Free video streaming service Crackle has become one of the first third-party publishers to support Amazon Interactive Video Ads. The integration via the Crackle Connex sales arm will let consumers learn more about a product or add a product to their Amazon shopping cart directly from the screen during an ad break. Crackle parent company Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment is expected to add Amazon ads to its Chicken Soup for the Soul and Redbox VOD apps in the future. The agreement also allows Amazon Fire TV customers to watch free movies and TV shows via Redbox.

“Interactive ads that allow customers to buy items right from their TVs have been a dream for many advertisers for years,” writes Cord Cutters News, emphasizing that “now, Amazon has built a platform to do just that and is slowly finding partners to air these ads.”

To implement the program, Crackle has formed a streamlined integration path between Amazon’s Elemental MediaTailor OTT ad solution from Amazon Web Services and Amazon Publisher Direct, explains MediaPost, which seems to suggest that as a result of the integration Crackle Connex will be able to offer publishers all types of interactive video ads through its various VOD platforms, and won’t be limited only to Amazon products and services.

“Working with Amazon Publisher Direct gives us access to new capabilities and allows us to leverage its growing offerings to the video advertising community,” said Philippe Guelton, chief revenue officer of Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment in an announcement. “There is so much interoperability that will continue to be uncovered as Crackle Connex provides world-class streaming programming and leverages enhanced video advertising support from Amazon Publisher Direct.”

In other Chicken Soup news, MediaPost reports that “Redbox is expanding its Perks rewards program beyond movie rentals at its kiosks, to apply to titles rented or purchased through the Redbox’s streaming app/transactional video-on-demand (TVOD) program.” The app is available on Samsung TVs and via Roku and Vizio.

While Netflix announced in April that it will stop renting physical DVDs as of September 29, Redbox still has 29,000 video kiosks, and “points accrued by renting or purchasing movies can be exchanged for free rentals,” MediaPost explains.