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Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

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Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#181

Post by isleyaardvark »

bcgraham wrote: post #164
Udik wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with Rotten Tomatoes is that - I suspect- the studios are perfectly able to influence the professional reviewers. Or, more probably, professional reviewers adjust their expectations and judgments on the type of movie they're reviewing. The end result is that every recent shiny pile-of-crap produced by Hollywood gets enthusiastic reviews and therefore excellent scores on RT. Gravity: RT score 97% 2001 A Sp…

RT's Tomatometer or Metacritic's Metascore are not measures of film worth as a kind of "atomic weight." Tomatometer, in particular, is a statement about how many reviewers gave a positive review, without regard to each reviewer's depth of feeling. Imagine three movies: First: 90% of reviewers gave 5/5, 10% of reviewers gave 1/5. Second: 90% of reviewers gave 3/5, 10% of reviewers gave 2/5. Third: 80% of reviewers gav…

Exactly, it's more a measure of broad appeal than quality.

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#182

Post by xixi77 »

Majestic121 wrote: post #148
thenomad wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That'd be nice, but it hasn't happened yet. I'm not going to make a grand sweeping statement here, but certainly, I've found out about multiple useful products via adverts. I actively don't want them to go away completely. I am very interested in hearing about new products in a number of spaces. If people can pay to let me know, briefly, about their thing that they think I might find useful, I'm cool with that.

Did you actually have a need for those products before hearing about them? I find myself very often in the situation were I hear/learn about a new cool thing, and I want it absolutely right now (The last example was a colleague bringing an Oculus to work, I almost ordered one the spot) However, I try to wait a bit before actually buying anything big (like one/two weeks), and I find that most of the time I don't actua…

I don't think "real" and "new" are opposites -- if someone only realizes that she wants X after hearing about X, why does it make her need any less real?

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#183

Post by dec0dedab0de »

eevilspock wrote: post #113
bostik wrote: post #63

Oh wow, that's rich. Quoting from the article: Sites like Rotten Tomatoes that aggregate movie reviews into one overall rating are being blamed for poor opening weekends. The best part is that the quote above even provides a link to the reference they are using for the made statement.[0] In effect, the studios are complaining that news of the films' crappiness are spreading too fast . Let that sink in. The studios co…

> When a bunch of reviews can undo the effects of a massive, weeks or months long marketing push, I'd say it's time to rethink your product strategy. Whenever a debate about advertising pops up on HN, many people defend it as the necessary way for consumers to find out about good products. Healthy free markets depend on informed consumers, but to think that advertising results in informed consumers makes little sense…

I'm hoping for a future where recommendation systems and collaborative filtering get so good that they render marketing and advertising useless.

How can you recommend something you've never heard of?

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#184

Post by 7Z7 »

crdb wrote: post #61
qrendel wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the critic (and user) reviews are what I think of as "easy mode" ones. They don't really teach you anything about the film, just say whether they liked it or not, using the most colorful language they can possibly muster. The FF quote seems like a typical example. Alternatively there are some that really dig deep into the meaning and execution of the film and analyze it in ways I would never think of, not hav…

Thanks for the recommendation. These (FCH) reviews are awesome. Do you know any other such critics?

The Plinkett reviews, on Red Letter Media?

http://redlettermedia.com/plinkett/star-wars/ http://redlettermedia.com/plinkett/star-trek/ http://redlettermedia.com/plinkett/other-movies/

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#185

Post by mangeletti »

johnchristopher wrote: post #105
rconti wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your usage of the phrase "crass anti-intellectualism" is far more absolute, dismissive, and disparaging than anything the parent said.

I don't think so. Moreover dismissing an entire group of people (hipsterism ? really ?) by stating that watching and enjoying movies one doesn't like is akin to stoking one's ego and that such movies are pretentious seems way more... well... dismissive and absolute to me. Because, believe it or not, some people truly enjoy the movies he doesn't enjoy and it has nothing to do with ego. This is objectively anti-intelle…

My comment isn't intended to be anti-anything. I spend 10-15 hours per week studying philosophy, history, economics, ontology, physics (a little), and biology, even if it is largely via Wikipedia. I'm certainly not anti-intellectual.

By assuming that watching "hipster movies" makes you intellectual, you've illustrated exactly my point, that (some) people watch these movies because they think it somehow makes them into intellectuals, which fits the definition of pretentious quite well.

Also note, pertaining to pretentiousness, that pretending to be an "intellectual" by category or style doesn't change one's IQ by even a little.

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#186

Post by [deleted] »

knowaveragejoe wrote: post #139
mrob wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find the same thing. For example, the funniest movie I've ever seen is "Freddy Got Fingered". This is currently rated 11% on Rotten Tomatoes. And the most boring movie I've seen is "Lost In Translation", which is rated 95% there. In both cases I watched them because I liked the lead actor's previous work, and that's had a better success rate than trusting reviews.

I'm appalled that for someone out there, Freddy Got Fingered is the funniest movie they've ever seen . Likewise, that Lost In Translation is the most boring .

[deleted]

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#187

Post by eevilspock »

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #183
eevilspock wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When a bunch of reviews can undo the effects of a massive, weeks or months long marketing push, I'd say it's time to rethink your product strategy. Whenever a debate about advertising pops up on HN, many people defend it as the necessary way for consumers to find out about good products. Healthy free markets depend on informed consumers, but to think that advertising results in informed consumers makes little sense…

I'm hoping for a future where recommendation systems and collaborative filtering get so good that they render marketing and advertising useless. How can you recommend something you've never heard of?

A grapevine starts with one. Recommendation systems, as well as the plain old web, are just scalable grapevines. If a new product is good, people will quickly hear about how good it is from actual users. As opposed to from you the biased (and often motivated to mislead) seller.

So how do you bootstrap your good product into the grapevine? A variety of ways, depending on what it is. Sending samples to reviewers. Announcements on relevant websites (such as HN). Making it available in catalogs and product search engines (Amazon, an app store, Etsy, Orbitz, etc) where people will encounter it in search results.

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#188

Post by fluidcruft »

Majestic121 wrote: post #148
thenomad wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That'd be nice, but it hasn't happened yet. I'm not going to make a grand sweeping statement here, but certainly, I've found out about multiple useful products via adverts. I actively don't want them to go away completely. I am very interested in hearing about new products in a number of spaces. If people can pay to let me know, briefly, about their thing that they think I might find useful, I'm cool with that.

Did you actually have a need for those products before hearing about them? I find myself very often in the situation were I hear/learn about a new cool thing, and I want it absolutely right now (The last example was a colleague bringing an Oculus to work, I almost ordered one the spot) However, I try to wait a bit before actually buying anything big (like one/two weeks), and I find that most of the time I don't actua…

> Did you actually have a need for those products before hearing about them?

Yes. As a mater of fact, a prime example from earlier this week--I live in an area with very active clays and we've had a serious drought this year which has shifted foundations around like crazy--whatever, that's what active clays do and you learn to live with it. But the annoying part is doors that stick or won't close or closets that won't open. So, I fixed a few last weekend by putting spacers behind hinges and moved some strike plates around and was getting ready to learn how to plane the doors that couldn't be fixed that way and for the first time and I saw an advertisement for an "adjustable door hinge". Whoa. best. idea. ever. Test batch is in the mail and I have high hopes. Why on earth these things aren't stocked in the local Lowe's or Home Depot is beyond my comprehension.

Re: Be Suspicious of Online Movie Ratings

#190

Post by eevilspock »

fluidcruft wrote: post #188
Majestic121 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you actually have a need for those products before hearing about them? I find myself very often in the situation were I hear/learn about a new cool thing, and I want it absolutely right now (The last example was a colleague bringing an Oculus to work, I almost ordered one the spot) However, I try to wait a bit before actually buying anything big (like one/two weeks), and I find that most of the time I don't actua…

> Did you actually have a need for those products before hearing about them? Yes. As a mater of fact, a prime example from earlier this week--I live in an area with very active clays and we've had a serious drought this year which has shifted foundations around like crazy--whatever, that's what active clays do and you learn to live with it. But the annoying part is doors that stick or won't close or closets that won'…

Ran into? That's not an argument for ads. That's an argument for serendipity. We don't need ads for chance encounters of things that might be useful. You run across them when you visit someone's house, or a friend tells you about something great, or someone here on HN mentions it. Or maybe you do a web search and it comes up as a recommended alternative to planing doors. All of these are better than ads because the source does not have a conflict of interest, an incentive to deceive.

And we can move away from a web, roadsides, subway cars, buses, everything littered with ads. We can have a web and newspapers or television news that don't put out junk to increase page-views or tv views using any means necessary (e.g. click bait, sensationalistic junk "news" "reports", etc).

We won't have children being programmed to want more and more stuff.

I could go on and on.

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