation engine. And while that’s good, it won’t be enough to win the streaming wars.
When it comes to streaming, image recognition AI will be the killer app.
Image Recognition Commerce
AI Image Recognition Commerce (IRC) will be the next big iteration in retail.
Here’s how it is going to go: Within the next year or so, you’re going to watch a show on Amazon Prime. Let’s say they do Geek Girl instead of Netflix. Teenagers will literally be watching Geek Girl and be able to pause at any point during the show. They’ll be able to click on any part of the screen—what a character is wearing, a gadget, a beauty product, anything—and buy that thing, with one click, on Amazon. It’ll be a frictionless transaction.
AI image recognition is now so good, Amazon will simply run their model through every show they have available on Prime. It’ll be able to map every product, brand, and detail on what is in that program or movie, and match it to their warehouse and logistics system. This will start an entirely new retail typology. Some of you may even remember this as an early internet promise. Well, that time has finally arrived.
With new movies and series, this would be purposely built into the production and costing model. Forget product placement; this will be Vision Commerce.
Amazon is the only tech company that can do this. Even if the others like Disney+, Apple+, and even Netflix all have image recognition, none of them have the logistic back end to execute this idea.
Remember they know who’s watching (the TV, tablet, and smartphone watches you too), they have your credit card on file, your address, they know your size—everything.
This capability will induce Hollywood and TV production companies to choose Amazon over Netflix and others as their preferred streaming launch platform. Why? Because Amazon can say: “Oh, by the way, you can make a 30% commission on everything people buy while watching your show.”
It will be more profitable to work with Amazon—other streamers will need to pay more for content, and yet deliver less financial reward back to content providers.
Here’s my prediction: a few years from now, we’ll be talking about Prime the way we talk about Netflix today.
Keep Thinking,
Steve.