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Comment by jaymmartin | Hacker News Reader

Netflix used to define the ratings as "Hated It", "Didn't Like It", "Liked It", "Really Liked It", and "Loved It". I didn't find it difficult to memorize.

What's to stop you from applying whatever textual descriptions you want to the numbers?

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Because I might apply different ones, making them useless in aggregate if I assume anything I like has to be a 4 or 5, but you assume that you'll rate anything you like as low as a 2, and reserve just 1 for "don't watch it"

This is why the Uber/Lyft rating system is effectively useless. Five stars is basically "was not unsafe", and four and below indicate significant safety, cleanliness, rudeness, or other problems.

If each star rating had a textual description of what it meant, and drivers didn't have to maintain something like a 4.3 (or whatever it is) in order to stay on the platform, the ratings would actually mean something.

Then you have my girlfriend who rates everything a 3/5 because it's average or to be expected. 4/5 for particularly good service. And nobody gets a 5/5.

I think star systems are a waste of time.

This is why I never fill out my car dealership's service department surveys. I'm not going to give a normal oil change visit 10/10 in every category because that's simply bullshit. Giving anything less gets my service advisor punished for not delivering excellent service.

I'm honest with him and tell him exactly why I won't be filling it out. If I do ever fill one out, he'll know exactly why before I send it in.

I usually do the same but for Uber I rated decent drivers 5/5 because I'd been told everyone does this hopefully she does the same.

That’s still the way the star ratings appear when I watch Netflix using my 2013 Samsung Blu-ray player. For the first few years of watching Netflix, I would religiously rate films and TV show (even those I’ve already seen in the cinema) to help its recommendation engine but it didn’t really help much.

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