In August last year, a rumor made the rounds that Amazon was planning to launch a free and ad-supported video streaming service aimed at Fire TV device owners. It turns out that rumor was true, with just such a service being revealed this week through Amazon's IMDb website and carrying the name Freedive.

As Variety reports, IMDb Freedive is a completely free video streaming service for viewers in the US that will make its money through advertising. A growing number of movies and TV shows will be offered to anyone who cares to sign up using an Amazon, IMDb, Facebook, or Google account. It seems Amazon doesn't mind which you use as long as you start watching and generating some ad dollars.

At launch, Freedive already has over 130 movies and 29 TV shows available to stream, with deals signed to offer content from CBS, NBCUniversal Television, Sony Pictures/Colombia Pictures, New Market Films, Warner Bros. Television, A+E Networks, and Annapurna Pictures.

Viewing is not being limited to Fire TV devices as first thought. Anyone in the US can watch via Fire TV or a computer once they have signed up. Streaming via the IMDb app will also be available soon, therefore opening up the service to smartphones and tablets.

By launching this new service through IMDb it's clearly separate from the premium Amazon Prime Video service. It seems likely that the adverts appearing on Freedive will regularly point to Prime Video as the better option in terms of breadth of content alongside all the other benefits of becoming a Prime subscriber. I'd expect some enticing discounts to appear on that first year of Prime through Freedive, too.