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The Clickbaitification of Netflix

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Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#211

Post by valyagolev »

stonemetal12 wrote: post #184
m12k wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are instinctively drawn to a lot of things that are really bad for us in significant amounts, because we are designed to fit into an environment where those things are scarce. Sugar, fat, inactivity, "interesting news", outrage. These all steal our attention because that response helped our ancestors survive and pick out these rare but important treats. But in typical human fashion we've now crafted a world th…

Isn't that more because of what they are optimizing for than the fact that they are optimizing? To continue the food analogy engagement is blood sugar levels and they are seeing how high they can crank it. If they optimized for "happier and healthier in the long run" then they would probably loose short term engagement spikes, but have fewer people quitting for health reasons. Basically they could be broccoli if they…

all-broccoli diet is no good either. so it’s the optimization itself, yes

for a balanced diet, we have to make our own choices, based on our particular, local situation, and not rely on any generalised algorithm. which is very unpleasant. i wish there could be a Facebook telling me what i actually should know! alas, it's always going to be on me to choose

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#213

Post by 542354234235 »

yakubin wrote: post #115
dr_dshiv wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How might a streaming service be designed to increase user happiness and wellbeing? From a positive design perspective, could certain streaming features give users a greater sense of purpose or goal accomplishment (e.g., mastering a genre) or help users meaningfully connect to others (e.g., seeing what friends have recommended lately)? While measuring the effects of a feature on wellbeing outcomes is substantially ha…

> How might a streaming service be designed to increase user happiness and wellbeing? Yesterday I worked longer, because we had a critical bug at an unfortunate moment. At some point my brain stopped working and I couldn't make progress. So I stopped work for the day, solved some solitaire, mindlessly played some chess, and watched a couple episodes of anime on Netflix. After that my brain unblocked itself and the wo…

I don’t think anyone is saying that mindlessness should be banned or completely removed from a platform. But that it should not be pushed so heavily that it is edging out any kind of deeper engagement, or just non engagement.

All these services are competing for human attention, which there is only a finite amount. I think it is pretty obvious that this has resulted in more mindlessness, where apps are trying to fill every sliver of open attention with the most easily digestible little piece of data (a 10 second meme, a couple of comments, a 30 sec friend snap). Combined with apps and services trying to take your attention from other things through strategic notifications, this is the opposite of long term wellbeing.

Attention and focus for long periods of time is a skill. Delayed gratification is a skill. Both of those are needed for long term growth, developing other skills, and doing activities that are fulfilling but not immediately gratifying. Being surrounded by things that constantly and perniciously attempt to carve up your attention and provide instant gratification is detrimental to those skills.

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#214

Post by mumblemumble »

tornato7 wrote: post #31
matheusmoreira wrote: post #3

Would Netflix have to do this if it actually had content people wanted to watch? It's just sad watching it double down on this pulp because every other copyright holder took their ball and went home.

Netflix REALLY went for quantity over quality with their library. I'm certain that there are some great shows in there, but I have to start ten different series just to find one I like. On the other end of the spectrum, the Disney+ library is rather small, but I find at least half the shows to be enjoyable, so that's where I turn to first.

I don't really feel like there's much quantity, either, though. The stuff they're doing is just so very stylistically homogenous.

I guess it's down to how you frame it? Some people see 100 different flavors of ice cream. I see 100 different flavors of chocolate ice cream. Both perspectives are accurate. Which one is more useful to you perhaps depends on how much you like chocolate ice cream.

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#215

Post by peeters »

dangus wrote: post #166
yarcob wrote: post #102

This is why I quit my Netflix subscription. The algorithm seems to have picked up the fact that I like watching SciFi and Zombie movies, so my Netflix homepage was this dark place filled with Sci Fi and Zombie movies. One problem with this is that Netflix only has a handful of good SciFi and Zombie movies, and I've seen them all. So the homepage was filled with movies I've seen already, or the dime-a-dozen copycat mo…

+1 on renting films with some level of purpose. A lot of people I know refuse to pay for movie rentals. I've seen this too many times: endless scrolling to try to find that one decent movie that comes free with the subscription. But movie studios aren't stupid. They don't just give away their best movies for free. So those who simply aren't willing to pay are left watching Hitman or The Quake (fine Hulu content). The…

My issue with renting has always been the ridiculous upselling for quality. Advertise 4.99 for a movie, but oh, you don't want the "standard definition" that hasn't been standard since 1996? Well then it's 8.99.

Edit: Just gave Play Movies another chance and it looks like perhaps they've finally stopped doing this.

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#216

Post by TheMightyLlama »

m12k wrote: post #197
stonemetal12 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that more because of what they are optimizing for than the fact that they are optimizing? To continue the food analogy engagement is blood sugar levels and they are seeing how high they can crank it. If they optimized for "happier and healthier in the long run" then they would probably loose short term engagement spikes, but have fewer people quitting for health reasons. Basically they could be broccoli if they…

Well, yes, they could certainly try. But "happier and healthier in the long run" is much harder for them to measure than "has responded to instant gratification". It's much harder to A/B test effectively at longer time scales and make the ML model reinforce the right things. But also, "healthier" might involve creating less engagement "content" for them to feed to others, lowering the network effects of the whole pla…

The problem here is that if there was one single company that wanted to exit the standard approach and create less engaging content they would be more likely to fail.

The companies that are creating content which optimises to the most engaging content will drown out the one "healthy" one.

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#217

Post by unethical_ban »

ghusbands wrote: post #120
teekert wrote: post #104

I really hate it that when I'm digesting an episode of Rick and Morty I have to scramble for the remote or I'm watching some completely uninteresting series about a family in the 19th century or something. I just want the end screen and sounds to finish and then turn off the telly and go to bed. In stead I feel slapped in the face. Consistently my watching experience ends with (increasingly large) negative feelings.…

You can now turn off autoplay of both trailers and next episodes, in settings. (Account menu -> Account -> Profile and Parental Controls -> [your profile] -> Playback settings -> Change)

Take a moment to think about having to go through six layers of menu tree to access a frequently requested feature. Now imagine explaining this step to someone who doesn't intuitively understand computers and whose children bought them a Roku for Christmas.

I'm not fussing at you, just thinking about this first-world hell.

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#218

Post by Terretta »

bjornlouser wrote: post #203
zz865 wrote: post #25

Anyone have a good website that lets you find netflix shows? I like a wide variety of stuff and I think Spotify/Netflix/Youtube always gets too confused to be useful.

flixable.com

So I pulled this up, popped into Netflix tab, and…

“The top suggestion, you won’t believe!”

https://i.imgur.com/waixdBJ.jpg

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#219

Post by rchaud »

yosito wrote: post #67
barneybooroo wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is your outrage that they’re commissioning content that reflects a diversity of experience?

Not the commenter you're responding to, but I've found quite the opposite. Content on Netflix is increasingly trending towards one narrow "woke" way of seeing the world, and nothing that falls outside of the narrow, American left perspective, or encourages any diversity of thought is available anymore.

Can you proviede some examples of this narrow way of seeing the world? TV shows tell stories. Occasionally those stories aren't going to be towards one's liking.

For example, Amazon Prime is constantly spamming me with ads for Jack Ryan. My take is that they do so because they paid a lot for the IP. Not because it's trying to shove the benefits of American militarism abroad down my throat.

Re: The Clickbaitification of Netflix

#220

Post by blahblahblogger »

tsjq wrote: post #93
matheusmoreira wrote: post #3

Would Netflix have to do this if it actually had content people wanted to watch? It's just sad watching it double down on this pulp because every other copyright holder took their ball and went home.

>Would Netflix have to do this if it actually had content people wanted to watch? very well said. that line is spot-on. for my taste / prefs, I could notice a clear state of uselessness around late 2019. I stopped netflix subscription starting Jan 2020.

I also stopped Netflix at some point early in the pandemic. More and more I was seeing good shows go away and nothing decent replacing it. Then they had all these weird shows (Cuties?) coming around that left a bad impression.

Ultimately my canceling of Netflix went along with canceling big tech as my disillusion has grown across the board: * Amazon (this was hard to cancel, my prime subscription is still paid for the next 6 months) * Facebook (still use the messenger app to chat w/ friends though) * Google (search and Chrome - but still use gmail of course and at work)

I'm going to cancel something from Apple to do a full de-fanging of FAANG :)

Actually here's what I'll cancel: Apple Arcade. Everything they release now is just a "+" game from a non-Apple-Arcade title. "Somegame+" where it means no ads and maybe a little extra content. Originals on Apple Arcade are now harder to find and everything in my new/recommended/trending/etc is a "plus title".

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