4 ms·

Netflix originally had a very healthy and diverse social ecosystem of reviewers. For some reason they decided to remove all comments and lengthy reviews for the

Netflix originally had a very healthy and diverse social ecosystem of reviewers. For some reason they decided to remove all comments and lengthy reviews for the thumbs up/down. Maybe it was because they didn’t want to hire mods but honestly it was a huge opportunity for Netflix to create a very sticky social media network that would be impossible to replicate and disrupt. Maybe because of hubris they thought that the studios would never catch up with the tech. I mean look at blackberry and Nokia - they never caught up to Apple but when you think of it as hardware vs software especially commodity cdn software after a decade it really comes down to either the content or social network effect. They missed on both.

oneplane 4y ago
We never had any useful reviewers. Only on the US version.
phpisthebest 4y ago
>>For some reason they decided to remove all comments and lengthy reviews for the thumbs up/down. The reason was / is pretty widely known, their customer base did not reaction "properly" with the "correct" opinions to the shift in direction of neflix original programming and comedy specials, coming to head with the widely panned Amy Schumer Special which most netflix customers responded negatively to and brought an end to the review and rating system
- CoastalCoder 4y ago
  I agree this was a widespread suspicion, but I don't remember ever seeing corroborating evidence.
- glenstein 4y ago
  Misinformation alert! I tried to track down an article substantiating the comment above, and what I found was news outlets reporting that alt-right trolls organized to artificially spam 1-star reviews of her special. https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/amy-schumer-netflix-alt-right/ https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/amy-schumer-netflix-alt-ri...
  - phpisthebest 4y ago
    Daily Dot is not a place I would cite for a "fact check" Also pretty common, a meme for the most part now, for media outlets to proclaim all negative criticism is "alt-right trolls", these accusations are often given with out any real evidence backing the claim
    - glenstein 4y ago
      Daily Dot is not the original source, they are one of numerous independent publications raising the same point. So that is irrelevent here, and they appear to be citing specific threads and not just engaging in open-ended speculation, and the phenomenon of organized alt-right trolling is real, so your comment is inaccurate at every level.
  - Ekaros 4y ago
    And why shouldn't the customer be able to review product for any reason? Why is that fascist totalitarians on left want to ban freedom of the speech and always resort calling anyone who in most slightest and mildest degree disagree them as alt-right.
    - glenstein 4y ago
      Coordinated inauthentic behavior to artificially tank reviews is not a representative sample of actual audience sentiment and shouldn't be represented as such. And again, this isn't a case of "calling anyone" alt-right, it's not speculation, it's a report about stuff that happened in specific reddit threads.
- raydev 4y ago
  The Amy Schumer thing is pure speculation.
  - phpisthebest 4y ago
    Speculation based on timing, public comments and coincidence... If this was a trial it would be a circumstantial case, probably not enough to convict someone "beyond a reasonable doubt" but if it were I think there is "clear and convincing" circumstantial evidence to correlate the 2 events
    - raydev 4y ago
      Two issues here: > Amy Schumer Special which most netflix customers responded negatively to Speculation. There was a big social media swarm very loudly upset about Schumer, even putting aside the claim that they were alt-right like someone else here mentioned, you cannot deny the bandwagoning. The bad star ratings simply could not be trusted after that. > I think there is "clear and convincing" circumstantial evidence to correlate the 2 events These sorts of changes can take years to pitch and refine, especially given existing data Netflix had. I'll accept that the ratings brigade may have been a "okay, we've seen enough" moment for Netflix, but the fact is Netflix had been publicly talking about redesigning the rating system for more than a year prior. This is like saying Elon Musk made Twitter work on an edit button, turns out they had been hashing out the details for years and were forced to say something. https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-wants-to-ditch-5-star-ratings-2016-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-wants-to-ditch-5-sta...
      - phpisthebest 4y ago
        I invite you to go back and re-read my comment, because I never claimed that Schumer event was what caused them to start working on a new system to replace the star, I said "their customer base did not reaction "properly" with the "correct" opinions to the shift in direction of neflix original programming and comedy specials, coming to head with the widely panned Amy Schumer" The "incorrect reviews" predated Schumer, but as you said Schumer was the "we have had enough with our customers giving us feedback we do not like" moment It was clear for a LONG LONG time before Schumer that at least 50% of netflix customer base was not happy with the direction the content was going... The ever decreasing subscriber count is a reflection of this as well As to the "everyone that disagrees with me is alt-right nazi trolls" charge that people like to bet around anytime a movie, TV Show, or comedy special etc is not approved of by the audience is frankly non-sense. The "media" coverage around the "review bombing" provided not actual evidence of such a thing happening, and unlike sites like Rotten Tomatoes, one had to be an actual customer of Netflix to review it so their is less opportunity for that than say a rotten Tomatoes which I personally think the "problem" is over stated even for those sites, Instead it is gate keepers being out of touch with the consumers but they refuse to admit that so it is not them that is out of touch no it has to be "bots and trolls" or "alt-right" or some thing other than the actual fans, consumers, etc rejecting their project
- smaryjerry 4y ago
  I’m surprised this isn’t mentioned more. Removing ratings was a disaster, just personally as a consumer. You don’t feel engaged enough use their like/dislike system where as with a rating you got that feeling of contributing something and were contributing something. So, first you’ve removed engagement, that’s bad. And now we get these like 98% match type of rating systems, and every time you see a movie or show that is high match but you hate it makes you lose confidence in the whole system.
- waspight 4y ago
  Why did they never used IMDb rating?
e3bc54b2 4y ago
A goodreads for movies? I'd be interested in that.. But, Netflix was getting more barren. People would notice the reviews they wrote were disappearing, because the content itself got pulled (not-renewed) from Netflix. That's worse than one-time plug-pull, so Netflix didn't really have the choice.
- rerx 4y ago
  > A goodreads for movies? Letterboxd wants to be that, pretty much, without tying it to one specific catalogue of titles available to stream. I think Mubi still has a lot of reviews, regardless if movies are available there or not. There it works, I think, because their offering always was understood to be much more niche than Netflix's.
  - e3bc54b2 4y ago
    These days I just go to /r/MovieSuggestions. Nearly everything I've watched since pandemic has come from suggestions there and they are quite good. The sub probably has a year of life left before it gets overrun, so enjoy while it lasts :)
n0tth3dro1ds 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

oneplane 4y ago

We never had any useful reviewers. Only on the US version.

phpisthebest 4y ago

>>For some reason they decided to remove all comments and lengthy reviews for the thumbs up/down. The reason was / is pretty widely known, their customer base did not reaction "properly" with the "correct" opinions to the shift in direction of neflix original programming and comedy specials, coming to head with the widely panned Amy Schumer Special which most netflix customers responded negatively to and brought an end to the review and rating system

CoastalCoder 4y ago
I agree this was a widespread suspicion, but I don't remember ever seeing corroborating evidence.
glenstein 4y ago
Misinformation alert! I tried to track down an article substantiating the comment above, and what I found was news outlets reporting that alt-right trolls organized to artificially spam 1-star reviews of her special. https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/amy-schumer-netflix-alt-right/ https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/amy-schumer-netflix-alt-ri...
- phpisthebest 4y ago
  Daily Dot is not a place I would cite for a "fact check" Also pretty common, a meme for the most part now, for media outlets to proclaim all negative criticism is "alt-right trolls", these accusations are often given with out any real evidence backing the claim
  - glenstein 4y ago
    Daily Dot is not the original source, they are one of numerous independent publications raising the same point. So that is irrelevent here, and they appear to be citing specific threads and not just engaging in open-ended speculation, and the phenomenon of organized alt-right trolling is real, so your comment is inaccurate at every level.
- Ekaros 4y ago
  And why shouldn't the customer be able to review product for any reason? Why is that fascist totalitarians on left want to ban freedom of the speech and always resort calling anyone who in most slightest and mildest degree disagree them as alt-right.
  - glenstein 4y ago
    Coordinated inauthentic behavior to artificially tank reviews is not a representative sample of actual audience sentiment and shouldn't be represented as such. And again, this isn't a case of "calling anyone" alt-right, it's not speculation, it's a report about stuff that happened in specific reddit threads.
raydev 4y ago
The Amy Schumer thing is pure speculation.
- phpisthebest 4y ago
  Speculation based on timing, public comments and coincidence... If this was a trial it would be a circumstantial case, probably not enough to convict someone "beyond a reasonable doubt" but if it were I think there is "clear and convincing" circumstantial evidence to correlate the 2 events
  - raydev 4y ago
    Two issues here: > Amy Schumer Special which most netflix customers responded negatively to Speculation. There was a big social media swarm very loudly upset about Schumer, even putting aside the claim that they were alt-right like someone else here mentioned, you cannot deny the bandwagoning. The bad star ratings simply could not be trusted after that. > I think there is "clear and convincing" circumstantial evidence to correlate the 2 events These sorts of changes can take years to pitch and refine, especially given existing data Netflix had. I'll accept that the ratings brigade may have been a "okay, we've seen enough" moment for Netflix, but the fact is Netflix had been publicly talking about redesigning the rating system for more than a year prior. This is like saying Elon Musk made Twitter work on an edit button, turns out they had been hashing out the details for years and were forced to say something. https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-wants-to-ditch-5-star-ratings-2016-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-wants-to-ditch-5-sta...
    - phpisthebest 4y ago
      I invite you to go back and re-read my comment, because I never claimed that Schumer event was what caused them to start working on a new system to replace the star, I said "their customer base did not reaction "properly" with the "correct" opinions to the shift in direction of neflix original programming and comedy specials, coming to head with the widely panned Amy Schumer" The "incorrect reviews" predated Schumer, but as you said Schumer was the "we have had enough with our customers giving us feedback we do not like" moment It was clear for a LONG LONG time before Schumer that at least 50% of netflix customer base was not happy with the direction the content was going... The ever decreasing subscriber count is a reflection of this as well As to the "everyone that disagrees with me is alt-right nazi trolls" charge that people like to bet around anytime a movie, TV Show, or comedy special etc is not approved of by the audience is frankly non-sense. The "media" coverage around the "review bombing" provided not actual evidence of such a thing happening, and unlike sites like Rotten Tomatoes, one had to be an actual customer of Netflix to review it so their is less opportunity for that than say a rotten Tomatoes which I personally think the "problem" is over stated even for those sites, Instead it is gate keepers being out of touch with the consumers but they refuse to admit that so it is not them that is out of touch no it has to be "bots and trolls" or "alt-right" or some thing other than the actual fans, consumers, etc rejecting their project
smaryjerry 4y ago
I’m surprised this isn’t mentioned more. Removing ratings was a disaster, just personally as a consumer. You don’t feel engaged enough use their like/dislike system where as with a rating you got that feeling of contributing something and were contributing something. So, first you’ve removed engagement, that’s bad. And now we get these like 98% match type of rating systems, and every time you see a movie or show that is high match but you hate it makes you lose confidence in the whole system.
waspight 4y ago
Why did they never used IMDb rating?

e3bc54b2 4y ago

A goodreads for movies? I'd be interested in that.. But, Netflix was getting more barren. People would notice the reviews they wrote were disappearing, because the content itself got pulled (not-renewed) from Netflix. That's worse than one-time plug-pull, so Netflix didn't really have the choice.

rerx 4y ago
> A goodreads for movies? Letterboxd wants to be that, pretty much, without tying it to one specific catalogue of titles available to stream. I think Mubi still has a lot of reviews, regardless if movies are available there or not. There it works, I think, because their offering always was understood to be much more niche than Netflix's.
- e3bc54b2 4y ago
  These days I just go to /r/MovieSuggestions. Nearly everything I've watched since pandemic has come from suggestions there and they are quite good. The sub probably has a year of life left before it gets overrun, so enjoy while it lasts :)

n0tth3dro1ds 4y ago

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]