Amazon Prime Video Has More Movies, But Netflix Has Higher-Rated Films, Study Says (usatoday.com)

When you want to watch a movie, which streaming service truly delivers? If you want quality, opt for Netflix. If you prefer quantity, peruse Amazon Prime Video. From a report: That's the conclusion from Streaming Observer. The tech news website looked at all of the movies on Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and HBO Now as of January 20 and analyzed the films' ratings on movie and TV review site Rotten Tomatoes. Also factored in: data from the streaming providers, as well as third-party search sites Reelgood and JustWatch. The site found Amazon had the most movies (17,461) -- four times that of Netflix (3,839) and many more times the amount on Hulu (2,336) and HBO (815). But Netflix had more movies -- 596, more than 15 percent of its library -- with a "Certified Fresh" rating from Rotten Tomatoes, a designation given to the best-reviewed films.

Comments

Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

The top rated movie of ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes is "Black Panther". So....yeah.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Not sure why I am being modded down. The "ratings" on Rotten Tomatoes mean nothing. The 3rd top rated movie of all time is "Lady Bird" and the 5th is "Get Out" and 7th is "Mad Max: Fury Road". The best movies of all time. Think about that.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Desler]

Yeah, it's almost as if opinions vary from person to person. Shocking!

Re:Certified Fresh

[Drethon]

The top rated movie of ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes is "Black Panther". So....yeah.

You mean ratings push the movie more people like for personal reasons to the top, rather than the movie with the highest cinematic quality? Hmm.

Re:Certified Fresh

[quenda]

Yeah, it's almost as if opinions vary from person to person. Shocking!

Yes, but not randomly. There is some critical consensus, and those movies, while not bad, are surprising to see in an all-time top list.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Oswald McWeany]

Not sure why I am being modded down. The "ratings" on Rotten Tomatoes mean nothing. The 3rd top rated movie of all time is "Lady Bird" and the 5th is "Get Out" and 7th is "Mad Max: Fury Road". The best movies of all time. Think about that.

Rotten Tomatoes "help" but it isn't the whole story. Generally better films will get higher ratings and worse films will get lower ratings. There are exceptions for various reasons- but it can help. It's all subjective though.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Oswald McWeany]

Yeah, it's almost as if opinions vary from person to person. Shocking!

Yes, but not randomly. There is some critical consensus, and those movies, while not bad, are surprising to see in an all-time top list.

A lot of newer movies will be more extreme at one end or the other as people who rushed out to the cinema to see them either think they're "the best ever" or "the worst ever". Ratings tend to get more accurate over time. Newer films tend to be driven to either extremes.

You can probably trust a "5 year old film"'s reviews than a "1 year old film"'s reviews.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Well I do disagree with the Wizard of Oz being one of the top 5 (but that is just my opinion), but do you seriously think "Black Panther" is the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME? And "Mad Max: Fury Road" is the fifth??? The ratings are worthless because it is obviously gamed by a bunch of script kiddies.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Or it is gamed by a bunch of script kiddies. Either way, the ratings are useless.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

What person truly believes that Black Panther (or even Mad Max: Fury Road) are in the top 5 movies of all time??? I liked both movies, but they will both be forgotten in a few years.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Wonder Woman is listed as the 12th best movie OF ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes. "A Quiet Place" is 16th. Of the best movies of all time. Of every movie ever made in the history of cinema.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Drethon]

Or it is gamed by a bunch of script kiddies. Either way, the ratings are useless.

Yeah, personal reasons is kind of a broad stroke which can of course include my bank account or my love of screwing with people.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

" Generally better films will get higher ratings and worse films will get lower ratings."

Obviously not. Look at the lists: https://www.rottentomatoes.com.... The ratings are useless.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

I've thought about it. What do you think "ratings" should mean? Rotten Tomatoes is clear what their ratings mean: it's an aggregate score of what the general public and movie critics have thought about a movie. Is it perfect? No. Does it have gaps? Yes. For example, most movies that been released in the last 20 years or so will have a rating. Older movies that predate the Internet era may not have a rating or a smaller set of opinions. Also the rating says nothing about the quality, importance, or brilliance of a movie. It only relays the general likability of a movie.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Just because you don't value the rating (and frankly misunderstand what the rating is) does not mean it is useless to other people.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

No. The Rotten Tomatoes score is based on whoever gamed the system. My entire point is saying Netflix has "higher rated" films is useless, because the RT ratings are meaningless. I am not insulting people precious super hero movies. I liked Black Panther, but it isn't the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME like RT claims.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Maybe because you seem to mistake the Rotten Tomatoes rating (whether a movie is generally liked) with something far more subjective (whether a movie is the "best").

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Oh I guess I was deceived by the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" heading under the list I was talking about here: https://www.rottentomatoes.com...

Paddington 2 has a 100% rating. The new Spiderman drivel has a 97% rating. Give me a break. Obviously the system is gamed.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Again, the RT rating only shows how much a movie was generally liked. It offers no subjective opinion if a movie is "the best" which is what you are trying to making it out to be. Seems you want to apply a Strawman argument.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Higher RT rating == better liked film. It has nothing to do with "best". That is your lack of understanding. That is your strawman argument.

Re:Certified Fresh

[drinkypoo]

Maybe because you seem to mistake the Rotten Tomatoes rating (whether a movie is generally liked) with something far more subjective (whether a movie is the "best").

It's all subjective! Is there a better way to determine what's the "best" movie of all time than popular enjoyability?

Re:Certified Fresh

[Altus]

Or it has something to do with the fact that a shit load of people have seen Black Panther since the site existed but most people haven't been re-watching citizen cane and thinking "yah know what, I should review that on rotten tomatoes"

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Only if you want to assert that your opinion of a film should exceed other people's opinion of a film in regard to a subjective opinion when the rating has nothing to do with that subjective opinion.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Anonymous Coward]

Thereby invalidating the claim "of all time".

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Did you look at your link? It says clearly: "All lists are sorted by Adjusted Score" There is a question mark right next to "Score" that tells very briefly how it came to this conclusion. If you click on "What is the Tomatometer", it tells you very clearly how they come up with the list. But let's look at the crux of your agument: RT posting their score of other people's opinion is invalid because it goes against YOUR opinion.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Oh that's odd. Maybe I was confused by the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" header on the list: https://www.rottentomatoes.com...

How you could possibly believe any rating from that site is unbelievable, but people are naive and stupid.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

My opinion of a film doesn't matter, but when you give a list and say it is "THE BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" (actual words) and put Black Panther as #1, then you have a credibility problem. The entire website is gamed.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Tell me genius: if it has nothing to do with "best" why is the list under the heading "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" on the website. Higher RT rating means someone has gamed the system for fun and profit. The RT ratings are nonsensical and have little to do with what the public "liked".

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Citizen Kane is 4th. Black Panther is 1st. This is a list of the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME". Best movies of all time. My point is the ratings are nonsensical. I don't care what the reasons are (I know what the reasons are), but my point is basing any criteria on RT ratings is useless because the ratings are useless.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Again understand what the RT rating is because you don't seem to want to admit that it is a measure of likability not quality.

Re: Certified Fresh

[reanjr]

Newer movies - with fewer reviews - are statistically more likely to hit the outliers. You're just seeing that effect. It doesn't say anything about how accurate the reviews are for the typical movie.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Again read the website. It clearly says "Best" by their score which is a measure of general likability. It would be more technically correct to say "Highest Rated". But let's look at your other point: Higher RT rating == gamed because a movie that you don't think should be as highly rated must have been gamed. There is no other explanation according to your reality. Let's look at your example: Black Panther. It was generally liked by most people. But no, that's not true according to you. It must have been gamed even though the reality matches the score. It was well liked therefore it has a higher score. This isn't rocket science, man.

Re:Certified Fresh

[thegarbz]

Not sure why I am being modded down. The "ratings" on Rotten Tomatoes mean nothing.

It means that reviews liked something. Interestingly the some total of your comment can be summarised with: I disagree with a large group of reviewers on this case, which makes your post decidedly off-topic.

Re:Certified Fresh

[godrik]

Personally, I have always taken this kind of online rating with a 20% confidence interval. I use to read IMDB scores like that:
>9 people got super excited about it. Probably the movie does not deserve that score but that also means it is probably going to become some kind of a cultural reference. So you probably want to watch it.
>8 There is a consensus that the movie is decent.
>7 People who are not particularly about that style of movie liked it fine. It is a good bet you'll like it too.
>6 About only the people enthusiastic about that type of movie found it enjoyable. Approach with care.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0...
Titanic https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0...

Now when you see a movie with more than half a point of shift you know there is something going on:
The ghostbusters all female reboot https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1...
The girl next door https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0...

You'll see movie with a clear age scoring difference. That probably means something too.

Re:Certified Fresh

[bigdavex]

You're right. It's not the best. I don't think that's exactly what the rating means. I guess it means "of people who are interested in this sort of movie, what percent of them liked this movie?" So films that are unambiguously of a particular genre will score higher with audiences, because we have already filtered for people who like (in this case) the Marvel recipe.

Similarly, ratings on boardgamegeek.com for expansions to games are generally higher than the ratings for base games, because of the selection bias.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Cederic]

It offers no subjective opinion if a movie is "the best" which is what you are trying to making it out to be.

No, he quite clearly isn't making it out to be that. He's very clearly highlighting that the article's description of 'higher rated films' is based on a demonstrably flawed measure.

Rotten Tomatoes also categorically offers only a subjective opinion. If there was any objectivity at all then the examples he's quoted would never have made the top 5 - and if you disagree with that, do please articulate the objective criteria that would grant them such lofty status.

Seems you want to apply a Strawman argument.

The fucking irony.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

I did. Do you see the list that says "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME"? That is the list I am talking about. Black Panther is #1 on that list. Too stupid to live.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Who said it goes against MY opinion? Maybe I think that "Black Panther" is the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME. Do you think that? Does anyone? The point is the scoring is obviously gamed and useless. It has nothing to do with my opinion. My opinion doesn't matter.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

"All lists are sorted by Adjusted Score" there is even a score. Frankly you just don't want to admit what is clear to everyone else: The rating doesn't mean what you are trying to make it mean. This is just a strawman argument over and over again.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Very doubtful. You are telling me that so many of the "most likable" movies of all time happen to be from 2018? "Lady Bird" was the 3rd "most likeable" movie OF ALL TIME? So stupid.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

No he isn't. He clearly wants to use "Best" as a strawman because his specific example of Black Panther isn't the "best" to him. Never mind that rating is not and has never meant what he wants it to mean. The RT score is a measure of general likability. It isn't a measure of subjective superiority.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Who said I disagreed? My opinion on the movies doesn't matter. If you think that the "best" movies of ALL TIME (from the website) are Black Panther, Wizard of Oz, and Lady Bird (and two of them just happened to come out in 2018) then you are just stupid. If you don't think the system is gamed, I don't know what to same.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Desler]

Apparently hundreds of people on one site. So what? Why do you care so much?

Re:Certified Fresh

[Cederic]

Black Panther isn't the "best" to fucking anybody. Any rating system which declares it the highest rated film of all time is clearly fucked in the head.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Anubis IV]

The top rated movie of ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes is "Black Panther". So....yeah.

A) Actually, it's not. It's the top ranked using their "Adjusted Score", but it's not the top rated, which should have been obvious, given that it has a 97% rating currently and there are plenty of films with a 100% rating.

B) If you hover over the ? on the Best of RT page, you'll see that their Adjusted Score is calculated using a Bayesian formula that's designed to account for variations in the number of reviewers per movie. I.e. More reviewers in agreement will result in a higher Adjusted Score. As such, it should be fairly obvious that their Adjusted Score will be biased towards more recent films (i.e. ones with more reviews).

C) A bias towards more recent films is a feature, not a bug, given that it helps their users discover films they haven't yet seen that are more likely to be available, which is basically the entire point of Rotten Tomatoes. They aren't the AFI, BAFTA, or Academy. They make no claim to being the arbiters of all that is good in film.

D) Despite the bias, the top 10 still contains three films (The Wizard of Oz, Citizen Kane, The Third Man) from the last century, and every set of 10 after that contains 4 to 7 films from the last century, suggesting that it's still doing a pretty good job at bubbling up the best films, even if they're not necessarily ranked in the top 100 in the order we might think they should be.

But, perhaps most importantly, your argument is missing the point entirely. The question of good vs. great—should Black Panther be ranked higher than Citizen Kane?—doesn't matter when we're talking about the overall quality of streaming libraries. What matters is whether they do a good job at distinguishing good vs. bad—that they correctly labeled Black Panther and Citizen Kane as "Certified Fresh" while not giving that label to most of the schlock that comes out each day. Towards that end, it seems like Certified Fresh is a decent indicator of quality, even if you (and I, just to be clear) might disagree with how they rank individual films within the Certified Fresh set.

Re:Certified Fresh

[squiggleslash]

Because it's dumb. There are three ratings RT uses.

Certified Fresh/Rotten - more movie critics liked the movie than disliked it or vice versa.
Average rating - the average rating the critics gave it
Audience score - the average rating readers of the site gave it

If you're trying to find the top ten movies of all time, then sure, all these metrics have problems and you would be being stupid for trying to use them for that application.

However, for the study "Does this platform show better movies than that platform", the first of the metrics (the binary "critics like/dislike this") is good enough for the purpose. It's unbiased, it's easy to understand, and it's fairly unlikely a "good" movie will end up in the wrong category. Not impossible, but rare enough that it won't impact the study's results.

Sources of data are rarely perfect, but doesn't mean all data is useless. You think the data scientists use to calculate the width of the event horizon of Sagittarius A* is accurate enough that you could send a space ship there and guarantee it wouldn't get sucked in? No. But it's good enough that you have a strong idea of the magnitude of its size and you can compare it to other massive black holes.

This is the same principle. We're not trying to find out if Black Panther is better than Reservoir Dogs. We're trying to find out if Amazon hosts better movies than Netflix, and have thousands of samples to choose from.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Let me break it down for you guys, since apparently you don't understand until I spell it out: RT is gamed. RT is gamed by the movie studios, people with an agenda, Netflix, Amazon, whoever pays for favorable ratings, etc. In the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" list (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/top/), 7 of the top 10 movies are from 2017/18. Many of them weren't even seen by many people. Most of the "Certified Fresh" stuff is SCHLOCK. "Spider Man 10", "Batman 7". On the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" list, the THIRD ONE is "Lady Bird" (grossed $47 million!). That doesn't make sense, and doesn't even align with other review sites (7.4 out of 10 on IMDB) but 98% on RT. It is pretty scary what people will believe.

Re:Certified Fresh

[110010001000]

Right. So "Lady Bird" is the 3rd most "generally likeable" movie of ALL TIME. And 7 out of the top 10 most "generally likeable" movies came out in 2017/18. OK. You win.

Re:Certified Fresh

[The Grim Reefer]

Or it has something to do with the fact that a shit load of people have seen Black Panther since the site existed

But aren't the percentages they're using, or at least showing, based off of the professional movie critics score? If you click on Black Panther the critic score is 97% but the audience score is 79%. The critics score is based off of 448 review while the audience score is based off of 84,175 reviews.

The Wizard of Oz is in the number 2 spot with 111 critic reviews at 98% while 875,492 people on the audience side rated it at 89%.

Lady Bird is number 3 and the 349 critics rated it for an average of 99%. While on the audience side it's at 79% from 20,663 people.

I haven't seen Lady Bird, but have seen both Black Panther and Wizard of Oz. While I enjoy both movies for different reasons, I don't think I'd place either as better than Citizen Kane. Not that I would ever be likely to try to personally rate all three of those movies on a single list. They are all much different in my mind and which I would prefer to watch would depend on what kind of mood I happen to be in at the time.

Re:Certified Fresh

[lgw]

You're modded down because Slashdot moderation is almost entirely political reflex these days.

Rotten Tomatoes critic scores are just garbage. They reflect whether a movie is "the sort of movie people should see" in the mind of critics, not whether a movie will be engaging or entertaining. That was fine back in the day when that just meant boring, incomprehensible art-house films would be on top: ask an enthusiast for a recommendation and you're unlikely to get something practical. It was easy to ignore those and get real value from critics. Now it's all politics, and fuck that noise.

Rotten Tomatoes viewer scores are pretty good. Sure, you have to adjust for the lowest common denominator, and discount broad comedies and Transformers movies, but that's easy.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Anubis IV]

That doesn't make sense, and doesn't even align with other review sites (7.4 out of 10 on IMDB) but 98% on RT.

Actually, it does, but you're confused because you're comparing apples to oranges and expecting things to match.

IMDb is a wiki and its scores are based solely on user reviews, whereas Rotten Tomatoes uses critic reviews for its top-line rating. Apples and oranges. That doesn't mean Rotten Tomatoes lacks user reviews, however. In fact, if you check the Audience Score for Lady Bird on Rotten Tomatoes, you'll see that it's at 79%, pretty much spot-on with IMDb's 7.4/10.

You clearly prefer user reviews. I actually find them to be a rather mediocre indication of a film's quality, particularly when it comes to blockbusters, given that fans and foes of a franchise/cast/crew will leave reviews without any regard for the merits of a particular film (e.g. most entries in the widely-maligned Transformers franchise have user scores far in abundance of what is merited). Even at their best, I generally find that user scores are only useful to answer the question of whether or not a film is entertaining, but entertainment value is a rather shallow assessment of a film's merit, and in most cases should merely be one metric considered among many. User scores generally don't speak to the the overall quality of the film, whereas critics frequently try to address the topic of whether or not a film is an exemplar within its genre.

In the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" list (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/top/), 7 of the top 10 movies are from 2017/18.

If that's the only evidence you have for your conspiracy theory, you're running short on facts. I already explained why what you're talking about is a feature, not a bug (see (C) above). If you want to suggest that a fully-disclosed, common sense bias in a formula is an indication that Rotten Tomatoes is bought-and-paid-for by the industry, that's your choice, but that's a rather weak foundation on which to stand.

Re:Certified Fresh

[LostMyAccount]

I always wondered if there was some way of statistically correcting ratings to overcome various biases (ie, more recent movies tending to be higher rated, etc) so that ratings scores were more normalized and could be trusted as a basis for comparison.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknownSoldier]

Here is a link to the list in question:

Rotten Tomatoes' Top 100 Movies of all time

I agree the list is shit. Looks like someone mispelt "Most popular."

* Black Panther is ranked 1? In whose delusional universe? Most popular? Maybe? Best? LOL at all the stupid plot holes.
* Mad Max: Fury Road is ranked 7?? It was meh. The Matrix was far better.
* Dunkirk is ranked 20?? It is meh aside from the nice cinematography and I even went to the IMAX to see it.
* Stupid Wars: The Latest Junk is ranked at 31??? Even Gladiator was better then this shit.
* The Force Awakens is at 42. A crappy remake of Star Wars: A New Hope scores higher then the original not even on the list??? WTF.
* Manchester by the Sea is 45 -- b-o-r-i-n-g as fuck. Can I have my 2 hours back please?

I don't see Baraka on the list. For a movie to have no dialog, no plot, no characters AND to be that moving is out of this world. The BluRay version is a real treat.

I don't see any Robin William's movies on the list: When Dreams May Come, Awakenings, The Fisher King, Mrs. Doubtfire, Good Morning Vietnam, Alladin, Dead Poet's Society, Goodwill Hunting, Bicentennial Man, etc. Any one of these is better then the tip 10 combined.

No James Cameron movies on the list?

I don't see Contact on the list? Oh wait we got crap like Baby Driver at rank 58. How silly of me to think we were listing good movies!

No Jet Li movies such as Hero?

This list is a total farce. It is a list of most popular. Most of these movies will be forgotten in a decade.

I guess McDonald's serving BILLIONS of hamburgers makes them The Best Food of All Time! /sarcasm

Re:Certified Fresh

[LostMyAccount]

But gamed to what end? Are you positing an specific conspiracy (ratings gamed for boosting a studio, filmmaker, star, etc) for gaming the RT scores or is it just chaotic gaming of the process by people with the skills to game the process based on whatever motivates them at the time?

I'm willing to believe some movie ratings are gamed to suit some agenda or other -- like I could see Black Panther being boosted because "black superhero", but I'm not entirely sure that the people who think it should be promoted as some kind of icon of African American equality are the same people capable of actually gaming the ratings for it (unless you want to count social pressure on movie reviewers generally to promote a movie about black superheroes).

Mostly I think the examples are just of recent movies having some kind of advantage.

Re:Certified Fresh

[91degrees]

Black Panther has been nominated for the best Picture Oscar. Citizen Kane is an old film that made several innovations, but it was made in the 1940's and the themes are going to be far less relevant today than they were 78 years ago.

Is there an objective reason you think that Citizen Kane has to be better than Black Panther?

Re:Certified Fresh

[91degrees]

I think it's worth looking that the ratings graph. A few controversial movies will have a lot of anomalous 10/10 and 1/10 ratings but the rest of the values show a bell curve. The peak indicates how good on average people felt it was, and you can estimate how likely it is you will agree based on its width.

Re:Certified Fresh

[ShanghaiBill]

Is there an objective reason you think that Citizen Kane has to be better than Black Panther?

Of course not. Movie ratings are entirely subjective. People have different tastes. I have not found RT to be a good guide to whether I will like a movie.

I use Amazon Prime Video because I am already a Prime member for the free shipping, so the videos are effectively freebies.

Re:Certified Fresh

[skinfaxi]

Mad Max Fury Road was the best movie of its year. I'll definitely be re-watching it every year or so.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Aighearach]

I saw Mad Max: Fury Road, but I can't remember what happened. I saw the first 3 many times; two of them were even good! But the details aren't very memorable.

My top list:
Gandhi (1982)
Seven Samurai (1954)
sequel to Seven Samurai (Star Wars) (1977)
The Godfather Part II (1974)
Ah! My Goddess! (2000)
My Sassy Girl (2001)
Rocky (1976)

I could name 50 better than Mad Max: Fury Road, even if they were only action films.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

It depends if you also understand what a "percentage" means. Based on this response it doesn't seem that you do understand. You do realize you can do the exact same math as Rotten Tomatoes right? It's not exactly a hard science to divide.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Your subjective opinion just like his has nothing to do with the RT Rating and never has. You are arguing the same wrong point as him. The RT Rating is an aggregate of whether the general public and critics liked the film. It says nothing about whether the film is a masterpiece of cinema. It says nothing about the importance of the film. It say nothing about brilliance of the acting. It only says whether or not most people who reviewed the film liked it. You are the only trying to extrapolate that score into some measure of superiority.

Re:Certified Fresh

[mea2214]

Or maybe the studios figured out how to build bot armies to game RT ranking. Black Panther is up for best picture next month.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Galactic Dominator]

I didn't dig into it, but it certainly can't be most popular either. How many people do you believe hold "It Happened One Night" in high regard as a measure of popularity? Just some stupid algorithm by a site that should have the resources to do much better.

Re:Certified Fresh

[antdude]

I prefer https://flickmetrix.com/ that uses ratings from all the popular web sites. However, it seems to be broken since it is missing some ratings from them at the moment. :(

Re:Certified Fresh

[ayesnymous]

No, Black Panther is at 97%, while Get Out is at 98%.

Re:Certified Fresh

[91degrees]

Given that a market leading commercial service like Netflix wants to show the most popular films of the moment, I don't see why there's a problem here.

Re:Certified Fresh

[Cederic]

No. The people calling it 'highest rated' are.

"Just because it's higher rated doesn't make it better" is exactly why using that shitty rating system is fucking silly.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Why are you disagreeing with a fact? According to how RT does their rating, Black Panther is the highest rated film. It involves basic math not rocket science. Black Panther has a higher percentage of positive reviews than most films. You can actually do the math yourself. That doesn't mean Black Panther is a masterpiece. Only you and him are arguing that it does. That's the strawman argument he was using.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

You realize you do the math yourself right? Of all the reviews on RT, divide the positive reviews by all the reviews on Lady Bird. That's how they get their numbers. What you don't seem to understand or want to admit is that your opinion doesn't represent everyone.

Re:Certified Fresh

[UnknowingFool]

Who said it goes against MY opinion? Maybe I think that "Black Panther" is the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME.

You wrote: "No. The Rotten Tomatoes score is based on whoever gamed the system. My entire point is saying Netflix has "higher rated" films is useless, because the RT ratings are meaningless. I am not insulting people precious super hero movies. I liked Black Panther, but it isn't the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME like RT claims."

Why do you feel the need to lie about what you wrote when we can read it.

Do you think that? Does anyone? The point is the scoring is obviously gamed and useless.

Just because you don't like something doesn't meant it was gamed. Just because you don't understand how RT Ratings work doesn't mean it was gamed.

It has nothing to do with my opinion. My opinion doesn't matter.

Your opinion doesn't mean that everyone who has a different opinion must be gamed. You seem to whine about how no one listens to your opinion and then set up some bizarre conspiracy about another opinion must be somehow "gamed"

Re:Certified Fresh

[painandgreed]

What person truly believes that Black Panther (or even Mad Max: Fury Road) are in the top 5 movies of all time???

What person really thinks that those ratings are for "all time" rather than "right now"? Aging of such scoring is an interesting topic. The long tail of scoring probably works for sleepers and average movies. Not sure how it will affect the popular movies of the times as they age. Personally, I think Fury Road will age better than Beyond Thunderdome.

Prime: "Space Boobs From Outer Space"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, there's a lot of utter trash on Prime.

This doesn't surprise me tbh.

Re:Prime: "Space Boobs From Outer Space"

[Oswald McWeany]

I currently have Prime, Netflix, and Hulu (although considered narrowing the list for a long time... the Mrs. is the only reason I haven't).

Despite all three of the major streaming platforms, I still have a hard time finding something decent to watch... and I only watch about 4 hrs of TV a week.

(kids and wife watch a-heck-a lot more than that though- but kids would be happy watching the same reruns over and over again)

Re:Prime: "Space Boobs From Outer Space"

[Darinbob]

I think it would be good for television in general if more customers just started watching less. The content creators are still under the impression that they have a captive audience who will watch whatever they offer, and who are willing to subscribe to multiple streaming services. Also less time in front of the television is a good thing overall.

Quality vs Convenience

[Anonymous Coward]

I have both Amazon Prime and Netflix. If I had to give one up, Netflix would get the boot. Netflix has much better video/image/compression quality but it also has far fewer new movies. On AP, there are normally two or three new movies a week that are worth a watch. On Netflix, it's more like one a month but with lots of self-produced, slightly-better-than-TV-movies acting as filler. Then there's the fact that AP also does rentals. Realistically, Netflix only shines for those who want to binge watch a bunch of TV shows.

Re:Quality vs Convenience

[Oswald McWeany]

I have both Amazon Prime and Netflix. If I had to give one up, Netflix would get the boot. Netflix has much better video/image/compression quality but it also has far fewer new movies.

Netflix has the much better user interface though. Amazon's looks like it was written by college interns taking programming 101.

Re:Quality vs Convenience

[drinkypoo]

Netflix has the much better user interface though. Amazon's looks like it was written by college interns taking programming 101.

It acts like it, too. It has a much harder time starting up a stream than netflix or youtube, and often chokes on its own commercials.

Re:Quality vs Convenience

[fropenn]

Totally agree. Based on the interface alone, I suspected Netflix had far more movies and shows than Amazon Prime. Prime, where are all these 17,000 movies you supposedly have? In my browsing on Amazon, I generally only see 35-40 titles tops, whereas on Netflix it seems there is an endless list of shows and movies (too many, really).

Re:Quality vs Convenience

[Darinbob]

Most of the good stuff I saw on prime required the extra fee. The movie rental is nice, but you can do the rental even without being a Prime member, and get the same rentals from other streaming services as well. For a television series though I think the extra fee is not worth the cost per episode.

Prime is like Apple TV, it mostly appeals to those who are already part of the parent company's ecosystem. If Prime Video users had to pay the additional cost separately from their "free shipping" yearly subscription then it would drastically drop in popularity.

Re:Quality vs Convenience

[Darinbob]

Why not just no extra fee for premium shows? If Netflix started offering shows where you had to pay extra beyond the subscription cost that the subscribers would be up in arms. But Prime users don't seem to mind, possibly because they're mistakenly assuming that the Prime Video is "free" as it comes with their "free shipping" subscription.

Re:Quality vs Convenience

[Darinbob]

I think you don't find most of them unless you do the manual searches. It should have the option to filter only those included with Prime though, I felt I got burned too much when stuff on my watch list turned out to be premium. That said, I stopped my subscription before the first free month was out, I ran out of stuff to see.

Why only those services?

[chipperdog]

How come they didn't analyze Tubi.tv, Crackle.com, Filmrise.com, Pluto.tv...There is more than just Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and HBO

Re:Why only those services?

[flood78]

You mean like Titanic 2?

Wither technical discussion

[chrism238]

Oh, how the articles on Slashdot keep getting less and less technical over time :-(

Re:Wither technical discussion

[Thelasko]

Oh, how the articles on Slashdot keep getting less and less technical over time :-(

I noticed you haven't made any submissions since 2014.

Slashdot is a democratic system. If you don't like what you see, do something about it!

Re:Wither technical discussion

[thegarbz]

How many technical articles have you submitted this week and how many of them were rejected? Is the problem Slashdot, or is it that people are more concerned with complaining rather than fixing a platform that is essentially heavily reliant on it's own users deciding what defines good content?

Why not help fix the things you find wrong: https://slashdot.org/submissio...

Re:Wither technical discussion

[Thelasko]

P.S. I'd like to thank the current Slashdot staff. Recently I've made some hasty submissions, and they have cleaned them up into something readable by the masses. Previously, the staff would post stories exactly as they were submitted. I don't write copy for a living. It's nice to have some professionals do it!

Re:Wither technical discussion

[garcia]

As someone who has been reading since 1996 or 1997, people have been making this complaint all along but I don't see much of a difference between then and now.

Plus, IMO, this is the sort of story which nerds may care about and falls under the tagline piece, "stuff that matters."

YMMV.

Re:Wither technical discussion

[grep -v '.*' *]

keep getting less and less technical over time

HEY! The article's got numbers in it, what ELSE do you want?

• * four times
• * many more times
• * January 20

Re:Wither technical discussion

[chrism238]

You have an odd view of what democratic means. Just because I'm disappointed that an increasing number of articles are decreasingly technical, doesn't behoove me to post articles more to my liking. And, if by democracy you mean a right to free speech, then I have just as much right to complain about what I read.

Re:Wither technical discussion

[ranton]

You have an odd view of what democratic means. Just because I'm disappointed that an increasing number of articles are decreasingly technical, doesn't behoove me to post articles more to my liking. And, if by democracy you mean a right to free speech, then I have just as much right to complain about what I read.

I think he meant Democracy as in each citizen has a duty in participating and maintaining the democratic institution. So if you don't like the quality of the discussion, participate. If you don't like the quality of the article submissions, participate. You certainly have the right to complain even if you aren't taking on any personal responsibility to do anything about it, but people will be less likely to care about your ranting.

Re:Wither technical discussion

[Thelasko]

Complaining about Slashdot stories and not making submissions is like complaining about the government and not voting.

Paying extra counts in their listing?

[bussdriver]

When I tried Prime many of the shows were only listed and required paying more $$$ to view them. It didn't appear to have that many shows included in the subscription or at least anything looking worth watching was not included.

Re: Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Anonymous Coward]

At least you can see it. Prime has Doctor Who - NF doesn't.

Nobody has the original Star Wars trilogy. All the streaming services are puffed out with B movies - direct to video shit that's not even worth background noise.

IOWS, the fee based streaming channels aren't worth what the charge.

Re:Paying extra counts in their listing?

[cascadingstylesheet]

When I tried Prime many of the shows were only listed and required paying more $$$ to view them. It didn't appear to have that many shows included in the subscription or at least anything looking worth watching was not included.

When (how long ago) did you try it?

Also, TFA is referring to Prime Video, which is the stuff that is included.

Re:Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Agent0013]

And exact words in the title don't find the movie you are looking for. Plenty of completely unrelated stuff shows up though. I had to use google to get the full title of an Amazon Prime made show to get their search to find it once I put the full title in. Parts of the title were not enough. I have seen this happen many times, their interface and search is that bad. Plus, there is nothing good to watch there just like the article says. Netflix is my goto for watching TV, Amazon Prime is a waste of space and I never even fire it up unless it is to actually rent something with real money.

Re: Paying extra counts in their listing?

[bobbied]

Recently gave Prime a whirl since I already subscribe for shipping purposes, hoping I could kill Netflix and save but realized, as you mentioned, about everything I could find included was complete garbage.

There were a few good movies included but I've already seen most several times. The content was just no where near the quality Netflix provides.

I have both and it's been at least 5 years. A few years ago I discovered that Netflix and I are diverging in tastes as they cycled out much of their library in favor of their own content. I find most of the "Netflix Originals" to be overly reliant on sex and nudity that's just not worth watching, even if the storylines are reasonably good. I like their non "TV-MA" offerings quite a bit, it's just that these offerings are few and far between. So I'm about to drop Netflix as I find myself watching Prime nearly all the time.

Yes, Prime has a huge pile of stuff that's pretty much chattel from bygone years. But if you are game to try watching some of the old black and white stuff, some of it's pretty good, at least in comparison to some of the trashy garbage on Netflix. Amazon has been going down hill with their Prime library too, but I've found a number of gems buried in there of late. I like the fact that I can watch pretty much ANYTHING on Prime, if I'm willing to pay for it. I also like the huge library where you can "take a chance" with some of the old B&W films from the golden age of Hollywood, which where not all that popular or well known, but still worth the time to watch.

I suppose that if the trashy part of the TV-MA stuff on Netflix doesn't put you off like it does me, I can see folks liking Netflix better. But in my opinion Prime is better suited to me and my preferences.

Re:Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Thelasko]

Prime Video is included in the standard Prime subscription.

I agree with GP. If you want to pay extra money, Prime Video has an incredible selection. However, Netflix includes more with a basic subscription.

Amazon Music works similarly. Your Prime subscription gets you some content, but you have to upgrade to Amazon Music Unlimited to get the rest of their catalog.

Re:Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Darinbob]

It did have a lot of movies, but they were a lot of older movies. The general middle of the road stuff. I think a lot of content owners give their collections out as exclusives, meaning that Prime may get a lot of movies that no one else gets, and Netflix may get movies that no one else gets, and not just the new stuff.

I also think that many of the movies that Prime has now used to be on Netflix until their older contracts expired. A lot of content owners seem to want to punish Netflix for being too popular or affordable.

Re: Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Darinbob]

None of this is the problem with Netflix, the problem was the BBC yanking Doctor Who off of every single streaming service for a couple of years, then later granting access to only one service outside of the UK. Sure, with DNS you could probably get hooked into the BBC iplayer, but that's a bit of a pain for the average user.

I would greatly prefer if the content owners spread the stuff around, which should theoretically also increase their income since it would cover more users. Possibly Amazon is offering kickbacks to the Beeb?

Re: Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Darinbob]

There were a few Amazon exclusive that might have been interesting, but I'm not going to sub to a second streaming service for that. I can make better use of my money. I didn't even go to Netflix for their exclusives but because they had a lot of content originally. I have enough on the Netflix list that can last me for years. In the meantime the number of hours that I watch TV has been steadily declining.

Re:Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Darinbob]

And being part of the Prime subscription is the sole reason Amazon is even a player in the streaming field. For those who aren't already Prime members it's not worth the hassle.

Re: Paying extra counts in their listing?

[Darinbob]

I can't recall many Netflix originals with sex and nudity. The ones I do remember weren't at all trashy and would be considered prudish by premium cable standards.

Re: Paying extra counts in their listing?

[bobbied]

How many have you watched? I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that if you randomly pick a series rated TV-MA and watch it, within 2 episodes you will have a gratuitous sex scene or two in nearly all cases and/or enough "F-Words" you won't have fingers left to count them. Why do you need this garbage? Most of the story lines are good enough to watch without this stuff. Go look at how many "Netflix Original" offerings are rated TV-MA. I may be a bit prudish I suppose, but they are really pushing the boundaries too far for me. Write the engaging story and if that includes some sex, fine, but do you have to spend all the screen time actually showing it? I much prefer the old school way of just implying what happened, because let's face it, it isn't reality they are showing anyway with this.

So I'm guessing you've not watched much of the new stuff from Netflix, or you have and my point stands, that this garbage isn't adding to the story lines anyway, just taking up running time and you are not sensitive to it. I find it off putting, enough so I feel it ruins otherwise good work for me. If it doesn't bother you, enjoy the stories, some of them look pretty good.

Re:Paying extra counts in their listing?

[cascadingstylesheet]

And exact words in the title don't find the movie you are looking for. Plenty of completely unrelated stuff shows up though. I had to use google to get the full title of an Amazon Prime made show to get their search to find it once I put the full title in. Parts of the title were not enough. I have seen this happen many times, their interface and search is that bad. Plus, there is nothing good to watch there just like the article says. Netflix is my goto for watching TV, Amazon Prime is a waste of space and I never even fire it up unless it is to actually rent something with real money.

Well, YMMV. I find plenty to like in Prime Video. I have Prime anyway, and enjoy many things that I find in the included Prime Video.

But then, I enjoy lots of eclectic and older stuff. Not everyone does.

Makes no difference to people outside USA

[Anonymous Coward]

For us outside USA (in EU) it makes no difference because both have limited and mediocre offer.

Re:Makes no difference to people outside USA

[flood78]

Netflix in Canada is much better. But for Amazon Prime Video, the choice is not that large and most of the movies are the worst one. Matter-of-fact, the worst movie I ever watched was on Amazon Prime Video... "Moo Moo and The Three Witches".

Re:Makes no difference to people outside USA

[Oswald McWeany]

For us outside USA (in EU) it makes no difference because both have limited and mediocre offer.

You whine, but a lot of the shows I WANT to watch on Netflix are only available on Netflix outside North America; or they come out in North America a year later than they do the rest of the world.

Basically, if the show was made by a major US network, chances are it won't be on Netflix in N.A.; or we get it a year after you do.

Re:Makes no difference to people outside USA

[Cederic]

I haven't seen Moo Moo but the title would help me manage my expectations and it's unlikely to reach the bottom of my IMDB ratings. I mean, it's a mde-for-TV kids film, the warning signs are flashing from the other side of the moon on that one.

Unlike films like Last Dance, Inferno and Taken 3. I mean, shit, Liam Neeson tends to be watchable and Forest Whitaker is awesome any time he's on screen and Taken 3 was still a horrific shitshow I deeply regret trying to watch.

Although now I mention it, fairly sure that was an Amazon Prime selection. Hmm.

Re:Let's use an analogy

[Drethon]

So if this was a comparison of clubs, Amazon is the club full of pimply-faced, fat chicks and Netflix is the one full of fit 8s, 9s and 10s?

I've looked at a number of Netflix movies, I'm not sure I'd put the rating that high... but then that might push the Amazon rating lower too (I've watched like two movies on Prime, so not qualified to comment there)?

Certified Fresh != Ranking of best movies ever

[sjbe]

Not sure why I am being modded down.

Because you didn't make a useful or thoughtful point in the opinion of the moderators. And that fact is the answer to why certain movies have high Rotten Tomatoes scores. So Black Panther evidently has the highest ranking by whatever metrics Rotten Tomatoes uses. So what? It's just a ranking by some arbitrary metric. If that movie happens to be Black Panther then so be it. That isn't a problem. Lots of people consider it to be a very good movie worth watching and it's super popular with some demographics. Other movies would top the list by other criteria.

The best movies of all time. Think about that.

Ahh there is your error. It isn't a ranking of "best" movies. Never was. It's just a consensus opinion of whether a movie is worth considering spending time to see. It's not some sort of Academy Award for best picture of all time. Don't confuse the two.

Re: Certified Fresh != Ranking of best movies ever

[c6gunner]

I've never found Rotten Tomatoes to be particularly useful. IMDb seems much more sane:

https://www.imdb.com/search/ti...

Re:Certified Fresh != Ranking of best movies ever

[doom]

Didn't Ryan Coogler actively solicit his fans to hit the rottentomatoes ratiings system? That would be the point the OP was trying to make.

Now myself, I couldn't care less about rottentomatoes rankings, and Black Panther is a decent movie (but it wasn't even the best of 2018-- try "Sorry to Bother You")-- the point here would be that crowd-sourced ranking (typically with anonymous accounts without verified IDs!) aren't actually worth anything. The only time they won't be gamed is if no one cares enough about them to do it.

Bargain bins

[TJHook3r]

Wading through films on Amazon is like looking through the ex-rental bucket at Blockbuster, can't speak for Netflix. Give me two episodes of a half-decent series over a crappy film anyday - who's got time for rubbish when there is so much choice available, at any time of day?

Re:Let's use an analogy

[Oswald McWeany]

So if this was a comparison of clubs, Amazon is the club full of pimply-faced, fat chicks and Netflix is the one full of fit 8s, 9s and 10s?

By your comparison, the bouncer wouldn't let you in to the Netflix club... and maybe not the Amazon club either.

So?

[p51d007]

Amazon Prime comes with my subscription, which, for me is worth it. I order a lot from prime that pretty much pays for the shipping I get. The video & music is just icing on the cake. I mostly binge watch older shows. You can get an entire season of 30 minute shows in one afternoon.

Re:So?

[cyberchondriac]

Prime is also good if you like documentaries. There are a lot on England, Scotland, Medieval times, that sort of thing, which I like.
There's certainly no shortage of "C" rated stuff, but all in all it's worth it. All of modern Dr Who is available, and for the wife, Downington Abbey.
I use Netflix too, never tried Hulu though.

Re:So?

[DontBeAMoran]

Not sure how it works in the USA, but in Canada if I order 35 bucks worth of stuff "shipped by Amazon", shipping is free. Why would I pay for Amazon Prime? Sure it takes a few days, but it's free. Patience is a lost virtue.

Re: So?

[reanjr]

Because with prime you get free shipping on $3 orders. This significantly impacts how well you can replace basic shopping with Amazon. It's very common for me to pick up my phone and order something whenever I see it's running out. That would be prohibitively expensive if I was paying shipping each time for my toothpaste.

Better GUI or Forget about it.

[wolff000]

Amazon has probably the worst interface on PC to get to their movies. Most apps to search are much better but not great. Until they fix the GUI the video that comes with Amazon Prime is just a bonus to the shipping option. Just copy Netflix and be done with it already!

Re:Better GUI or Forget about it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Amazon has probably the worst interface on PC to get to their movies. Most apps to search are much better but not great. Until they fix the GUI the video that comes with Amazon Prime is just a bonus to the shipping option. Just copy Netflix and be done with it already!

At least with Amazon you can hover to see the rating of the movie or show. Easy to cherry pick good content. With Netflix, I don't know if a move is crap without bouncing over to Rotten Tomatoes and searching. And no, I don't trust Netflix's recommendation % outside of genre.

Amazon has strong original content and an extensive library of quality British / Euro shows, which I personally enjoy. In aggregate, my feeling is that Amazon provides a better overall content experience that Netflix.

Good point but...

[SuperKendall]

Although I totally agree with your revelation about the top rated movies on Rotten Tomatoes, in general I agree with the statement that Netflix more often has content I actually want to see, while Prime does have a wider range of movies but most of them are mediocre.

That's after many years of owning and using both services.

Re: Good point but...

[SuperKendall]

Prime comes with the video stuff included with the membership

That's a great point, it's why I have it and use it. I also would not pay for it otherwise, I mainly have Prime for delivery benefits.

Netflix is an extra charge, so by default I lean towards not paying for it

There I diverge. I see this as a proof that Netflix has better content, because as you say that is all you are paying for. If the Netflix content were no better than Prime content, why would people have both? Yet I think you would find a huge overlap between Prime and Netflix subscribers... I find the Netflix content so much better that if one thing had to go, it would be Prime...

I think it says a lot that I continue to pay for Netflix continuously year after year, while HBO (to bring another party into the discussion) I only subscribe to a few months at a time to catch up on a show or two.

Re:Good point but...

[Cederic]

Oddly that makes Amazon Prime a better service for me.

If a movie is genuinely good (above and beyond mere competent) then I've probably already seen it. If it's a great movie then I probably have a copy at home to watch on demand.

It's the other films that I haven't seen yet, that may actually be superb but too niche to receive mainstream recognition, that I want to see.

E.g. I saw the other day an advert for a new film about human trafficking, almost guaranteed a top rating on Rotten Tomatoes, likely to win a dozen different awards.

Meanwhile Lilya 4-ever is "Fresh: 58" despite completely and viciously depicting a compelling and realistic story on exactly the same theme.

I'd rather watch the foreign language independent film that isn't scared to properly explore its subject than the widely acclaimed Hollywood virtue piece.

More, but good luck finding what you want

[doggo]

Sure, Amazon has way more. But (at least through the ROKU app) good luck trying to find an interesting movie, even if it's not top-rated, that's free through Prime membership.

Almost any worthwhile film, even old black and white movies, is usually for rent or sale, rather than free through Prime. And browsing through the entire mess is more trouble than it's worth.

Re:More, but good luck finding what you want

[dyslexicbunny]

It's soooo bad on a Fire Stick.

The only way I can really make sense of it is to use my Fire tablet so I can filter to Prime only and tell my TV to start playing. That is not how I would prefer to interact with things.

Prime lacks good family movies

[Ogive17]

We only have Amazon Prime in our household. Trying to find a good family movie to watch (we have a son in kindergarten) is extremely difficult.

But

[rossdee]

Nobody gets Prime for the videos.

Its for the 2 day free shipping.

Re:Movies?

[Cederic]

90 to 180 minutes to tell a story, combining narrative, visual and audio elements, including scene setting, mood adjustments, entertainment and an actual fucking story is an artistic endeavour the results of which are often deeply enjoyable.

What sort of cunt thinks 'youtube' and 'tv' are relevant to that? They're just distribution challels, a movie is still a movie on either of them.

Maybe I'm just an old person. When did 'old people' become a synonym for 'educated' anyway?

Rotten Tomatoes isn't about how good

[rsilvergun]

a movie is, it's a popularity contest. There's nothing wrong with that. If you're in the business of making moves you spend most of your time/money on figuring out what's going to be the most popular, not what's going to be the best artistically/thematically.

RT not so good for film historians but great for consumer trends. If you're trying to build a stable of content it's a decent enough barometer.

No kidding

[rsilvergun]

There's a 3 part anime I wanted to buy (Kizumonogatari) and I had to wait an extra 3 weeks before parts 1 and 3 showed up in search results. I later found out if I'd drilled down into the categories they were there.

You don't really get that from Prime though

[SuperKendall]

It's the other films that I haven't seen yet, that may actually be superb but too niche to receive mainstream recognition, that I want to see.

That's nice but I don't think that is what Prime Video is offering.

By mediocre, I mean just that - not unknown. Not indie or foreign. Mostly Prime movies are a lot of just OK movies that did not escape attention, they simply didn't warrant much.

You mentioned Lilya 4-Ever, but I don't see it on prime video... but I do see Post Impact. And Mars Attacks.

Meanwhile on Netflix I have watched some interesting international movies, way more than I have seen through Prime Video.

It could be that I've just missed them, Prime Video search and recommendation being even more horrific than Netflix.

Re:You don't really get that from Prime though

[Cederic]

In the UK Netflix basically had no films at all, so I cancelled my subscription. They may now offer a broader range of foreign and independent cinema but I have a backlog of films from TV film channels and Amazon Prime.

On Amazon Prime there's rarely anything worth searching but they do keep adding (then removing) films, and that's where I find the interesting ones. E.g. in the autumn they added The Handmaiden, the plot summary for which puts it nowhere near my normal preferences - but then I spotted the name of the director. It has its flaws but it's also a bloody good film. (I did subsequently acquire and now prefer the director's cut as it has better pacing).

Back to DVDs (Blu-ray)!!!

[BishopBerkeley]

I cancelled Netflix last year. I cancelled Amazon Prime last month. I did that because our local video store, Salzer's in Ventura, CA, is a superb video store with English and foreign titles that not many streaming services have. I pay $60 a year to access the PBS archives through my digital devices, and I have a large credit balance with iTunes for software and digital movie rentals. This arrangement allows me to find movie gems at my video store, get the best news and documentary through PBS and get all of the frivolous Hollywood stuff through iTunes. I no longer waste time scrolling through endless screens of stupid movies that some dickhead "suggests" to me. Support your local indie video store. Salzer's in Ventura. Cinefile in West LA. Please put up the names of your local killer video stores. Algorithms have yet to better good taste. Of all the Netflix suggestions, I must confess that the Dead Snow movies and Look Who's Back were truly excellent.

Can we go with neither?

[doom]

Myself I watch a lot of Korean drama at random sites which might be gray-market for all I know, like gooddrama.to, and a bit of anime from places like animedao (I would like to like crunchyroll, but I prefer to download rather than stream). And I pick up disks at the local library on occasion, and buy them via bn.com now and then.

There's more stuff out there than I can possibly deal with, and I feel no gap in my life for not keeping up with netflix/amazon. Hell, I've all but given up on youtube these days -- google's crap keeps locking-up Firefox.

(Last I looked Netflix has next to nothing as far as anime goes-- just a dozen offerings, and the only one I cared about was Mushishi.)

Re:About Right

[nealric]

2010/11 was a very different experience, but one that can't really be repeated. In those days, streaming was still very much a niche, and Netflix could get streaming rights relatively cheaply to a wide variety of relatively recent releases. Part of the reason why they've started creating their own content is because they had to- many of the studios didn't want to play ball once they realized where Netflix availability was headed. Personally, I think they do a very good job. Not everything is great (far from it), but it's rare that I can't find something worth watching.

It's too bad that they got rid of reviews, but a quick google search on my phone serves that purpose just as well.

Re:Let's use an analogy

[Darinbob]

Amazon has some 10's, but of course you have to pay more cash above and beyond your club entrance fee before you can talk to them.

Re: Certified Fresh != Ranking of best movies eve

[c6gunner]

I didn't say it was perfect, just more sane.