In an email, the online giant said it will start bombarding its service with "limited adverts" from January 29. Those who want to keep their accounts ad-free will have to fork out an extra $3 a month on top of their Prime subscription or $9-a-month Prime Video membership.

In September, Amazon first announced that it would shove ads down its customers' throats - and that the first countries to suffer are the US, UK, Germany and Canada. Customers in France, Italy, Spain, Mexico and Australia must choose between putting up with the ads or paying more by the end of next year.

Amazon claimed it aimed to "have meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming TV providers". But "meaningfully fewer" is a load of rubbish, as Variety reported that four minutes per hour was the lowest amount of ad time for a streaming platform.

Amazon repeated that nonsense in the email it sent to customers. It also said that adding ads to its service and charging more for an ad-free viewing experience will help it invest "in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period ".

The company told customers that they will start seeing ads by the end of January and gave them a link to a website where they can pay for ad-free viewing.

 In a web page about the change, Amazon said it will not show ads with rented or bought content. It also said that Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, the Mariana Islands and American Samoa are spared from the rollout for now.