Latest news with #AlexRider
Daily Record
15-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Record
Exact day UK Firesticks will lose access to popular free streaming app
This popular app will be shut down for good in a matter of weeks. Amazon's Fire TV Sticks are one of the most popular streaming devices in the UK as they provide access to all of your favourite streaming and catch-up apps without having to fork out a lot of money on a new smart TV. Simply by sticking this handy gadget into your telly, all of your favourite shows and films can be accessed in one place. However, some unfortunate news is looming on the horizon as one popular streaming app will be removed from the device. Amazon previously gave the warning late last year, but an exact date has now been confirmed for when the app will be shut down for good. Freevee, which is a free-to-view app, will stop working on all UK Fire TV Sticks at the end of August, reports the Mirror. This means that those who watch content via the app will no longer be able to do so as of September 1, 2025. For those unfamiliar with Freevee, it is an Amazon ad-supported app that offers users a way to stream movies, TV shows and some live broadcasts for free. Some of the shows currently on the app include Alex Rider, Hell's Kitchen USA, Jury Duty and Bosch: Legacy. However, Amazon's popular streaming device isn't the only service being impacted, Freevee will also be shut down on all Android and iOS devices. For those worried about missing out on their favourite shows, Amazon isn't letting them completely disappear. Instead, Fire TV Stick users will be able to find them on the Amazon Prime Video app. This has been done in a move to simplify the services available and move them into one app. Therefore, users will soon need to sign into their Prime Video account to gain access. These shows will still be available for free, but they will be mixed in with other Prime content that either requires a one off fee to view or a monthly Amazon Prime subscription. This may be a bid from retail giant Amazon to get more people to join its Prime subscription service, which is currently £8.99 per month. New members can currently get a 30-day free trial, which will also give them access to Amazon Music and next-day delivery on Amazon shopping. In a pop-up message on the Freevee app, customers were told: "Prime Video is the new exclusive home for Freevee TV shows, moves and Live TV. The Freevee app will be accessible until August 2025. "Continue watching your favourite Freevee Originals and our library of hit movies, shows, and live TV on Prime Video for free, no subscription needed. Download Prime Video to get started and sign in with your Amazon account." As of September 1, Amazon Fire TV Stick users will have no choice but to use the Prime Video app to watch their usual free content. For those who are both a Prime Video subscriber and a Freevee viewer, this will be a welcome change as all of their usual content will be easily accessed in one app. Join the Daily Record WhatsApp community! Get the latest news sent straight to your messages by joining our WhatsApp community today. You'll receive daily updates on breaking news as well as the top headlines across Scotland. No one will be able to see who is signed up and no one can send messages except the Daily Record team. All you have to do is click here if you're on mobile, select 'Join Community' and you're in! If you're on a desktop, simply scan the QR code above with your phone and click 'Join Community'. We also treat our community members to special offers, promotions, and adverts from us and our partners. If you don't like our community, you can check out any time you like. To leave our community click on the name at the top of your screen and choose 'exit group'.
Times
15-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Anthony Horowitz: Don't call me Grandpa, I'm not in the corner dribbling
It is the question facing all men if they are lucky enough to become a grandparent: what would you like to be called by the next generation: Granddad, Grandpa, Grandfather or Gramps? For the bestselling author, Anthony Horowitz, who has two grandchildren, Leander, two, and Cosima, eight months, the answer is none of the above. He said the word grandfather 'carries too much baggage. You know, it says you're old. It says you're superannuated. It says you're sitting in a corner dribbling. It says you are grey. It says you are sort of no longer at the centre of things'. Best known for his children's spy books, the Alex Rider series, which have sold more than 19 million copies worldwide, Horowitz, 70, said his aversion to the word grandfather was partly linked to his deeply 'unpleasant' grandmother.
Telegraph
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Anthony Horowitz: Children can't read long books any more
Children may no longer have the attention span to read novels more than 300 pages long, according to Anthony Horowitz. The 70-year-old author said he believed modern society was rewiring children's minds, and popular books were now 'very short' and had big type and lots of pictures. He added that his bestselling Alex Rider series of children's books may not have been as successful if they were released now. Speaking to the Headliners podcast, Mr Horowitz said: 'The world of children's books at the moment doesn't look to me to be in a very good state. 'I wonder if there is still a large audience for Alex Rider novels, which are long-ish, 300-plus pages and quite complicated. They are proper novels. 'I'm not saying they're great literature, but I am saying that they are, you know, proper novels. I worry that the audience is not there for them any more. 'Actually, if I was writing the Alex Rider books today, if I started with Stormbreaker this afternoon, I worry [if] it would find an audience because this is to do with attention spans, to do with social media, to do with smartphones, to do with the way that children's minds are being rewired almost by modern society.' Mr Horowitz added that he was 'happy' his adult books now occupied most of his time, confirming that he currently had no plans 'to do any more Alex Riders'. He continued: 'I have misgivings about the world of children's books. You know if you look in a bookshop, the books that seem to be popular – and I'm not decrying them for a minute because they are giving children pleasure – tend to have very bright colours on the cover and [a] sort of slightly cartoonish look. 'They're very short, they're big type, they're lots of pictures... that seems to be now what is more popular and it's not what I write.' He added that the challenge may be to write books 'designed specifically for an audience that doesn't particularly want to read'. 'I have been thinking to myself for some time that everybody's saying that children don't want to read any more, that it's getting more and more difficult,' the author said. 'So why isn't a writer doing something about it to actually address the point, to produce a book that children will read? 'And does that mean that the book will have to be in some way really different to how books used to be and what they looked like? I'm beginning to think along those lines a little bit.' 'Pandering down to children' Last year, Mr Horowitz claimed children's literature was ' going downhill ' because publishers were flooding the market with silly books rather than proper stories. Speaking at the Hay Festival, he said: ' JK Rowling somehow managed to create a 600-page book with some quite demanding ideas in it and then the later Harry Potters, which are quite dark and certainly long, and they were this phenomenal international hit. 'Do you believe that any book published now, which had 150,000 words in it and aimed at a market of eight to 15-year-olds, would have any chance?' He added: 'It worries me that the world of children's books has changed. 'It is beginning, I worry, to go downhill in the sense of lowering expectations – so many books, which are just funny, silly, bad jokes, and the actual idea of the literate children's book, the well-written, real story, is less popular now. 'It seems to me that if there's a trend in modern children's books, if you just walk into a bookshop and look at the covers around you, you now see the same imagery, the same gaudy colours, the same pandering down to children rather than raising their expectations.'
