6 ms·

> their UI has sucked Would you be willing to elaborate on what you find frustrating? We're doing work in a similar area.

fgonzag 8y ago
The interface is slow (though I think the actual design is decently usable but nothing great). Which categories you get are random, yes you can search for specific tags but that's a bit of a hassle and involves typing on a remote. What I'd really like would be both custom and sticky categories. Categories that will always be shown to me (simply by liking a category), and sticky custom categories by combining tags (like creating a action comedy category by combining the action and comedy tags and having that category always show up on my feed). Netflix lacks personalization IMHO, because algorithms will never replace my actual taste. Let me tell you what I want you to show me. Also, they should make a drill down search (minimize typing, please!). What I mean is a simply search menu with 5-10 major category types (genre, actor, director, tags) then being able to continue filtering by different categories on the fly. Also, add a completely optional where I can see what my friends liked (with their permission ofc). That way I can, hassle free, get recommendations from people I trust. You can even make public feeds! Famous movie critic public feed, etc. So many possibilities to improve Netflix, I wouldn't even know where to start.
- js2 8y ago
  Start by turning off the god damn trailer auto play. Just give me an option under settings. Please. I just want to browse in peace and quiet.
  - wool_gather 8y ago
    I agree this should not be turned on by default, but FYI if you mute it, that's sticky as long as you're not clearing cookies.
    - js2 8y ago
      I’m referring to the AppleTV Netflix app specifically.
hinkley 8y ago
As I tried to articulate this I realized that Hulu and Netflix now have the same problem. In netflix, right arrow, up and down always mean the same thing, but left changes meaning in an unpredictable way. In Hulu it’s the up button. To get out of a list you have to walk off the beginning. In both cases there’s now a very small limit to the number of things you want in the screen because you’ll have to walk back or go clear through to get out. It reinforces having a scarcity of entries or too many subsections. They should go back to using the menu button to escape out of a subsection. Make the subsection four or five elements wide and continuous scroll. But they keep doubling down on their poor use of real estate. Adding things like auto playing previews that some of us hate. Hulu used to work like this, which is why I have such venom. My tv had the old UI on it, so I stopped using the Apple TV version for a year or two. But when I got the new TV I was stuck with the awful, and they’ve done basically nothing since.
really3452 8y ago
I miss actual 1-5 star ratings. I want to know if a movie is rated by a majority of people to be more than 4 stars. If its not I don't want to waste my time watching it. I don't care if the movie is rated to be a 95% match for my wife.
- mavhc 8y ago
  Probably got rid of it because most of their films are terrible
- deaddodo 8y ago
  The star rating was never the value of everyone's opinion, it's always been based on what Netflix thought you would rate the film[1]. So the % match hasn't really changed. Being able to give an honest opinion though, has. Now it's just a binary "yes" or "no", which is super annoying. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/netflix-ratings-really-mean-172702232.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/netflix-ratings-really-mean-1...
  - krrrh 8y ago
    I miss it too, but I expect that the vast majority of people only rated films they watched as 5 stars, 1 stars, or no rating (meh, or the same as 3 stars). Most things I watch still don’t get a rating, so it’s really a reduction of 5 levels to 3, not a binary.
  - wj 8y ago
    At one point they had the star ratings where you could see two different star ratings. The primary one was of users like you and then in smaller print could see average of all users. Going back even further you could see see you friends' ratings of a title.

fgonzag 8y ago

The interface is slow (though I think the actual design is decently usable but nothing great). Which categories you get are random, yes you can search for specific tags but that's a bit of a hassle and involves typing on a remote. What I'd really like would be both custom and sticky categories. Categories that will always be shown to me (simply by liking a category), and sticky custom categories by combining tags (like creating a action comedy category by combining the action and comedy tags and having that category always show up on my feed). Netflix lacks personalization IMHO, because algorithms will never replace my actual taste. Let me tell you what I want you to show me. Also, they should make a drill down search (minimize typing, please!). What I mean is a simply search menu with 5-10 major category types (genre, actor, director, tags) then being able to continue filtering by different categories on the fly. Also, add a completely optional where I can see what my friends liked (with their permission ofc). That way I can, hassle free, get recommendations from people I trust. You can even make public feeds! Famous movie critic public feed, etc. So many possibilities to improve Netflix, I wouldn't even know where to start.

js2 8y ago
Start by turning off the god damn trailer auto play. Just give me an option under settings. Please. I just want to browse in peace and quiet.
- wool_gather 8y ago
  I agree this should not be turned on by default, but FYI if you mute it, that's sticky as long as you're not clearing cookies.
  - js2 8y ago
    I’m referring to the AppleTV Netflix app specifically.

hinkley 8y ago

As I tried to articulate this I realized that Hulu and Netflix now have the same problem. In netflix, right arrow, up and down always mean the same thing, but left changes meaning in an unpredictable way. In Hulu it’s the up button. To get out of a list you have to walk off the beginning. In both cases there’s now a very small limit to the number of things you want in the screen because you’ll have to walk back or go clear through to get out. It reinforces having a scarcity of entries or too many subsections. They should go back to using the menu button to escape out of a subsection. Make the subsection four or five elements wide and continuous scroll. But they keep doubling down on their poor use of real estate. Adding things like auto playing previews that some of us hate. Hulu used to work like this, which is why I have such venom. My tv had the old UI on it, so I stopped using the Apple TV version for a year or two. But when I got the new TV I was stuck with the awful, and they’ve done basically nothing since.

really3452 8y ago

I miss actual 1-5 star ratings. I want to know if a movie is rated by a majority of people to be more than 4 stars. If its not I don't want to waste my time watching it. I don't care if the movie is rated to be a 95% match for my wife.

mavhc 8y ago
Probably got rid of it because most of their films are terrible
deaddodo 8y ago
The star rating was never the value of everyone's opinion, it's always been based on what Netflix thought you would rate the film[1]. So the % match hasn't really changed. Being able to give an honest opinion though, has. Now it's just a binary "yes" or "no", which is super annoying. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/netflix-ratings-really-mean-172702232.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/netflix-ratings-really-mean-1...
- krrrh 8y ago
  I miss it too, but I expect that the vast majority of people only rated films they watched as 5 stars, 1 stars, or no rating (meh, or the same as 3 stars). Most things I watch still don’t get a rating, so it’s really a reduction of 5 levels to 3, not a binary.
- wj 8y ago
  At one point they had the star ratings where you could see two different star ratings. The primary one was of users like you and then in smaller print could see average of all users. Going back even further you could see see you friends' ratings of a title.