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If you want to time gate your episodes with your friends you're still welcome to coordinate that with them. Lots of couples do this too ("Don't watch until we c

If you want to time gate your episodes with your friends you're still welcome to coordinate that with them. Lots of couples do this too ("Don't watch until we can do it together") but personally, no matter how excited I am for a show, if a streaming platform withholds episodes so that they can better manage social media and stretch out advertising I'll just wait until the whole thing is out before I even start watching. I'm totally done letting media companies dictate my time and letting them make me feel like I'm missing out somehow if I don't jump when they tell me to. I'll watch things on my schedule, when it's convenient for me, and I'll do it at my own pace. If a platform doesn't want to let me do that, I've got plenty of other things competing for my attention that will.

afavour 4y ago
> If you want to time gate your episodes with your friends you're still welcome to coordinate that with them. That feels somewhat naive. People don't only belong to one friendship group. > if a streaming platform withholds episodes so that they can better manage social media and stretch out advertising I'll just wait until the whole thing is out before I even start watching. Sounds like it works out for everyone, then: those that want to watch and discuss week-to-week can, those that don't can wait until the end of the season and watch all at once.
- autoexec 4y ago
  > That feels somewhat naive. People don't only belong to one friendship group. We did exactly that during pandemic lockdowns. We used a browser extension that let us sync our netflix viewing while we had a live chat running during the show. It meant we could all talk about the last episode during the week and people had something to look forward to. It's perfectly do-able unless you're actually trying to keep your friend groups segregated for some reason, like you've got friends that won't do anything with some of your other friends. > Sounds like it works out for everyone, then: It might, except that streaming companies are too stupid to take a long view on ratings. Amazon for example canceled The Tick because they didn't get enough views in the weeks immediately following release. By the time I (and many many others) got around to watching and enjoying it, they'd already made up their mind that it was a failure. When platforms withhold episodes I'm moving on to something else and it could be a long time before I make it back around to them. If they chase me away from a show and I have to find one that respects my time and that one has got 5-6 seasons, or if instead I pick up a video game that I'll put 150+ hours into it could easily be months before I get back to whatever they are heavily promoting and tracking this instant, assuming something new doesn't catch my interest and take priority. Release whole seasons at once, and people who want to time gate can start right away and take longer to finish, while people who binge can finish in a weekend and everyone else can go at their own pace, but in any case it's more eyeballs within the same timeframe.
  - seunosewa 4y ago
    What's the browser extension you used?
    - autoexec 4y ago
      I'm pretty sure it was Netflix Party which I guess has since changed their name to Teleparty (probably to avoid pissing off netflix)
- smeagull 4y ago
  > Sounds like it works out for everyone, then: those that want to watch and discuss week-to-week can, those that don't can wait until the end of the season and watch all at once. I do this, and then frequently forget about the show at all. Then never watch it. Cancelled netflix not too long ago. They should never have reminded me to check the view stats of my family.
dmonitor 4y ago
> If you want to time gate your episodes with your friends you're still welcome to coordinate that with them Forcing everyone to collectively sit with a single episode per week is fun. Watching all at once makes them all sort of meld together. Having to sit with an episode for a week changes the experience of watching the show. If you can convince your friend group to watch together, that's great, but things like discussion forums and twitter (where a lot of people like to talk about shows online) will always be dominated by binge watchers.
- genewitch 4y ago
  the last time i did this, it was with House, M.D., and it was with downloaded copies (to ensure correct subtitles, right?). Episode came out whatever day, a group of us would gather the next evening and watch it together. We had a blind person and two deaf people in the group. The only thing netflix (and possibly others, i wouldn't know) have done to improve that situation is adding descriptive audio service, which brings the usefulness of good subtitles to the audio track, so that blind people can experience more of the show that they can't see. I'm a bad anecdote for a couple of reasons, though: I haven't had a television connected to coax in any way since 2003, and i haven't liked any new television show created after about 2013 or so - furthermore, i haven't really "loved" any series that began after 2004 or 2005. A supermajority of my media (disc and disk) predates the iphone. A plurality predates America Online. Since i'm already on an aside, i'll point out a couple of things: First, thanks to the likes of MTV's indefatigable pushing in the late 80s and through the 90s, everyone raised in that era (and after) thinks that in order to be engaging, you must change cameras every 3 seconds. Bonus points if there's no story reason to do so. Secondly, or if you prefer, as an ancillary to the first point, the constant viewpoint shifts can aggravate certain conditions; for example, new shows tend to tire me out, and a "binge" for whatever reason tends to leave me with a headache that lasts a couple of days. Third, a plurality (and majority, up to ~75%) of all television shows produced in the US are either directly or indirectly Law Enforcement related, and i'm sure a rigorous study would bear out that has a detrimental effect on both public policy and the zeitgeist feelings of law enforcement and related groups.
  - tekknik 4y ago

afavour 4y ago

> If you want to time gate your episodes with your friends you're still welcome to coordinate that with them. That feels somewhat naive. People don't only belong to one friendship group. > if a streaming platform withholds episodes so that they can better manage social media and stretch out advertising I'll just wait until the whole thing is out before I even start watching. Sounds like it works out for everyone, then: those that want to watch and discuss week-to-week can, those that don't can wait until the end of the season and watch all at once.

autoexec 4y ago
> That feels somewhat naive. People don't only belong to one friendship group. We did exactly that during pandemic lockdowns. We used a browser extension that let us sync our netflix viewing while we had a live chat running during the show. It meant we could all talk about the last episode during the week and people had something to look forward to. It's perfectly do-able unless you're actually trying to keep your friend groups segregated for some reason, like you've got friends that won't do anything with some of your other friends. > Sounds like it works out for everyone, then: It might, except that streaming companies are too stupid to take a long view on ratings. Amazon for example canceled The Tick because they didn't get enough views in the weeks immediately following release. By the time I (and many many others) got around to watching and enjoying it, they'd already made up their mind that it was a failure. When platforms withhold episodes I'm moving on to something else and it could be a long time before I make it back around to them. If they chase me away from a show and I have to find one that respects my time and that one has got 5-6 seasons, or if instead I pick up a video game that I'll put 150+ hours into it could easily be months before I get back to whatever they are heavily promoting and tracking this instant, assuming something new doesn't catch my interest and take priority. Release whole seasons at once, and people who want to time gate can start right away and take longer to finish, while people who binge can finish in a weekend and everyone else can go at their own pace, but in any case it's more eyeballs within the same timeframe.
- seunosewa 4y ago
  What's the browser extension you used?
  - autoexec 4y ago
    I'm pretty sure it was Netflix Party which I guess has since changed their name to Teleparty (probably to avoid pissing off netflix)
smeagull 4y ago
> Sounds like it works out for everyone, then: those that want to watch and discuss week-to-week can, those that don't can wait until the end of the season and watch all at once. I do this, and then frequently forget about the show at all. Then never watch it. Cancelled netflix not too long ago. They should never have reminded me to check the view stats of my family.

dmonitor 4y ago

> If you want to time gate your episodes with your friends you're still welcome to coordinate that with them Forcing everyone to collectively sit with a single episode per week is fun. Watching all at once makes them all sort of meld together. Having to sit with an episode for a week changes the experience of watching the show. If you can convince your friend group to watch together, that's great, but things like discussion forums and twitter (where a lot of people like to talk about shows online) will always be dominated by binge watchers.

genewitch 4y ago
the last time i did this, it was with House, M.D., and it was with downloaded copies (to ensure correct subtitles, right?). Episode came out whatever day, a group of us would gather the next evening and watch it together. We had a blind person and two deaf people in the group. The only thing netflix (and possibly others, i wouldn't know) have done to improve that situation is adding descriptive audio service, which brings the usefulness of good subtitles to the audio track, so that blind people can experience more of the show that they can't see. I'm a bad anecdote for a couple of reasons, though: I haven't had a television connected to coax in any way since 2003, and i haven't liked any new television show created after about 2013 or so - furthermore, i haven't really "loved" any series that began after 2004 or 2005. A supermajority of my media (disc and disk) predates the iphone. A plurality predates America Online. Since i'm already on an aside, i'll point out a couple of things: First, thanks to the likes of MTV's indefatigable pushing in the late 80s and through the 90s, everyone raised in that era (and after) thinks that in order to be engaging, you must change cameras every 3 seconds. Bonus points if there's no story reason to do so. Secondly, or if you prefer, as an ancillary to the first point, the constant viewpoint shifts can aggravate certain conditions; for example, new shows tend to tire me out, and a "binge" for whatever reason tends to leave me with a headache that lasts a couple of days. Third, a plurality (and majority, up to ~75%) of all television shows produced in the US are either directly or indirectly Law Enforcement related, and i'm sure a rigorous study would bear out that has a detrimental effect on both public policy and the zeitgeist feelings of law enforcement and related groups.
- tekknik 4y ago