Netflix Watch Instantly Recommendation Thread

Watched Tickling Giants last night. The story of Bassem Youssef's satirical news show in Egypt a few years back. Thought it was pretty good. Also enjoyed his own web series a couple of weeks back.

Watched about half of the BBC War & Peace which I'd missed last year. Need to finish it.

"The Seven Five"—Bklyn crooked cop doc. Really good.

Kind of wanted to start watching X-Files again (haven't seen it in probably ten years), but their contract with Netflix must've expired. I had that show in my queue for like 8 years.

aw man i was very slowly making my way through them myself. that sucks. who has them now?

aliens iirc

getting v annoyed @ how they keep putting movies up and then taking them down like 2 months later, all w/o announcing them anywhere. Unless you follow some third-party blog's "Here's a list of what's arriving and leaving", you'd never know. You'd think by now they'd have something in-app w/r/t all of this shit???

I've gotten some notifications but they're not consistent

why did I ever taper off on watching iZombie? good lightweight fun

VG - 13 Reasons hooked me at some point and I need to point out the excellent use of "Vienna" in Hannah's final scene. I can't really talk about it yet though - it was really heavy and hard to watch at points.

Been watching Lovesick but find it to be pretty dull and too on the nose. Soundtrack is decent though. Anyone else watch it?

TOWER is on Netflix atm. Probably the best documentary of last year

Love S2 is better than the first, I'd be down for a Bertie spinoff.

just finished watching 13 Reasons Why w/ tt - really excellent and gripping, superbly acted and directed (tt was THRILLED that Gregg Araki did two episodes) with vivid characters and somehow a totally believable plot

also yeah emotionally intense like little i've seen before

Anyone else see/know that the Netflix star system was not an average of user reviews but an algorithm driven suggestion based on how much their system thought you'd like a specific film or show? Same with the new thumbs up/down system, apparently.

yeah, i thought that was common knowledge. for a few years netflix offered a $1 million dollar prize to any researcher who could improve on their recommendation algorithm by 10%: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netflix_Prize (the winning algorithm, from 2009, was apparently never actually implemented). here's a nyt magazine article i remember reading at the time: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/magazine/23Netflix-t.html

I knew they recommended things, but I had no idea that, say, a movie with five stars didn't mean most voters gave it five stars but that you had a five star chance of liking it or something like that. Just weird to have had a star system that wasn't an average, or even a traditional rating.

i definitely did not know that

me neither! what a swizz!!

the netflix series GUILT

not sure "recommend" is the right word as it is SHITE ON STILTS but i want someone to talk to with abt it

that finally explains why a lot of "popular now" movies have one star - lots of ppl like them, but netflix feels i won't? i guess?

xpost

Netflix ratings are garbage

it gave me an 85% match for happy gilmore, which means all that time i spent going out of my way to thumbs-down everything adam sandler has ever done went completely unnoticed

When that new Amy Schumer Netflix special came out, I noticed it only got one star or something like that, which surprised me. But then I heard that all these Trump people were actively trying to drive her rating down in revenge, which couldn't happen if the star rating was just a suggestion, because frankly, why would Netflix not suggest something it produced? Unless they are really obsessed with not accidentally pointing someone to something they wouldn't like. Except I generally do like her, and I do watch standup, which wouldn't explain why a suggestion-based algorithm wouldn't point it my way with a higher star rating. Maybe it was a mix of algorithms *and* averages? They're so cagey about this stuff.

The funny (not funny) thing is that I started it and thought it absolutely sucked, and when I looked up comments on that thread about Trump supporters, a lot of the comments backed up my opinion. That is, I like her, she can be funny, but this special sucks. So maybe it just was a 1 star show? Still, it made no sense to me, given what I learned about the star ratings.

Right now, if I go to my Netflix account and look at something universally beloved, like "Planet Earth," it calls it a 92% match, and this is something that not only does everyone like, but it's something I've watched several episodes of on Netflix!

Here are some stories about this stuff:

http://ew.com/tv/2017/03/16/netflix-star-ratings/

Yellin also noted that the review system has been less important over the years as the company has found users will often rank respected documentaries with five stars and more frivolous titles with one star despite being far more likely to actually watch the latter. (It’s true; many popular guilty-pleasure favorites like Armageddon are saddled with one-star averages despite having plenty of fans).

https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/03/netflix-believes-in-the-power-of-thumbs/520242/

http://bgr.com/2017/04/10/netflix-ratings-system-change-thumbs-up/

As a final point, it’s worth noting that the 5-star ratings system previously used by Netflix didn’t measure the average rating sourced from all viewers. Rather, Netflix uses an algorithm to place every Netflix viewer into a group of viewers with similar tastes. In turn, when a user under the old system stumbled across a title with a 4-star rating, it was Netflix’s way of saying that “users with tastes similar to your own gave this title 4-stars.” As we highlighted in a piece detailing Netflix’s somewhat secret ratings system, it wasn’t uncommon “for the same program to bear differing ratings for different users.”

http://bgr.com/2017/03/20/netflix-ratings-system-how-it-works/

As it turns out, the rating of a given program on Netflix does not represent a running tally of how all Netflix users ranked the program. On the contrary, Netflix lumps viewers with similar tastes into distinct groups and sources the rating you see on your screen from users with similar viewing habits as your own. That being the case, it’s not uncommon for the same program to bear differing ratings for different users. So while Iron Fist shows up as a 5-star program for me, it may show up as a 2-star rating for someone else.

In effect, Netflix’s rating system isn’t a true rating system as much as it is a personalized indicator of whether or not you will enjoy a specific program. If Netflix offers up a 5-star suggestion, it’s basically Netflix’s way of saying, “based on previous programs that you and users similar to yourself have enjoyed, there’s a really good chance you’re going to love this.”

Anyway, it's not thumbs up/down, which is even dumber, but Netflix is gambling more accurate.

xpost Happy Gilmore is pretty funny.

xpost I mean, it *is* now thumbs up/down. But just as dubious.

Early-ish on in Netflix's life they very much encouraged just looking through lists of movies and rating them on the star scale to better recommend movies to you. I guess they were more opaque about it as time went on so I get why people assume the star system was an average of other people's ratings.

Whatever algorithm they used WAS good though in my experience. I'd say a solid 90% of the time what they predicted I'd rate something was accurate.

People theorizing that Amy Schumer's special has a 1 star rating because of a concerted attack from Trump supporters was pretty amusing to me tbh.

i heard that her last special was just not funny in the slightest (from people who like her, like my wife). along the same lines: the latest Louis CK special isn't very funny either. Def. the least funny thing I've ever seen of his.

"Love S2 is better than the first" yes.

Nah, new Louie special is very good imo. Said this elsewhere, I thought I was kinda over him but that special brought me back on board. He's still sharp as hell.

it sucks that amy schumer is so unfunny because of the way she's held up as a "feminist" whatever

like she's just full of cheap shots and conventional wisdom reinforcement but i guess having thick upper arms and showing them off makes that ~transgressive~?

Just caught the first ep of the Hulu Handmaid's Tale series with Elisabeth Moss. I like so far!

Seen the first two of those. Excellent so far

i want to love "Dear White People" but the characters feel like weird not-quite-on imitations of their movie counterparts and i find the re-shots a little disconcerting and also they have given lines that one character says in the movie to other characters on the show to repeat???

Thought the OJ trial drama from a while ago was good, just finished it. David Schwimmer.

Juice! Juice! Say it ain't so Juice! Juuuuuuuuice!

Is there a thread for American Gods?

I was ready for a binge-watch of The Handmaids Tale, but dammit the teases have only released the first three eps. I'm fully on board at this point, it is very good.

it's breathtakingly good

the flashback storytelling bits are so chilling - the gradual breakdown of civilisation has never seemed so scary.

Started watching Fuzz the muppets on Meth cop show thing yesterday. Realised that the gangster's girlfriend was Rachel Bloom. Liked teh idea but not sure how good the show is.

JUst working through several stand up shows.

Also Hot Girls Wanted the series about sex and technology by Rashida Jones daughter of Quincy.

Watched teh documentary on Iceberg slim which was great. Then started on the Finding Fela documentaery which came out around the time the musical Fela debuted in London and I may have seen around that time. For some reason it cut out after 20 minutes so I need to sit down and watch it through. Think there was some problem with signal or connection at the time.

I need to finsh off watching the BBC War & Peace still.

xp to calzino: otm, and in that regard it's already much, much more emotive and entertaining than the book. it's almost like the deeper aspects of this series are what atwood had in mind all along.

(sorry stevolende)

Nah, new Louie special is very good imo. Said this elsewhere, I thought I was kinda over him but that special brought me back on board. He's still sharp as hell.

exactly how i felt. i chose it idly the other night not expecting much and i thought it was absolutely brilliant. so relentlessly enthusiastically dark, even when i find a show funny i don't tend to laugh out loud but this was hilarious.

Seven Five was a v good doc, mainly for the characters

'How corrupt was the Precinct in your time?'

'... Man ... TOP GUN! All the way, the Captain.'

finally finished Love Season 2, pretty good season I thought. god those people are so fucked up

maria got all mad at me because i didn't want to watch handmaid's tale because peggy from mad men bugs me and now maria thinks i'm a part of the dystopian patriarchy. i should get over it. i think peggy reminds me of someone i used to know and didn't like. she's too real or something.

i hate discovery/taste algorithms so much. this and youtube, it's awful. really feels like you're trying to look at the content available while some overeager huckster is in your face with a bunch of shit like YOU'LL LIKE THIS YOU LIKE THIS KIND OF THING RIGHT CHECK THIS OUT IT'S 84% SIMILAR TO THIS THING YOU WATCHED 4.5 EPS OF

ikwym but how do you solve the problem of how to find stuff in a non-linear - as in non-scheduled - world? is it still media recommendations?

(of course it's all far more mendacious than this and is about "optimising" "content" and keeping people in yr "ecosystem" but the problem of how to find stuff you want to see is still a problem - tho admittedly only if you're tied to your box)