I just had Vickie check on her phone, and only one of them, location, was actually enabled. This is pretty much a non-issue.
I just look at my phone, and I also only had "Location" activated - and even that is only "While Using". It doesn't appear AMC has taken over my phone as suggested...
Yeah, compared to most apps, AMC is looking positively responsible. I think @SandAndGlass needs to let his source site know that they are being needlessly alarmist.
On the infrequent occasion that I need to purchase an AMC ticket in advance due to an impending sellout, I do it via the website and get an email with the scanner code, which I show on my phone. I am on the hairy edge of AMC’s A-list being worthwhile for me. Average month I probably see 3 or 4 films, all morning matinees so it would be a wash for me, pricewise. I just don’t have time to see more films than that during the school year, other than during the holidays. I still think I would truly struggle to find more than 4 films/month outside of awards season, that I want to see at AMC. There are more films I would like to see at a Bow Tie about 30 minutes away, but they have no cheap matinees and you have to pay $1/hr to park, so I mostly avoid that theater, throw the titles onto my Netflix DVD queue for future home viewing, and hope they show up at AMC which they sometimes do.
I'm not the one who is publishing the permission's for the AMC app, they are. Don't shoot the messenger. Just because an app is not accessing a certain feature, doesn't mean that it cannot access other aspects. If their app was truly benign, then why not remove those permissions? Why have them there in the first place? By installing the app on your phone, you are granting it all of the permissions stated in the app that you are downloading and installing.
Cut'n'paste coding. Virtually nobody writes an app from scratch - they take bits from other apps, and didn't bother to go through and remove all of these requests, just setting the majority of them to "off" in the default installation. I'm confident my wife didn't go in and change the permissions as she had no idea they were there until I called her and talked her through finding them.
You want to know why they are doing this: Because there are scammers sharing their non-transferable pass with friends and, in some cases, with people who just pay them for a pass. It's the scammers who ruin things for everyone else. I don't blame Sinemia for this. Now, I think Sinemia is pretty crappy. But for this, they get a pass.
I do coding myself. A major company such as AMC, or more likely, the company that they contracted to produce the app, may reuse different sections of code that they have used before universally. They do not haphazardly leave code which can be malicious active within an app that their customer is doing to distribute to the public. Most of the free download apps contain spyware, be advised of this. Always look carefully over app permissions before downloading any app. The permissions that are published in the App Store (or Google Play Store), are the permissions that you are agreeing to when you download or install the app. I would never download and install an app with permissions, such as these on any device of mine. Further, since you can do the same thing in a browser, which you don't have to grant any permissions for, why download an app with abusive permissions in the first place?
Please, let's not give Sinemia a pass for anything. I would almost bet money that they will cancel my account before my year is up and I've done nothing but follow their rules: MoviePass competitor Sinemia says it won't give subscribers details on why it terminated their accounts I love how they're offering these "canceled" members an "adjusted refund" option. Read the fine print on that: You are eligible for an adjusted refund based on the difference between what you've paid to Sinemia and your spending which also includes the cost of the tickets you have received through your Sinemia membership.In other words, if you've paid them $120 for a twelve month membership, you may be eligible for a refund for your unused membership - let's say six months, for example. So they're going to calculate what the cost of the tickets you've received is (let's say 3 films/mo, for six months): 18 films at $10/ticket = $180. Then they're going to say you've received $180 in tickets for $120 in membership fees and you're ineligible for any refund. These guys are WORSE than Moviepass. Really.
Since you pay a monthly fee, they can only charge you for the actual months that you have already paid for and no more.
Sinemia is now offering a $100 prepaid card for $70. Sinemia Limitless is a $70 card with a $100 value Presumably they'll make it up in volume.
This looks like more of the same "too good to be true" stuff of MoviePass, with all the same hassle and lies that permeated it post price reduction. I'm staying on the sidelines.
Techcrunch had more about the Sinemia offer. So, users get $100 worth of tickets for a $70 one-time purchase. The new offering uses a digital or physical “debit” card that can be used to buy movies online or at the theater. Once the money is gone, the card won’t re-up unless the user makes another purchase. The caveat here, however, seems to be that the balance is only good one year. Oh, and “convenience fees" may apply to the price of the movie.
Here’s a story (video included) with a guy trying to buy a ticket with Sinemia, at the theatre. As soon as he clicks “buy”, his account is canceled. Video shows MoviePass competitor Sinemia terminating a subscriber’s account right after he tries to book a ‘Captain Marvel’ ticket I’m about to head out to see something tonight - will I have the same result?
I never bothered with MP or Sinemia, and these kinds of comments make me happy I didn't. Yeah, MP was the bee's knees for a while there, but life's too short to end up dealing with all the various hassles. Sinemia sounds like it comes with all the problems of MP but none of the positives since it's not dirt cheap like MP was for a while there...
Turns out that you can't sell something for less than it costs you and sustain a business unless your investors agree to throw their money into the kitty. Sinemia and Move Pass have failed - and the consumer is the one who loses.
Moviepass is back with an "Unlimited Plan" for $9.95. Terms of Service include changes to how you use it; You must book at least 3 hours before the movie, then confirm in a 30 minute window before the movie, then redeem your ticket. If you don't redeem the ticket then you get suspended. And it looks like you have to let them track your locaiton while the movie is playing becuase they specify that if you don't watch the whole thing then they might suspend you too. AND they reserve the right to limit your account as to which films you can see. So basically another scummy non-defined benefits with terms of service weighed toward the business in a very unequal and unfair manner. But I'll bet SOMEONE will love it here. (But it's really just a scam.) MoviePass brings back unlimited plan with heavy caveats
This stuff just p***** me off as a business owner. I don’t know if it’s that they assume people are so stupid or that the company is that arrogant. At least they are making it obvious that you are getting totally ripped off. I don’t undestand for the life of me why the DOJ hasn’t sued them yet. They are begging for it. The guys involved should have walked away with the millions they have, I’m sure, skimmed away. But everyone is greedy...they will have at it until they are in fact legally shut down.
Eh, I got thousands of dollars worth of movie tickets from my MoviePass membership. I don't see anything particularly onerous in any of the restrictions which I suspect are aimed at rip off artists. Quoting The Verge: When you want to see a movie using the “unlimited” service, you’ll have to reserve a seat over three hours before the film is due to start... Not a problem. Vickie and I know what film we plan to see that evening. and you’ll then have to check in between 10 and 30 minutes beforehand. Not a problem. We were used to that with the original MoviePass. If, over the course of a month, you fail to check in for more than one movie after having booked it, then MoviePass says it may suspend your account. I suspect this is to do with scammers using the debit cards for things other than movies. Even more strangely, MoviePass reserves the right to cancel your subscription if you repeatedly don’t watch a film “in its entirety” after having used the service to buy a ticket. Another anti-scammer thing - scammer checks in, leaves the theater during preview and sells stub to another person before the film proper has started.
Its a pretty good deal. I used go to cinema a lot when I shared a flat with someone, just to get some space, escape.