Techtonic

  Amazon Prime is one of the few subscriptions I’m sure most people use. Not only does it offer free and faster deliveries, it also includes Prime Music and Prime Video subscriptions in India, both of which are really good services in their own rights. Today, Amazon is making a change to its Prime subscriptions in India however, and will no longer offer one-month subscriptions for Prime. The change has been forced due to a recent RBI mandate regarding recurring payments. The new mandate requires banks and financial institutions to implement an additional factor of authentication for such payments. Amazon has highlighted the change in its updated  support page . Meanwhile, the company has not been allowing new sign-ups for the Prime trial since April 27. As of this moment, if you’re looking to get a Prime subscription, you will have to choose either a three month plan, or an annual subscription. These are priced at Rs. 329 and Rs. 999 respectively. “[…] we h...

  by Techtonic Group Amazon has started rolling out a video platform within the primary Amazon shopping app for users in India. Dubbed Mini TV, the service is live on the latest Amazon app for Android users. Amazon Mini TV Streaming Service Launched The Amazon Mini TV service is available for free and  currently shows select web series, comedy shows, and lifestyle videos . The web series section is primarily dominated by ‘The Viral Fever’ (better known as TVF) at the moment.  The lifestyle section includes videos from fashion influencers such as Sejal Kumar, Malvika Sitlani, Anaysa, and more. It even has some technology videos from YouTuber Trakin Tech available to stream within the app. As of this writing, the feature doesn’t have a prominent section in the app’s sidebar. Instead, it is  accessed through a banner on the home page . You can access Mini TV by tapping the banner found on the Amazon app’s home page, as you can see in the image below: The user ...

Slack Partners with Amazon to Take on Microsoft Teams By techtonic group Slack has signed a multi-year agreement with Amazon. As part of the partnership,  Slack will use Amazon's infrastructure  to step up its service, and  Amazon employees will primarily use Slack at work . The technical integrations through this partnership include four main aspects: Amazon Chime infrastructure with Slack Calls AWS Key Management Service with Slack Enterprise Key Management (EKM) AWS Chatbot integration with Slack Amazon AppFlow integration with Slack Slack, which recently also rolled out a  new design , will use Amazon's Chime for audio calls, video calls, and screen sharing in calls. Switching to Amazon Chime is believed to drastically improve the overall calling experience in the platform. The company will also integrate AWS Chatbot and Amazon AppFlow into its platform. For the uninitiated, AWS Chatbot uses an interactive agent to keep teams in the loop wit...

Amazon Reportedly in Talks to Aquire $2 Billion-Stake in Airtel By Techtonic group US technology and retail giant Amazon is reportedly planning on buying stakes worth $2 billion in Indian telecom operator Bharti Airtel. As reported by Reuters, sources close to the talks claim the conversation is in its early stages right now. With this investment, Amazon will acquire close to 5% stake in Airtel according to its current market value. Amazon's interest in Airtel isn't unwarranted. The company has  invested in India  quite often. In fact, it has committed close to $6.5 billion in investments in the country. that said, as mentioned before, talks are in early stages right now. Therefore, the terms of the deal may change, or the deal may not go through as well. Interestingly, this report comes at a time when Reliance Industries' Jio Platforms is seeing a lot of investment activity as well. Over the past few weeks, multiple US-based companies have  invested in Jio Pl...

Amazon India Now Has a Dedicated Mask Store By techtonic group As the  Coronavirus  lockdown approaches its kinda-sorta end, people need to learn living in the new normal. That means a lot of things, and it also means wearing masks in public places. To help with that, Amazon India has now launched a dedicated mask store on its website. The mast store from Amazon Fashion, offers over 500 cloth masks from 35 different sellers on the platform. The store, accessible from  this link , has masks of a variety of types. You can get  N95 masks, cloth masks, 2/3-ply masks, and more . If you usually commute via bikes, you can buy riding and cycling masks as well. Amazon's Mask Store has a wide selection to choose from. Personally, keeping an N95 mask for dense public places is my preference. However, I also use  printed masks for regular outdoor use because they don't look as bland and boring . If we have to live in this new normal, it's important to make sure...

Amazon Starts Food Delivery Service in India to Rival Growing Presence of Zomato, Swiggy By tectonic group As netizens continue to stay at home due to the lockdown restrictions, American e-commerce giant Amazon has today launched a food delivery service in India. Called Amazon Food, the service is accessible directly from the regular Amazon app. It has been launched in a bid to rival the growing presence of food delivery giants, Zomato and Swiggy, in the country. Rumors of Amazon  looking to enter  the food delivery space have been floating around for quite some time. The company has been internally  testing the service  since last year in partnership with select restaurants in Bengaluru. Now, Amazon Food has gone live today but is limited to select pin codes in Bengaluru to start with. The service allows customers to order food from local restaurants and cloud kitchens. It is great to see Amazon make hygiene the utmost priority and build its own  ...

Amazon India Now Accepting Orders on All Items in All Zone By Techtonic group The Indian government implemented a lockdown in response to the  Coronavirus pandemic  back in late March. The lockdown effectively banned e-commerce companies from shipping orders for goods that were not 'essential'. However, companies can now ship all goods in all zones in the country, except for containment zones. Amazon has announced that it is accepting orders on all goods across the country. As long as you are not in a containment zone, you can order non-essentials from Amazon. Moreover, the  company is also accepting 'Pay on Delivery' in most of these locations . The company has also announced measures to ensure social distancing for Pay on Delivery orders. You can read these measures  here . However, if you are in a location where the company is only accepting 'essential' orders, you will only be able to make prepaid payments. Amazon's biggest rival in India, Fl...

Prime Video will Premiere 7 Indian Movies Globally Because Theaters are Closed  By Techtonic group The extended quarantine to curb the spread of the novel Coronavirus has had India in a state of lockdown for almost two months now. During this time, public places including malls, shopping centers, and movie theatres have remained shut down. That means movies aren't getting theatrical releases, and now, Prime Video has reportedly secured the rights to premiere 7 Indian movies on its platform, completely skipping a theatrical release of any kind. The movies that Prime Video will be premiering include the following: Gulabo Sitabo Shakuntala Devi Ponmagal Vandhal Penguin Law French Biryani Sufiyum Sujatayum As this news came out, two of India's largest movie theatre chains put out releases expressing their extreme displeasure at the decision taken by production houses. In a statement, INOX said,  "Such acts, though isolated, vitiate the atmosphere of mutual partners...

Amazon Fire TV Gets a New 'Free' Tab By Techtonic group Amazon is adding a new "free" section to  Fire TV  menu's top navigation bar to make it easier for customers to find free content across different sources. According to Amazon's blog post, the tab gathers content across free ad-supported streaming services and apps such as IMDb TV, Twitch, Tubi, Pluto TV, Crackle, The CW, the News app, Red Bull, PBS, and PBS Kids. The content present in the Free tab will be refreshed regularly and the  media is curated across new, trending, and popular movies & TV shows categories .  "Most of the free tab consists of a collection of curated and thematic rows of movies and TV shows from our content providers. It also features a set of personalized, recommended rows of free movies and TV shows across categories like new, trending, and popular, as well as a dedicated row for news content powered by the News app on Fire TV.",  says the company. Apart...

Alexa Can Now Help Students to Learn English By Techtonic group British education publisher, Pearson, has announced a new  Alexa skill  that it says will help students of all age groups learn English faster. Called ' MyPedia ', the new interactive skill is said to enhance English vocabulary, listening, comprehension and storytelling abilities of all learners through a collection of engaging stories coupled with fun facts, trivia, quizzes and rewards. In an official press release on Tuesday, Peason said that the MyPedia skill is designed to enhance children's interest in the English language, and the stories in the skill can inspire them to be authors when they grow up.  "The skill’s simple voice interface can enable students to learn in an interactive manner, at their own pace ... It provides a holistic approach for students to build their language skills from home, for greater goals outside academic achievements." , said the company. The new skill is ...

Amazon Offering Free In-Game Perks to Prime Members via Prime Gaming By Techtonic group Amazon introduced the "Amazon Prime" way back in 2005 with just faster delivery benefits. However, as the years passed by, Amazon Prime went on to become a full-fledged ecosystem of Amazon's services with the addition of  Prime Video ,  Prime Music ,  Prime Reading  and several other services and benefits for the Prime customers. Now, the Seattle-based company is offering free in-game perks for a few mobile games to its Prime customers. After introducing almost all types of services, Amazon is now looking to capture the gaming sector. Earlier this month, we saw  Amazon Games announce its free-to-play game . Now, we got to know that  the company has created a dedicated webpage to spread info about the free in-game content  that will be offered to the esteemed Prime customers. Now, according to  the microsite  set up by Amazon,  the company ...