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Comment by TheOtherHobbes | Hacker News Reader

I only use Netflix and Prime, and both feel really stale to me. It's all "content" - good to very good production values designed to fill a gap and appeal to a demographic. But very repetitive and production line, with no passion projects, nothing too arty or quirky, nothing outside of the box, no surprises.

Some of it is quite watchable, but none of it is exciting or fresh. It's all some combination of stock soapy characters and themes in stock genre settings, usually with some comedy/sex/violence/horror added for stickiness.

Netflix could easily throw some money at graduate film makers and say 'Make something no one has seen before.' That might or might not help retention, but it's hard to shake the feeling Netflix are deliberately aiming for the middle of the bell curve as creative policy, and missing opportunities to lead instead of trying to play it safe.

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I think Netflix's big problem is I'll occasionally discover something amazing, and then look at the release date and wonder "why did it take so long to find this?"

If the experience browsing their catalog wasn't so awful, I'd be more inclined to try and use the service. Instead, after I've finished something good, I don't tend to come back to Netflix for awhile - it's easier to just watch stuff on Youtube because I know how to navigate it, the search works well, and the recommendations are actually decent.

I remember a couple weeks ago, Blade Runner 2049 was the first thing that popped up when I logged into Netflix. I was so happy to see it there, but when I went back the next night to watch it, it wasn't there (which is fine, the homepage isn't static). So I went to search for it, and "Blade Runner" returned nothing relevant (nor did "Blade Runner 2049"). I had to search "2049" to find it, and after the movie ended, Netflix recommended the first Blade Runner (which also didn't show up in any of my searches).

The search isn't always this bad (both Blade Runner movies show up in search the way I would expect them to now), but still...even when I know something great is on Netflix, it can be an utter pain to get to. It's like they're trying to get me to go with the mediocre recommendations instead of watching the good stuff that I know is on there.

It's so annoying that if I was the one paying for it, I'd cancel my subscription. And I remember things used to be a lot better, which just makes it all the more frustrating when looking for something good.

I guess this is the cons of being such a data oriented company. It requires guts to think beyond ROI when you have so much infos about your users and their habits.

Data oriented optimization strategies tend to result in local maximums. Jumping across the solution space from a local maximum to the global maximum requires a visionary leader, and some luck.

Throwing money at graduate filmmakers and telling them to follow their passions would all but guarantee a catalogue full of $CURRENT_DAY political messaging, which would be poison for subscriber retention.

Dont throw all the money there, just some to have some unique, quirky, passionate, fresh content. Surely people can skip titles they don't like.

> ... would all but guarantee a catalogue full of $CURRENT_DAY political messaging, which would be poison for subscriber retention.

Seems to me that's what they already have; which upon reflection, is indeed probably why they're currently having problems with subscriber retention.

You're right, but Netflix has been punished for taking risks. Look at the spike in churn rate with the release of 'cuties': https://thestreamable.com/news/report-netflix-saw-3-6-millio...

I feel what you say too, that all the content feels samey. But I'll offer a suggestion that works for me: try some animation. That's where you get the passion projects that can feel different. Animated characters and settings can be far more expressive and varied and fresh, compared to the stock sameyness you get from live action.

The new She-Ra on Netflix was the best thing I've watched in quite some time. It's not a kiddie show, it works for all ages, think like Pixar movies. Other great cartoons across a variety of streaming services: Steven Universe, Gravity Falls, Owl House, Star Trek Lower Decks, also the more mainstream Bob's Burgers. If you want something fresh to watch, try animation.

I have a similar experience with respect to watching foreign produced content. It's interesting because they present different approaches to the shows and even if they're using entertainment tropes they can be different enough because they're tropes of that nation.

But once I watched a few, Netflix filled my entire recommendation catalog with almost all e.g. Turkish and Korean shows. Pretty annoying as it's like ordering an ice cream dessert, then the only thing the menu ever shows is all ice cream desserts. It makes me think part of people feeling it's all the same is that the recommendation optimization is overbearing in shoveling too much of more of the same recent history vs presenting a mix of recommendation and discovery.

This exactly. Across a LOT of their anime, crime drama espcially (in my limited view, probably applies to other genres as well), I feel they have this minor variation on a theme, sort of algorithmically built, almost. Everytime i watch some new series i get this "wait a minute..." feeling. I occasionally find new stuff to watch that is interesting (of late, noir crime drama shows on Prime) but those also have the same ingredients. A lot of those are not prime original anyway. That original content seems rare.

> But very repetitive and production line, with no passion projects, nothing too arty or quirky, nothing outside of the box, no surprises.

I'm getting the feeling that Apple TV+ is where it's at for this type of content. Severance was particularly good.

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