Same with the ads for Amazon videos on Amazon Prime. They are ads and I don't want ads. But they don't see it that way (don't get me started on the forced watching of texts on Blue Rays).
My other bugbear are the auto playing videos on Netflix and the use of massive spoilers in episode thumbnails.
As a single consumer in a vast ocean I don't think my opinions will ever be listened to. Right now it's worth putting up with this crap as the benefits outweigh the cost but if it gets any worse I'll be unsubscribing.
You can actually turn off "Autoplay previews" now. You have to log into your account from a web browser, and then look at the Playback settings for the profile you want to change.
I bet someone has an engagement OKR anyway, though.
Goodhart's law applies. If a customer is watching more Netflix because they are binging some fantastic new context, that’s great for Netflix. If the customer watching more because the app keeps auto playing something they didn’t ask for and gradually pisses them off, not so good. Netflix might have better ways of measuring customer satisfaction that can tell if these behaviors make the customer more satisfied overall.
I fucking hate it. Yes, I’m one of those weirdos who sits through to the end when the copyright rolls past and gets pissed off when the lights come on at a theater during the credits.
It is incredibly disrespectful to the film.
This is one of those “good taste” things that I feel like Steve Jobs wouldn’t have tolerated.
It’s especially annoying on some older films with short end credits because it happens before the movie is even over.
We don't pay "respect" to delivery drivers, or to designers and engineers who brings us our gadgets and services in same way. Why should I spend my time and attention on credit rolls? It's not like anyone noticing it.
There are even credits in the loading screen of Adobe Photoshop.
Most popular gadgets with screens, smartphones, doesn’t have credits, not the most popular apps on App Store apart from couple of words “From Facebook”, “By Google” etc. It’s not considered “incredibly disrespectful” to not read credits in apps or acknowledgments in books that have it listed. It’s a personal preference to read or skip them. I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make.
I really enjoy movie watching. I use the credits to contemplate what I just watched. Sometimes to see who played specific roles, or what music was in the film, or the locations. So yes, I do watch the credits.
I know most people don't. But that decision should be mine or yours.
I found this attitude a bit confusing. The film makers are not there, who are you showing respect to? Also, do you read each crew members name? If not, what's the point of sitting through it?
I want to be in control of whether or not to watch to the very end. It should be my choice.
Bojack Horseman; I laughed, I cried, I lived...I jumped up out of my seat after six seasons to turn off some offensive trailer when it was finally over.
This really hits it for me. It's not even the credits that I need, per se, as long as the movie stop playing when it's done, whether with a credits sequence or a simple fade to black.
I waited for Stranger Things to come out on BluRay (currently waiting for the third season), and I'm 100% convinced I had a better experience than someone watching on Netflix, because the episodes actually ended after the credits. For a show few people will get to see this way, the writers really knew how to conclude each episode in just the right spot, so you had a nice place to take a breather and contemplate.
Of course, this confused the shit out of many viewers, who thought it was part of the show and tried to find meaning in it...
The Kodi Netflix add-on might not have the best interface, but at least it doesn’t do stuff like this!
You can now disable this at the account level. They added the option a few months back.
I usually watch TV with subtitles on (it means I can have the volume a little lower), and I find that cases where pre-roll ads are inserted either don't adjust the subtitle sync or don't adjust it properly. Amazon's subtitles are generally 1-2s ahead of the video, which is just enough to let the air out of a big reveal or ruin a joke.
Netflix and Hulu and competing with easier to use and more flexible pirated media, whether they like it or not. The consistency and flexibility of the VLC interface (or whatever media player you choose) is vastly better than whatever features a Netflix PM is trying to push to juice their metrics.
(I won’t even get into unskippable screens on Blu-Ray discs which are removed on the pirate version.)
My 960 GPU in the htpc doesn't quite have the bit depth that Netflix wants, therefore it disables 4k entirely. Bought the GPU at the time as it was the first with hardware HECV, has zero issues playing back a 4k encoding by someone else..
What happens if you play the first season of Stranger Things, which was produced in 4K but not in HDR?
On a more technical related note, I'd imagine 4K SDR variants of all Netflix HDR productions are generated on the back-end as an output of the same post-production process used to produce SDR prints at lower resolutions for reasons of both creative control an delivery efficiency; HEVC is just a compression algorithm, after all, and mostly orthogonal to matters of colorspace conversion and tone mapping.
See, e.g.,
https://partnerhelp.netflixstudios.com/hc/en-us/articles/360...
and observe that the example Dolby Vision workflow yields three distinct masters,
1. Dolby Vision (HDR + SDR tone mapping metadata)
2. SDR (generated automatically from the Dolby Vision source)
3. DCI-P3 (for potential theatrical exhibition)
I therefore assume the requirements for 4K SDR playback of SDR and HDR titles are identical.
‡ If and only if said Kaby Lake iGPU is connected to a video output.
I mention this because I can only watch 4K Netflix on my Hades Canyon NUC with the help of a Pascal eGPU, because, while the Kaby Lake iGPU is present and fully functional, all video outputs connect to the NUC's discrete AMD Polaris GPU, which Netflix doesn't support.
DRM sucks.
But lets be honest, essentially all pirates just want the content for free.
Frankly, this matters less and less if 98% of your offering is "Netflix originals" pulp. After 10 minutes of watching I have a feeling they should pay me for watching this.
In anyone asked me, I'd prefer quality over perceived quantity. Quality needs time, thought, talent.
You can usually find everything you want, but sometimes it requires some time.
I don't have a large 4k tv, so maybe I'm not appreciating how bad the streaming movies look.
But Netflix, Amazon, itunes, Vudo, etc. are all way easier services to use.
Second, they are targeting the masses, who probably like a 30 second preview for another show and don't care how 4k is encoded. In my experience, about 50% of people with high def TV's didn't even set up high def cable packages.
Even if it's hard to find something on public trackers with the right dubs/subtitles, it's rarely impossible for popular content. And if the subtitles are bad, you can, for example, download a different lower quality rip and pull the subtitles off that. The point is, in this system the user has control over the data they are consuming. This is infinitely preferable to some people than the chains of DRM.
It's not a huge amount of work by any means, but for many people it's probably insurmountable. Let alone when you compare it to the work involved to use a streaming service:
1. Sign up 2. Enter CC info 3. Done
When Netflix launched in Denmark, I immedately jumped on it. It used to have endless amounts of great content, and was way more convenient than piracy. Now it's just filled with trash, and I can never find what I want to watch. Piracy has again become more convenient.
My wife wanted to watch the Borne Identity and my um friend had figure out why Radarr blacklisted a bunch of releases then wait for it to download and un-par (which took 5x longer than the download). I came back into the living room 15 minutes later and found my wife just watching it with commercials on Peacock.
During a break I convinced her to switch to plex since it didn't have commercials. But then we had to pause the movie and fumble with subtitles for the scenes in the swiss bank. First downloaded set didn't match the timestamps. Second did, but it was like 5 minutes. "Why couldn't you just let me watch in on NBC HONEY?"
Something like https://put.io/ is far easier while still providing all the control you need over files and usually makes them available instantly.
1. Horrible video compression to save bandwidth
When they offer users high definition content, they're actually talking about the resolution of the image. The quality and detail of the image will almost always be much worse if compared to another source such as Blu-Rays. Netflix somehow manages to add compression artifacts to nearly 100% black frames. Scenes with a lot of movement are actually painful to watch.
Compare that to the obssessive attention to detail you can often find in piracy communities and the winner is obvious.
2. Censorship
These services aren't afraid to cut content in order to broaden their audiences. They may even be required to do it by law. Pirates obviously don't have these problems.
3. Annoying copyright issues nobody cares about
Netflix once had Terminator 1 and 3 but not 2, as well as Spider Man 1 and 3 but not 2. Was the license for these movies too expensive for them? Who knows? Who cares?
Want to watch a classic film? An influential film? Chances are it's not on Netflix. Where is it then? Who knows... Maybe not actually available at all anywhere no matter where you look.
Piracy just ignores these issues. As a result it gives you access to almost everything humanity has ever created.
4. DRM
Netflix won't give you access to their precious 4k+ streams if it feels your device isn't locked down enough. Disney is even more aggressive with these measures. Even on my perfectly locked down PS4 system it won't let me download content ahead of time. Apparently they think network connections are reliable.
Pirates simply don't have these problems.
5. Superior technology
Netflix's video player is garbage compared to mpv. The video players of every other streaming service manage to be even worse. It's not just the basic-ness of it either: sometimes it stutters and falls out of sync with the audio, sometimes it screws up the rendering of subtitles...
The one area where streaming service technology wins is their ability to offer alternate audio streams.
For piracy, one just needs to backup. And, this is controlled by user not whatever COMPANY/POLICY.
FWIW I have 20/10 vision (twice as sharp as "perfect normal") and have never seen the appeal of retina screens or 4k.
edit: Also the file sizes are vastly larger for 4k for an incremental benefit.
Okay, I’m sure the logo has meaning to the devs, so they don’t mind it looking like an error message. That’s fair. They aren’t Instagram, they’re not going for the lowest common denominator. And, okay, the UI works, so why fuck with it?
But why doesn’t it play the next video in a directory when you’ve finished the first? Why is the playlist option so hard to find and oddly implemented? Why can’t they update the UI to look like it was at least made for win7?
This sounds like a major gripe, but really it’s not. Everything else is amazing in that app, it’s one of the best, most complete user experiences around, especially for a free app, but it just seems like it has some really obvious problems with fairly minor fixes
I use MPV which has a much more minimal UI and better performance: https://mpv.io/
My biggest goal with kids is to help them with their focus and limit exposure to "infinity pools" of content. It's not that I have a problem with the content of the ads, it's that they train kids' brains to want to switch quickly between content the moment a show has a lull.
It creates that FOMO that they might not be watching the most exciting show right now because the ad always makes the other show look way better.
Youtube is of course the epitome of this issue, although disabling the mini-player on kids content helps a little.
Or people with small kids.
- Never show ads for other shows - Always skip opening themes
Granted, the current situation is problematic, but this happened even before and since you are prime, you don't get any money back or something like that. It's just bad luck then.
Now, you might think you could rely on the services where you pay extra for same-day delivery or morning next day. But those end up missing the delivery window a good half of the times I used them - even before the pandemic.
Next day or same day delivery just isn't something that seems to work reliably here in Western Europe.
I know companies where a local driver will literally get in a car and bring me what I need right away, but that doesn't scale to Amazon levels.
Given that prime delivery rarely holds its promise, it is no surprise that Amazon needs to make non-prime delivery even less attractive.
But you know, there are other vendors! Plus, you are less likely to get a fake product if you order directly from there.
And the dark patterns on placing an order without re-upping Prime feels like the fake download buttons on download.com without an ad blocker.
(I actually tried going along with the scam, but his call centre was so noisy he couldn't hear what I was saying, ffs.)
They show you ads for YouTube TV, literally while are you watching TV with your paid YouTube TV subscription.
How many ad dollars are just being flushed down the drain...
And no, it’s not an ad placeholder. Because they have that too. There is a scene that says “you’re watching YoutubeTV, your show will resume momentarily” while a yellow ad bar progresses.
They aren’t also analog ads. You can tell when YTV is playing back an ad recorded within the show, vs when they flip the stream from content to ad content because the UI changes.
Nope, from what I can tell, they definitely just show their own ads to their customers.
When I had Dish, I saw a lot of DirectTV ads. That makes sense. But I never saw Dish advertising Dish. Maybe I just never paid attention.
HBO doesn't show commercials. It DOES use the time between two shows (starting on the hour or half hour) to preview other shows on the same network but I find these slightly less annoying that paid-for ads.
Likewise with Amazon showing you an ad for a product you literally bought minutes ago as if you'd want to buy another before the first arrives or LinkedIn recruiters trying recruit you to your current role.
Specialty equipment like for photography/cycling or 3d printing is the worst. Buy a Sony camera or Peak design tripod and you'll get ads for the same thing for a year. Like accessories and complementary products I'd understand but come on. Just how many thousand dollar cameras do you expect me to buy per month/year?!
Like I understand the complexity in optimizing that query for Amazon and personalized product history, etc.
But YouTubeTV for Pete’s sake, is a static property of the network. It doesn’t change for anyone already watching YTV and therefore subscribed.
Just don’t put YTV ads on the YTV network. Simple as that. Someone legit went and added them.
“Already have it”!!!
On my samsung TV you can't even change the language from within the menu while watching, you have to close playback, go to playback settings of the movie, change the language, go back to the movie's main menu and then start the movie again.
First world problem, I know. But still highly annoying.
Also, they should stop showing me ads for things I've watched.
They better not make them unskippable ever.
It might be the case that my DNS server (basically PiHole but something I built before PiHole was a thing) is blocking them. However it doesn’t stop inlined ads from YouTube, 4oD, Twitch and other streaming / on demand services.
On some smart TVs, there's an explicit (or on-screen) button to skip these. If you don't see a skip button and you have a Fire TV remote, you can press the >> double arrow button to skip these.
I agree that there should be an option to disable these altogether, like how Netflix offers an option to disable video previews.
Worst part is, prime crashes my TV's video player. Once that happens I am not able to play any video at all, even on other apps. And ads made it worse since it usually crashes as I switch videos and adds are more video switching.
And yes Amazon, they are ads.
A) Usually my VPN is active and I don't want to shut it down just that netflix/amazon allows my to watch something
B) I like setting the playback speed to ~1.1 of my media player, which is not supported by any streaming provider I'm subscribed to.