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I've used Plex for more than a decade, and I've seen it drop in quality over the years as Plex the company has pivoted towards being a streaming service. Perso

I've used Plex for more than a decade, and I've seen it drop in quality over the years as Plex the company has pivoted towards being a streaming service. Personally, my main beef is that as a client app, the streaming service stuff has bled into the personal library UI in obnoxious ways. For example, the default "tab" is called "Recommended". This shows some kind of algorithm-based feed of stuff they think you want to watch. This tab is the default even for your own private library. Why would it suggest stuff from a library that I curate? It's very strange. In the browser, it remembers your last active tab to some extent, but the native apps (like on AppleTV) does not. When I open the app and go to a folder, I just see recommended stuff. Similarly, if you go to the screen for a TV show in your library, it will show a "Related shows" section. It's my library, I know what is there, I don't want these spammy algorithmic things. Occasionally I run into other parts of the app, which invariably try to steer me towards using their streaming service. It's just a constant reminder of how it's no longer designed for my purposes.

urbandw311er 3y ago
> Why would it suggest stuff > from a library that I curate? Mostly to try and help save time, eg to suggest you could resume a couple of recently watched episodes that you haven’t finished yet. Or that you might want to watch something that was just added to the library in the last few minutes. In most cases this has proved useful to me and I’ve found it to be a timesaver.
- atombender 3y ago
  No, I disagree. On the Recommended tab for my TV show folder, the rows are: - "Recently released" and "Recently added", which I agree are useful — but don't belong in a separate tab, as I always sort by recentness. - "Start watching": Shows it thinks I should start watching; why? I know what I have and what I intend to watch. - "Rediscover": Shows I have started watching but not finished, pointless. I could just browse. - "More in [random genre]": Pointless, I know my library, it's my library. - "Top rated TV": Ditto. - "Recently played": Never use this, doesn't belong under "Recommended". It's all just pointless stuff, and not appropriate as a default view when I'm navigating into my own library.

urbandw311er 3y ago

> Why would it suggest stuff > from a library that I curate? Mostly to try and help save time, eg to suggest you could resume a couple of recently watched episodes that you haven’t finished yet. Or that you might want to watch something that was just added to the library in the last few minutes. In most cases this has proved useful to me and I’ve found it to be a timesaver.

atombender 3y ago
No, I disagree. On the Recommended tab for my TV show folder, the rows are: - "Recently released" and "Recently added", which I agree are useful — but don't belong in a separate tab, as I always sort by recentness. - "Start watching": Shows it thinks I should start watching; why? I know what I have and what I intend to watch. - "Rediscover": Shows I have started watching but not finished, pointless. I could just browse. - "More in [random genre]": Pointless, I know my library, it's my library. - "Top rated TV": Ditto. - "Recently played": Never use this, doesn't belong under "Recommended". It's all just pointless stuff, and not appropriate as a default view when I'm navigating into my own library.