Happy couples use Netflix!
Brand name recognition. It’s an imposed intellectual monopoly on our toiletries and snack foods. It infiltrates our language and informs our shopping habits, causing many to chose higher priced items of equal or lesser value over their less imaginatively named counterparts. For those who have the will power to resist, you still run the risk of becoming a walking advertisement. Do you use cotton swabs, or do you use Q-tips? Tissues or Kleenex? Do you copy or Xerox? Do you drink milk shakes or Krusty Partially Gelatinated Non-Dairy Gum-Based Beverages?
And now that same threat of market domination looms over how we rate our movies. That’s right. It’s a disturbing trend, but one which is becoming increasingly harder to ignore. I am, of course, referring to the Netflix Star. Just because they haven’t trademarked the term doesn’t mean it isn’t an attack on the previous industry standard of four stars. Netflix has essentially thrown down the gauntlet, saying, we are giving you more for your film rating buck, because we give you five stars. Rate films by our standards.
Integrity’s my middle name, motherfucker!
Because It’s not just on Netflix that people are using the five star system. People are actually using it to rate movies in their everyday lives. I see it on the blogs and I hear it in the streets. You see the latest generic Hollywood blockbuster? How many Netflix stars? Or, I saw that watered down romantic rehash this weekend. I’d give it four Netflix stars.
Let he who is without sin cast the first postage-paid flat rate mailer. I too have been swept up in Netflix Star mania. In fact, I have decided that five stars is too limiting for my movie rating needs and have since spearheaded an email campaign urging Netflix to give it’s users the power of the half star. I would ask all those who support the cause to please take the time to bombard Netflix customer service with emails. Or better yet, rip a starfish in half and mail it to your nearest Netflix shipping facility.
5 responses so far ↓
kelly // June 25, 2007 at 4:25 pm |
you know adam and i both use the “netflix rating system of five stars” on our blogs. is this a secret hate campaign directed as us for our recent comments? hmmm…
i suggest to find an even worse offender you take a look at Time Out New York’s new rating system (i’m not exactly sure when they implemented it, but i’m sure it is when i decided not to renew my subscription), where they have decided to use a completely arbitrary 6 star rating system for everything from movies to books to albums to concerts. what a cop out. especially since their favorite number of stars to give…you guessed it – 3 stars! what does 3 out of 6 mean anyway, you guessed it, nothing! it means it wasn’t good, it wasn’t bad, but they still had to write a review and weren’t smart enough to form an actual opinion…yea 3 stars it is!
“better yet, rip a starfish in half and mail it to your nearest Neflix shipping facility” – BRILLIANT. loved that bit.
thejamminjabber // June 25, 2007 at 5:34 pm |
6 stars?!?!?! That’s preposterous!
kfugrip // June 26, 2007 at 1:17 pm |
The netflix influence reaches far beyond the mear minds of consumers and into the halls of serious criticism. I noticed that a few years ago in Film Comment magazine they changed their rating from 4 stars (and a ‘bomb’ for the rare true piece of garbage) to 5 stars (with the ‘bomb’ there as well). I was curious as to the reasoning but I’ll bet it had something to do with netflix.
I have no problem with the 5 star system, as I have said to you on many occasion, and thus I use it in my blog. The half star is a waste. You might as well go to 10 stars like amazon.com.
Also, I use Q-tips.
Encapsulated Movie Reviews « thejamminjabber // June 28, 2007 at 3:55 pm |
[...] About ← Netflix and the Half Star [...]
dreamrapper // July 18, 2007 at 3:59 pm |
Wow, that Gene guy is looking old. I give that moustache 4 Netflix stars though.