The Atlantic: Nobody Knows What’s Happening Online Anymore. Why you’ve probably never heard of the most popular Netflix show in the world.::undefined
An insightful thought from a TV critic I read years ago just as streaming was taking off :
There’s no such thing as the best TV show anymore, because there’s so much that’s generally good enough to be a candidate that no one person has watched it all and spent the time to assess it properly.
More broadly, this had happened to western culture with the internet. Previously, with only three tv channels and two major papers, we were all literally on the same page.
I’d go further and say there’s a vertical dimension too in terms of complexity. Society and its various aspects such as technology are now complex enough in total they I don’t think anyone can ever say they understand what’s going on.
I use the phrase “societal decoheshion” to describe that. We (whoever that may be) just aren’t all that unified enough in our culture or information sources anymore.
Even just since Reddit became dead to us, my wife (who I met through Reddit) and I went to different platforms, and find ourselves often catching each other up on what our respective corners of the internet are doing.
There IS a best TV show and it’s Six Feet Under and it’s perfect and the ending makes me cri every time and I will FIGHT ANYONE WHO DISAGREES
But srsly it’s a 10/10
There are tons of young millionaire youtubers who I’ve never heard of. It’s pretty cool actually that there are so many niches to fill.
And plenty of poor low-subscriber channels that are actually really good and could blow up at some point.
I’ve certainly watched some people from before they were big and from memory their content was more or less just as good in the “early” days. Which all up makes for a pile of stuff!
And plenty of poor low-subscriber channels that are actually really good and could blow up at some point.
Probably doing stupid things like posting with useful titles and thumbnails without agape mouths…
That seems to be the only kind of trash content that Google is interested in pushing these days.
That seems to be the only kind of trash content that Google is interested in pushing these days.
Youtube “pushes” whatever gets more views and longer watch time.
If trashy crap is being suggested, that means other people are watching it in increased numbers.
Youtube “pushes” whatever gets more views and longer watch time.
No YouTube pushes what people will click on. They don’t care about the quality of the content, whether the people who watch it actually enjoy it (dislike = “engagement”), or what kind of content people are actually subscribed to because the ads come first.
Youtube “pushes” whatever gets more views and longer watch time.
No YouTube pushes what people will click on.
That’s pretty much what I said.
Google pushes what you click. Stop watching this kind of content and it’ll probably stop being recommended to you
Not true. I don’t watch it.
And even if I did, it doesn’t mean that I liked it. None of these tech companies’ algorithms seem to account for that little fact, even when I directly express otherwise.
they are not optimizing for your enjoyment, they’'re optimizing for your engagement. they don’t give a fuck if you hate what you’re watching as long as you watch it for longer.
they are not optimizing for your enjoyment, they’'re optimizing for your engagement.
Yes that’s my point.
they don’t give a fuck if you hate what you’re watching as long as you watch it for longer.
Don’t know about you but I don’t spend my free time torturing myself.
Well I practically never see these kinds of thumbnails, it’s absolutely influenced by your behaviour whatever it may be.
This might explain why meta wants to join the fediverse.
A shift away from a knowable internet might feel like a return to something smaller and purer. An internet with no discernable monoculture may feel, especially to those who’ve been continuously plugged into trending topics and viral culture, like a relief. But this new era of the internet is also one that entrenches tech giants and any forthcoming emergent platforms as the sole gatekeepers when it comes to tracking the way that information travels. We already know them to be unreliable narrators and poor stewards, but on a fragmented internet, where recommendation algorithms beat out the older follower model, we rely on these corporations to give us a sense of scale.
I don’t know how many are like me who almost doesn’t watch tv shows at all. I tried to watch a few but at best it’s quite mediocre to me compared to a good movie, and they are too long for my like. Nowadays I only watch movies, or read books, besides playing games. I don’t know how much I’m considered a weirdo today for not watching tv shows at all.
By myself I never really watch TV shows for the same reasons you mentioned but with my wife we watch an episode of something for dinner. Shows like chernobyl or the wire were really good and I’m glad I watched them but there are a lot of shows that just don’t end and they get old quick
Thanks for posting the archived version. I ran across this story recently and hit a paywall right after the article mentioned the problem with paywalls.
Netflix’s single most popular anything from January and June 2023 was a recent thriller series called The Night Agent, which was streamed for 812 million hours globally.
Saved you a click.
And The Night Agent was a fantastic show. You should go watch it.
Was it? It was fine – that thing you throw on because you’ve watched most of everything else that fills that kind of derivative political action conspiracy thriller. Not particularly intelligent, not particularly funny, a loose enough plot that you can be paying attention once every 5 minutes and get by. Some folks get shot. There’s a conspiracy ooooOOOOoooh.
Maybe that’s what defines good these days, when content is just a glut of mediocrity.
I was shocked it was up top the list in terms of ‘quality,’ but I watched it because, it was there… So, I guess that explains it?
The Recruit (similar vein) was a superior show in terms of quality. Recommend that if you need a quick fix.
AAA quality is wanting these days. I just got done watching Rebel Moon. Apparently a $166m budget movie. Completely devoid of anything resembling a story or characters.
