Comment by marcosdumay
1 year ago
Well, people that want to half-watch TV deserve stuff made for them too.
Netflix has shows made for really watching too. I don't know if they are rebellious acts from their makers, brought without an option, or actual choices, but Netflix does have them.
My impression is that Netflix cornered themselves into the same AAA race to death that the major movie studios are in. Everything is too expensive, so they can't accept risks, so nothing is really good (nor really bad). Micromanaging is just one more visible consequence of that, between lots and lots that stay hidden but are as important to the final result.
> Well, people that want to half-watch TV deserve stuff made for them too.
The Muzak-ification of film?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muzak
> Well, people that want to half-watch TV deserve stuff made for them too.
What? No they don't. Film and television are visual art forms that are meant to be viewed and given the appropriate attention. There's already plenty of mediocre television out there you can use as background noise; we don't need to intentionally lower the bar for the media that's being made. As the article mentions, Netflix has already played its part in ruining the job landscape for writers and actors. I guess they see a need to play their part in devaluing the work that remains.
> no they don’t. … > meant to be viewed and given the appropriate attention
I think the person choosing to spend a few hours of their one life with some audio/visual media, whether they’re doing their laundry or not, is the one who gets to decide whether or not it’s art, and how much attention it deserves. Anything else leads to some uncomfortable places.
There are two different perspectives. The viewer is, of course, entitled to do whatever they want in the privacy of their own home. The creator or creators, conversely, are entitled to create something with the intention that it be viewed; if they didn't have that intention, then they probably wouldn't choose a visual medium.
I think what bothers me is Netflix inserting themselves into this conversation and trying to dictate what creators create. The idea of using data to say "well, some portion of people don't actually pay attention while their TV is on" to conclude "therefore, we should create visual media that is not intended to be watched" is the reductio ad absurdium conclusion of data-driven decision making gone wrong and it deserves ridicule.
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“ Film and television are visual art forms that are meant to be viewed and given the appropriate attention.”
According to who…?
There’s not even a universally agreed upon definition of ‘art’ last time I checked.
Since when is there video that's not meant to be viewed? Is there also audio not meant to be listened? Written words not meant to be read? Of people want something to listen in the background while doing something else, there's music, podcasts and audiobooks.
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Don't worry, very, very soon the crappy shows that people half-watch will no longer be produced. By humans.
We'll still need people to create actually good content, but that crappy filler stuff will be generated.
It will be a special kind of hell, but there will probably be some way to find out what to actually spend your time watching.
6.5/10 movies only deserve 65% attention, and 6.5/10 is the target imdb rating for all streamers. Not bad, not great, but good enough to avoid controversy and maintain subs.
> Film and television are visual art forms that are meant to be viewed and given the appropriate attention
Some of it, yes. But the majority of it is just circus, designed, together with bread, to keep the masses quiet.
No. No they don't.