“On paper, news that Netflix is phasing out the stars in favour of a thumbs up/thumbs down system should be heartening. From later this year, we’re told, Netflix subscribers will be asked one simple question: essentially, did you like this or not? Click the thumbs-up button and Netflix will suggest similar titles for you to watch; click the thumbs-down and it’ll make that sort of thing harder to find during future visits. Percentages will also be introduced, to show you how suited you are to any given content. It’s viewing as online dating basically.”
Category: media
Netflix Suggests Interactive Storylines – But Do Audiences Really Want This?
“It seems to me to misunderstand the fundamental appeal of television; that it is bedtime stories for grownups. You plonk yourself in front of the screen to be entertained. That doesn’t mean being fed pap; contemporary television is increasingly a feast for the upper reaches of the mind as well as the primitive bits that would be just as happy banging a stick on a stone. But it does mean being presented with a finished product: a complete, satisfying entity with a beginning, a middle and an end (however many seasons it takes to get there). We want to cede control to someone else.”
Cut Big Bird? Political Forces Align To Fight It
“The telephone survey of 1,001 registered voters, conducted jointly by Republican and Democratic polling firms and released Thursday as Trump’s budget landed, showed 73 percent opposing federal cuts for public television; meanwhile, 83 percent, including 70 percent of those who voted for Trump, wanted Congress to find budget savings elsewhere. NPR, meanwhile, has also found a powerful Republican ally in Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that grants federal funding for the CPB.”
Canada Council Announced New $88 Million Arts Initiative For The Digital World
“It’s clear that the new generation, the generation of digital natives, has expectations of how they relate to any experience or any content or any moment. The arts sector needs to master and take advantage of the digital transformation, as opposed to pretend that we are victims of it.”
Here’s How The Internet Is Now Saving Culture…
“In the last few years, and with greater intensity in the last 12 months, people started paying for online content. They are doing so at an accelerating pace, and on a dependable, recurring schedule, often through subscriptions. And they’re paying for everything. You’ve already heard about the rise of subscription-based media platforms — things like Amazon Prime, Netflix, Hulu, HBO, Spotify and Apple Music. But people are also paying for smaller-audience and less-mainstream-friendly content. They are subscribing to podcasters, comedians, zany YouTube stars, novelists and comic book artists. They are even paying for news.”
Trump V. Big Bird? Do You Like Those Odds?
“There is no viable substitute for federal funding that ensures Americans have universal access to public media’s educational and informational programming and services. The elimination of federal funding to CPB would initially devastate and ultimately destroy public media’s role in early childhood education, public safety, connecting citizens to our history, and promoting civil discussions – all for Americans in both rural and urban communities,” said CPB President Patricia Harrison in a statement.
Trump’s Budget Cuts Will Badly Damage Public Broadcasting As A Whole, But Not So Much NPR And PBS
“In other words, defunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting would mean hurting the local TV and radio stations that a whole lot of Republican voters watch and listen to.”
Time To Bring Back Dubbing For Movie Musicals
“Let’s bring back vocal dubbing. If you’re going to hire famous actors to bring some star power to your movies, help them out by letting someone else do the hard part. Back in the movie musical heyday, this practice was fairly common — the late Marni Nixon, for instance, provided the singing voice of everyone from Deborah Kerr to Audrey Hepburn — but those who provided dubbing often went without fair credit. But that’s a black mark against Hollywood, not against dubbing itself.”
Orson Welles’s Final Film Is Being Completed At Last (Thanks To A Certain Famous Online Media Company)
The Other Side of the Wind, “one of the most famous movies never released – one that has bedeviled various directors, movie companies and cinema buffs since Welles left it unfinished upon his death in 1985 – may finally be completed and shown worldwide.”
BBC Interview Hijacked By Toddlers Becomes Battleground In Culture Wars
When the video clip went viral, an incorrect assumption made by a lot of viewers on social media – and several media outlets – raised quite a few hackles. As Roxane Gay tweeted, “Today one of the funniest, most charming videos showed me that we have way more work to do than I ever thought.” Caroline Davies explains. (includes video)