PBS

Excellent selection of shows

A few times per year, you'll open the app and get nothing more than a swirling "Wait" icon. The navigation buttons on the remote won't do anything. Hitting Firestick Home and re-entering the app won't do anything.

I've learned that all the "waiting" won't result in anything ever happening. Waste of time.

Why does that happen? Was there an app-update and PBS never learned to manage their updates properly? Is it punishing me for watching too much PlutoTV?

The Great Oracle, "Artificial Intelligence," will recommend checking the Firestick App Store for an update, and/or going into the Firestick Settings to clear cache and cookies. All a waste of time.

Its last suggestion, reinstall the app, should be suggested first. Fastest way is to uninstall the PBS app and reinstall it. I've never been successful at the other stuff, mostly because I couldn't find the functions -- deep, deep in the Firestick menus, if they're actually in there somewhere at all.

Part of the reinstallation process is to get the code from the reinstalled app that appears on your TV and plug it into your cellphone. The display offers the PBS URL to go to with your phone, or point your camera at a QR code that is also displayed, which might save 5 seconds over typing the URL. You'll need your Passport login name and password; I keep mine refreshed on the back of my arm with a permanent marker. Once your phone is logged onto their website, you type the code that's burning into your TV's display into the website. Then, the phone and your TV start doing complex electronic communications, and the TV app comes to life as if nothing happened.

Only a few times a year. When you get the swirling "Wait" icon, REMEMBER. After reinstalling it a couple of times, it becomes old hat.

We know that PBS stands for The Public Broadcasting Service. It's completely safe to say that it's The Professional Broadcasting Network as well! Sincere thanks are due this team, Patrick Riley

This app is great for watching many videos available on PBS. It allows me and family to watch all kinds of great PBS content on demand and when I want to. It's part of how the internet is changing the way we watch TV. That is exactly why I downloaded it and exactly why I like to use it. To add to that, it seems to be rather resistant to crashing or freezing.

The kindle version lives up to expectations but the fire stick version has some serious problems. Many of the videos you see while browsing the with the Kindle version as well as looking at the PBS videos web site don't show up on the fire stick app. An excellent example is Rick Steve's Europe and Nature. A work around is to browse on a kindle or a web browser and add these shows to your watch list (you need a free PBS account). Sadly this work around is disappointing because some things that will show up on a watch list in the web browser and kindle app, won't show up in the fire stick app watch list. Some examples of this are the following Nature shows :American Eagle, Hummingbirds: Magic in the Air, Christmas in Yellowstone, Bears of the Last Frontier: The Road North, Bears of the Last Frontier: City of Bears, Bears of the Last Frontier: Arctic Wanderers, The White Lions, Kangaroo Mob, Cracking the Koala Code, and Magic of the Snowy Owl. Another work around is to mirror a kindle onto the TV but then your Kindle is tied up and mirroring can be unreliable. A problem report was submitted to PBS about 5 days ago and no useful reply has been received.

I like it but I'm bothered that videos available in a web browser on on the Kindle PBS app are not available on this app. This is a major disappointment especially when I was hoping to use it to help an elderly non technically inclined relative use it to watch PBS content.

I'd give it 3 1/2 stars because I think it's better than okay and it's worth downloading review but can have some serious annoyances. I suppose one could counter that it's free but also represents my tax dollars at work so we still paid for it.

(FIre TV Stick with Alexa Remote). Great content. Terrible app. We have been trying to get through an episode of American Experience and it constantly skips, buffers and judders. The skipping is about 10-15 seconds of content, every couple minutes. Other shows in the app (Nature, Secrets of the Dead) do the same thing. We tried changing resolution, routing the sound through the TV instead of the receiver and surround sound, playing with the hidden fire stick resolution menu, restarting the fire stick, restoring the fire stick to factory defaults because all my tinkering with the settings had it locked up and I couldn't get back into my settings menu to undo what I did. I've been watching PBS on my iPad and desktop Mac, but we bought the Fire Stick specifically because we wanted to play this app on our big TV to enjoy the content as a family. Netflix and Prime do not seem to have the issues, it seems to be just this app. I still hope there might be some troubleshooting I haven't tried yet that may fix it, but out of the box, it simply isn't working well.

An additional word regarding the negative reviews about content availability: We donated $60 to PBS (tax deductible) and are able to watch anything that we have wanted to watch in the app for free for a year. That's cheaper than a good pedicure or a decent dinner date. "Support for Public Broadcasting comes from Viewers Like You". Also, I'm pretty sure most shows and serial episodes are free for a couple weeks after their original air date. If you stay fairly current with your shows, you'll be able to view what you want for free, even if you aren't a PBS donor/subscriber.

My grandson absolutely loves PBS shows. The menu of shows is easy to navigate and features thumbnail pictures of each show in a grid. When you hover over one of the thumbnails it expands. When selected you can choose from about 4 complete episodes of the show, some songs, and some other brief episode samples. Good stuff here.

I purchased an Amazon fire stick and downloaded this channel APP along with many other channel app's. I wasn't aware I would be prompted for a review from Amazon for each channel downloaded (or I wouldn't have downloaded 90% of them.) If there are no previous words to this paragraph and a three star review, then it is obvious I haven't had the time nor inclination to review the channel APP. I do often review items for seller discounts and therefore I am expected to leave reviews for every item purchased. The problem here is I didn't purchase any of these channel apps, they were all free for download and use. I will eventually get around to either reviewing each channel or deleting them from my Amazon fire stick, however when they are deleted from my fire stick the review requests remains. Due to the fact I am rated on my ability to leave a review for all my Amazon purchases, I must leave this wordy explanation for my review explaining the fact that I wish I had not been prompted for a review on a free channel app. The Amazon fire stick has been a good little functioning device that allows me to stream conventional shows over my home wifi and internet and although it's not the fastest device (click and wait sometimes) it does function as expected for a small HDMI stick over wifi. I only wish there was a way to disable the requests for reviews on free channel apps.

I love PBS programs and in particular, 'Masterpiece Theatre'. I am an aficionado of mystery/thrillers, and PBS provides us the best programming.

With the PBS Video for Kindle, I am able to watch Masterpiece Theatre at my leisure. I viewed 'Endeavour' last night. This is the story of young Inspector Morse as a new detective at Cambridge. I finished watching the 'Lewis' series series last week. Beside Masterpiece, I often watch POV and other programs of interest. They are available when I have the time.

The PBS Video on kindle is superb theatre. HD picture and sound. The best I have seen and heard. The Kindle HD provides the kind of sound and picture only available in a movie theatre. This application is one of the best apps available on the kindle.

Highly Recommended. prisrob 07-09-13

> Decent app with expected features:

The content that PBS provides speaks for itself, from Downton Abbey to Nova to Ken Burns. However, this review is not about the content itself.

The app provides video quality that is quite good, and streaming is usually seamless. Occasionally, there's the hiccup, and the player does not seem to change streaming quality to match a change in the quality of one's internet connection. For most people, this isn't an issue. Also, browsing content is fairly intuitive. The ability view content from my local PBS station is nice. However, it would be nice if the app allowed greater customization of the home screen.

> Full screen landscape issue:

I had the same problem that others have described where the video does not rotate into full screen landscape mode. Even after selecting full screen the video refused to play in landscape, so there was no real "full screen" experience. However, the fix described by ME to TN (top rated review) did not work for me. Here's what I found fixed the issue.

Most apps that are meant to be viewed in landscape (e.g. Netflix) will rotate to landscape regardless of the Kindle's settings. However, it turns out that the video in the PBS app does not rotate to landscape from portrait on its own if auto-rotation is locked on portrait for the Kindle itself. PBS could have done better here. To fix this issue, one has to enable auto-rotation for the Kindle itself, or lock the Kindle in landscape.

For those that want more detail, swipe down from the top of the screen. This brings up a panel with 6 options -- locked/unlocked, volume, brightness, wireless, sync and +more. Set locked/unlocked to unlocked. Leave it on unlocked or rotate to landscape then lock again. Either works. Now, after selecting full screen, the app should display in landscape correctly.

> Additional gripe:

I mainly use this app to view the Newshour. However, PBS does not upload their videos to the web as consistently as should be expected. It may be an entire day, or even a full weekend, before the full episode is viewable. That said, all the reports are provided, even before the episode airs and PBS is contractually allowed to post the episode online. However, the need to select and play individual reports detracts from the overall experience of watching the show. Outside the Newshour, there is much less time-dependency (i.e. no 24-hr news cycle), so non-immediate web uploading is not an issue.

It is a wonderful add on to streaming library- Quality productions. For the Ken Burns documentaries alone worth the money and the donation to PBS is modest. Have watched three documentaries already and for those alone was worth the year's donation

This did look very promising until I downloaded it and found that it requires a US zip code to work. It won't let you enter letters (for a UK postcode), so you can't get permission to view any content.

Looks like a good app but won't work as it requires flash, which is not available for kindle as far as I'm aware!

Supposed to get a free trial BUT whenever I go to watch the station it ways I have to get a PBS passport which I have done. I did watch one amazing program but I cannot commit to paying 7.00/month to a station that I cannot even watch to make a decision. So, is it the PBS station I DON'T want or is the fault of whoever provides the supposed 30 day free trial? Either way I am opting out of paying $100/year for PBS

I really enjoy PBS and the shows that are offered especially the Masterpiece shows, which are all available on the PBS app.