Turning Off Autoplaying Previews • Hacker News Board

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#11

Post by Someone1234 » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:40 PM UTC

2bitencryption wrote: post #4

Didn't ever expect to see this capability. A bit unrelated, but: anyone remember in the "early" days when Netflix held competitions to develop the most accurate recommendation and ratings engines? Giving out million dollar prizes? And held possibly state-of-the-art tech for this? And then one day completely gutted the star rating system, replacing it with a much-despised "thumbs up/down" system, giving up their "so g…

It was right around the time their first "Originals" came out. I guess accurate recommendations is less important than shows with cheaper licensing costs or home-grown originals.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#12

Post by scrooched_moose » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:40 PM UTC

2bitencryption wrote: post #4

Didn't ever expect to see this capability. A bit unrelated, but: anyone remember in the "early" days when Netflix held competitions to develop the most accurate recommendation and ratings engines? Giving out million dollar prizes? And held possibly state-of-the-art tech for this? And then one day completely gutted the star rating system, replacing it with a much-despised "thumbs up/down" system, giving up their "so g…

I'm pretty sure the new recommendation algorithm is basically just "recommend Netflix originals in a random order".

Edit: I feel like I should add something besides a snarky comment:

I was searching for a mid-2000s Best Picture Nominee a few days ago (something like Munich or Capote, but don't remember). Results 1 & 2 were The Irishman and Marriage Story. None of the other non-Netflix best picture nominees were anywhere in the results if that was the connection they were making.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#13

Post by minimaxir » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:41 PM UTC

joegahona wrote: post #6

I'd love to know what metrics they were optimizing for when they introduced this feature.

Definitely viewthrough rate (i.e. % of people who subsequently view the video after hovering over a video thumb and the autoplay triggers vs. normal viewthrough rate after hovering over a thumb).

Of course, a weakness of this testing is failing to account for negative metric impact outside of the one you are optimizing.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#14

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:41 PM UTC

2bitencryption wrote: post #4

Didn't ever expect to see this capability. A bit unrelated, but: anyone remember in the "early" days when Netflix held competitions to develop the most accurate recommendation and ratings engines? Giving out million dollar prizes? And held possibly state-of-the-art tech for this? And then one day completely gutted the star rating system, replacing it with a much-despised "thumbs up/down" system, giving up their "so g…

[deleted]

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#15

Post by 1123581321 » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:41 PM UTC

2bitencryption wrote: post #4

Didn't ever expect to see this capability. A bit unrelated, but: anyone remember in the "early" days when Netflix held competitions to develop the most accurate recommendation and ratings engines? Giving out million dollar prizes? And held possibly state-of-the-art tech for this? And then one day completely gutted the star rating system, replacing it with a much-despised "thumbs up/down" system, giving up their "so g…

A lot more people use the thumb system than were using the star system.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#16

Post by rconti » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:41 PM UTC

coreyp_1 wrote: post #7

The Autoplay is REALLY, REALLY, A-N-N-O-Y-I-N-G!!! Actually, I hate most of the current design (UI/UX). It's really streamlined when all you want to do is push "play", but everything else is, quite frankly, laborious.

I know this is going to make me sound old, but so much UI/UX is getting worse. I can't even tell which tile is highlighted on my appleTV because it's only about 5% larger than the adjacent ones. The only way you can tell is by the change as you cursor around, you can't tell at a glance (and this is on a 75" TV).

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#17

Post by dmannorreys » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:42 PM UTC

Finally. I've been so frustrated about the autoplaying previews, especially since I've experienced that after a few seconds, the menu will fade out and Netflix will play the video as if you had clicked "Play". But I haven't clicked "Play", I only happened to rise up from my couch, hear the preview starting, do whatever for 30 seconds and then come back having to stop or restart the episode.

Absolutely terrible. I'm really happy Netflix has given us a way out.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#18

Post by deagle50 » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:42 PM UTC

joegahona wrote: post #6

I'd love to know what metrics they were optimizing for when they introduced this feature.

I think they correlate engagement to retention.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#19

Post by sunkenvicar » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:43 PM UTC

Finally. Thank you!

I consider the previews spoilers. And autoplay destroys pacing because it skips the preroll/credits.

Re: Turning Off Autoplaying Previews

#20

Post by underbluewaters » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 9:43 PM UTC

It's amazing it took this long. I can understand how some people might be okay with this feature but it causes me actual anxiety to use the Netflix app on my AppleTV. Before autoplay I could mindlessly browse looking for content. Now I hurry through to check if there is anything new and get out as fast as possible. They must know that people use the app less since this change... right?