Netflix Shows Different Skin Colors on Movie Title Cards Depending on Your Race | Hacker News Reader

Netflix Shows Different Skin Colors on Movie Title Cards Depending on Your Race

exstreamist.com

20 pointssharkweek12 comments

I didn't see different poster for same movie although I'm not a caucasian. Maybe it's just not your ethnicity but also your previous viewing habits. For example, if you watched lot of movies with hispanic or Indian or african-american actors then you might get those posters to incentivize you to watch more.

I'm pretty sure they have exhaustive feature set (not just demographic information) in their model to select the cover poster for user.

It's all about engaging. It's actual leveraging the biases of the individual rather than Netflix. You're being racist, not netflix which is kinda funny.

There's data points to indicate you're more likely to watch X if they show A,B,C title cards. When you do, that reinforces that link. In aggregate it feeds data points to Netflix that lets them A/B test the needed graphics.

Customer biases driving biases/business decisions.

This just in, based on the data they collect on a users habits, companies adjust their marketing to suit demographics.

So... is the data racist? Is the user more inclined to click on things with people from their demographic? Is it really Netflix at fault for aligning their content to a users browsing habits?

It appears to me that Netflix didn't "assume" her demographic. They very accurately identified her based on data she unwittingly provided them and they adjusted the content according to what she would statistically most likely view. In the same way almost all modern companies do.

https://medium.com/netflix-techblog/artwork-personalization-...

There you have it. They don’t even see it as something they should be embarrassed about. It’s something to be written up for their engineering blog. They’re proud of it.

I guess the question is whether Netflix is generating the graphics or the movie producers supply varying content targeting different demographics.

It seems interesting that with all its investment in original content, Netflix would rather re-skin "white" movies than invest in "black" movies.

I wonder if this is a sign of institutional racism at work and lack of diversity.

>, Netflix would rather re-skin "white" movies than invest in "black" movies.

Citation needed, here. Netflix could be doing both.

I know, right? I just may not be seeing the black movies because I'm a white customer.

Or you may not be seeing black movies because you don't watch black movies. I think the only solution here is the "Android" route: allow people to log in to their account and turn the knobs on the recommendation algorithms, or turn them off entirely.

Hmmm I wondered why netflix seemed to use actors that weren't actually very prominent in the show or movie being watched for their title cards. Makes sense now i suppose.

Mine shows Kristen Bell in a river in her bathing suit. I'm a guy and have action movies and comedies mostly on the netflix home page. So..yeah.

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