More people should be subbed to this! Stat Significant never leaves me frustrated that an obvious chart is missing. In this one, I'm so pleased that we got to see forwards and backwards on the quality vs top10 data.
I've always been skeptical about Netflix's Top 10 lists. How do we actually know these are their most viewed films and TV shows? There doesn't appear to be an outside company, like A.C. Nielsen for broadcast TV, that is determining the rankings. My suspicion is the lists only reflect what they WANT to promote to subscribers...or worse what they're getting paid to promote! (Sorry, I'm pretty cynical about such things!)
There's an underlining assumption to this analysis: what the crowd considers a good movie is the same as what I consider to be a good movie or a show. I've learned that the top 10 lists only tell me whether a movie or a show I'm interested in is available, not whether a movie on the list is any good.
I watch how you do with my own carefully curated list of “best”. I find that doing my research ahead of time as I hear about shows/movies an having it presorted makes it much easier to pick the next thing as it’s easier to pop the next thing off the list rather than try and do the research then. I even keep separate lists for things to watch with my spouse vs things to watch on my own. Rarely does the Netflix top 10 help me choose something.
However, I think it does provide one extra benefit that you didn’t cover here. For many, what you are watching has a social aspect in that you can then discuss it with friends/colleagues. This was well coordinated with TV shows on network/cable TV as most everyone saw same episode at same time. Advent of streaming and practice of dropping whole shows at once kind of broke this aspect as everyone would be at different spots or not have heard of the show yet. I notice that more and more streaming shows are going back to the one episode per week format. I think the top 10 format helps people coordinate “what is everyone else watching” and that may have value to maximize social discussion.
I see no need to trust Netflix Top Ten listing: it just a list of most viewed shows and movies. My personal tastes rarely intersect with such lists. If they do, I find it more coincidental and surprising.
Incredibly funny that movies in the top ten score worse than those outside it. Netflix has a good number of garbage movies that no one ever watches too, so it's a bit surprising.
I think the top 10 is probably optimized for "revealed preferences" though. The things people actually watch, not the things they say they would like. What they really want is watch time. I'll admit that sometimes after a long day of work, I feel like I don't have enough energy to watch something really good. In this state, I'm not going to watch Schindler's List, and I might care if what I do watch isn't objectively very good.
More people should be subbed to this! Stat Significant never leaves me frustrated that an obvious chart is missing. In this one, I'm so pleased that we got to see forwards and backwards on the quality vs top10 data.
I've always been skeptical about Netflix's Top 10 lists. How do we actually know these are their most viewed films and TV shows? There doesn't appear to be an outside company, like A.C. Nielsen for broadcast TV, that is determining the rankings. My suspicion is the lists only reflect what they WANT to promote to subscribers...or worse what they're getting paid to promote! (Sorry, I'm pretty cynical about such things!)
There's an underlining assumption to this analysis: what the crowd considers a good movie is the same as what I consider to be a good movie or a show. I've learned that the top 10 lists only tell me whether a movie or a show I'm interested in is available, not whether a movie on the list is any good.
I watch how you do with my own carefully curated list of “best”. I find that doing my research ahead of time as I hear about shows/movies an having it presorted makes it much easier to pick the next thing as it’s easier to pop the next thing off the list rather than try and do the research then. I even keep separate lists for things to watch with my spouse vs things to watch on my own. Rarely does the Netflix top 10 help me choose something.
However, I think it does provide one extra benefit that you didn’t cover here. For many, what you are watching has a social aspect in that you can then discuss it with friends/colleagues. This was well coordinated with TV shows on network/cable TV as most everyone saw same episode at same time. Advent of streaming and practice of dropping whole shows at once kind of broke this aspect as everyone would be at different spots or not have heard of the show yet. I notice that more and more streaming shows are going back to the one episode per week format. I think the top 10 format helps people coordinate “what is everyone else watching” and that may have value to maximize social discussion.
I see no need to trust Netflix Top Ten listing: it just a list of most viewed shows and movies. My personal tastes rarely intersect with such lists. If they do, I find it more coincidental and surprising.
Incredibly funny that movies in the top ten score worse than those outside it. Netflix has a good number of garbage movies that no one ever watches too, so it's a bit surprising.
I think the top 10 is probably optimized for "revealed preferences" though. The things people actually watch, not the things they say they would like. What they really want is watch time. I'll admit that sometimes after a long day of work, I feel like I don't have enough energy to watch something really good. In this state, I'm not going to watch Schindler's List, and I might care if what I do watch isn't objectively very good.
I appreciate the research, but lol I cant get over an article using statistical analysis to prove your wife has bad taste in movies 😂