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Amazon Prime Video Has More Movies, But Netflix Has Higher-Rated Films, Study Says (usatoday.com) 200

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
When you want to watch a movie, which streaming service truly delivers? If you want quality, opt for Netflix. If you prefer quantity, peruse Amazon Prime Video. From a report: That's the conclusion from Streaming Observer. The tech news website looked at all of the movies on Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and HBO Now as of January 20 and analyzed the films' ratings on movie and TV review site Rotten Tomatoes. Also factored in: data from the streaming providers, as well as third-party search sites Reelgood and JustWatch. The site found Amazon had the most movies (17,461) -- four times that of Netflix (3,839) and many more times the amount on Hulu (2,336) and HBO (815). But Netflix had more movies -- 596, more than 15 percent of its library -- with a "Certified Fresh" rating from Rotten Tomatoes, a designation given to the best-reviewed films.
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Amazon Prime Video Has More Movies, But Netflix Has Higher-Rated Films, Study Says More

Amazon Prime Video Has More Movies, But Netflix Has Higher-Rated Films, Study Says

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  • Certified Fresh (Score:5, Interesting)

    by 110010001000 ( 697113 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @09:21AM (#58039738) Homepage Journal
    The top rated movie of ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes is "Black Panther". So....yeah.

    • Re:Certified Fresh (Score:5, Insightful)

      by 110010001000 ( 697113 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @09:29AM (#58039800) Homepage Journal
      Not sure why I am being modded down. The "ratings" on Rotten Tomatoes mean nothing. The 3rd top rated movie of all time is "Lady Bird" and the 5th is "Get Out" and 7th is "Mad Max: Fury Road". The best movies of all time. Think about that.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Desler ( 1608317 )

        Yeah, it's almost as if opinions vary from person to person. Shocking!

        • Re:Certified Fresh (Score:5, Insightful)

          by quenda ( 644621 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @09:53AM (#58039938)

          Yeah, it's almost as if opinions vary from person to person. Shocking!

          Yes, but not randomly. There is some critical consensus, and those movies, while not bad, are surprising to see in an all-time top list.

          • Yeah, it's almost as if opinions vary from person to person. Shocking!

            Yes, but not randomly. There is some critical consensus, and those movies, while not bad, are surprising to see in an all-time top list.

            A lot of newer movies will be more extreme at one end or the other as people who rushed out to the cinema to see them either think they're "the best ever" or "the worst ever". Ratings tend to get more accurate over time. Newer films tend to be driven to either extremes.

            You can probably trust a "5 year old film"'s reviews than a "1 year old film"'s reviews.

            • Wonder Woman is listed as the 12th best movie OF ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes. "A Quiet Place" is 16th. Of the best movies of all time. Of every movie ever made in the history of cinema.
        • What person truly believes that Black Panther (or even Mad Max: Fury Road) are in the top 5 movies of all time??? I liked both movies, but they will both be forgotten in a few years.

      • Not sure why I am being modded down.

        Because you didn't make a useful or thoughtful point in the opinion of the moderators. And that fact is the answer to why certain movies have high Rotten Tomatoes scores. So Black Panther evidently has the highest ranking by whatever metrics Rotten Tomatoes uses. So what? It's just a ranking by some arbitrary metric. If that movie happens to be Black Panther then so be it. That isn't a problem. Lots of people consider it to be a very good movie worth watching and it's super popular with some demograp

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by doom ( 14564 )

          Didn't Ryan Coogler actively solicit his fans to hit the rottentomatoes ratiings system? That would be the point the OP was trying to make.

          Now myself, I couldn't care less about rottentomatoes rankings, and Black Panther is a decent movie (but it wasn't even the best of 2018-- try "Sorry to Bother You")-- the point here would be that crowd-sourced ranking (typically with anonymous accounts without verified IDs!) aren't actually worth anything. The only time they won't be gamed is if no one cares enough a

      • Not sure why I am being modded down. The "ratings" on Rotten Tomatoes mean nothing. The 3rd top rated movie of all time is "Lady Bird" and the 5th is "Get Out" and 7th is "Mad Max: Fury Road". The best movies of all time. Think about that.

        Rotten Tomatoes "help" but it isn't the whole story. Generally better films will get higher ratings and worse films will get lower ratings. There are exceptions for various reasons- but it can help. It's all subjective though.

      • I've thought about it. What do you think "ratings" should mean? Rotten Tomatoes is clear what their ratings mean: it's an aggregate score of what the general public and movie critics have thought about a movie. Is it perfect? No. Does it have gaps? Yes. For example, most movies that been released in the last 20 years or so will have a rating. Older movies that predate the Internet era may not have a rating or a smaller set of opinions. Also the rating says nothing about the quality, importance, or brillianc
        • No. The Rotten Tomatoes score is based on whoever gamed the system. My entire point is saying Netflix has "higher rated" films is useless, because the RT ratings are meaningless. I am not insulting people precious super hero movies. I liked Black Panther, but it isn't the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME like RT claims.
          • Again, the RT rating only shows how much a movie was generally liked. It offers no subjective opinion if a movie is "the best" which is what you are trying to making it out to be. Seems you want to apply a Strawman argument.

            • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

              by 110010001000 ( 697113 )
              Oh that's odd. Maybe I was confused by the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" header on the list: https://www.rottentomatoes.com... [rottentomatoes.com]

              How you could possibly believe any rating from that site is unbelievable, but people are naive and stupid.

            • Re:Certified Fresh (Score:4, Insightful)

              by Cederic ( 9623 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @11:47AM (#58040630) Journal

              It offers no subjective opinion if a movie is "the best" which is what you are trying to making it out to be.

              No, he quite clearly isn't making it out to be that. He's very clearly highlighting that the article's description of 'higher rated films' is based on a demonstrably flawed measure.

              Rotten Tomatoes also categorically offers only a subjective opinion. If there was any objectivity at all then the examples he's quoted would never have made the top 5 - and if you disagree with that, do please articulate the objective criteria that would grant them such lofty status.

              Seems you want to apply a Strawman argument.

              The fucking irony.

              • No he isn't. He clearly wants to use "Best" as a strawman because his specific example of Black Panther isn't the "best" to him. Never mind that rating is not and has never meant what he wants it to mean. The RT score is a measure of general likability. It isn't a measure of subjective superiority.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by Cederic ( 9623 )

                  Black Panther isn't the "best" to fucking anybody. Any rating system which declares it the highest rated film of all time is clearly fucked in the head.

      • Maybe because you seem to mistake the Rotten Tomatoes rating (whether a movie is generally liked) with something far more subjective (whether a movie is the "best").
        • Oh I guess I was deceived by the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" heading under the list I was talking about here: https://www.rottentomatoes.com... [rottentomatoes.com]

          Paddington 2 has a 100% rating. The new Spiderman drivel has a 97% rating. Give me a break. Obviously the system is gamed.
          • Did you look at your link? It says clearly: "All lists are sorted by Adjusted Score" There is a question mark right next to "Score" that tells very briefly how it came to this conclusion. If you click on "What is the Tomatometer" [rottentomatoes.com], it tells you very clearly how they come up with the list. But let's look at the crux of your agument: RT posting their score of other people's opinion is invalid because it goes against YOUR opinion.
            • Who said it goes against MY opinion? Maybe I think that "Black Panther" is the BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME. Do you think that? Does anyone? The point is the scoring is obviously gamed and useless. It has nothing to do with my opinion. My opinion doesn't matter.

        • Maybe because you seem to mistake the Rotten Tomatoes rating (whether a movie is generally liked) with something far more subjective (whether a movie is the "best").

          It's all subjective! Is there a better way to determine what's the "best" movie of all time than popular enjoyability?

          • Only if you want to assert that your opinion of a film should exceed other people's opinion of a film in regard to a subjective opinion when the rating has nothing to do with that subjective opinion.

            • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

              by 110010001000 ( 697113 )
              My opinion of a film doesn't matter, but when you give a list and say it is "THE BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" (actual words) and put Black Panther as #1, then you have a credibility problem. The entire website is gamed.
              • Again understand what the RT rating is because you don't seem to want to admit that it is a measure of likability not quality.
                • Very doubtful. You are telling me that so many of the "most likable" movies of all time happen to be from 2018? "Lady Bird" was the 3rd "most likeable" movie OF ALL TIME? So stupid.

      • Although I totally agree with your revelation about the top rated movies on Rotten Tomatoes, in general I agree with the statement that Netflix more often has content I actually want to see, while Prime does have a wider range of movies but most of them are mediocre.

        That's after many years of owning and using both services.

        • Re:Good point but... (Score:4, Interesting)

          by Cederic ( 9623 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @11:56AM (#58040716) Journal

          Oddly that makes Amazon Prime a better service for me.

          If a movie is genuinely good (above and beyond mere competent) then I've probably already seen it. If it's a great movie then I probably have a copy at home to watch on demand.

          It's the other films that I haven't seen yet, that may actually be superb but too niche to receive mainstream recognition, that I want to see.

          E.g. I saw the other day an advert for a new film about human trafficking, almost guaranteed a top rating on Rotten Tomatoes, likely to win a dozen different awards.

          Meanwhile Lilya 4-ever is "Fresh: 58" despite completely and viciously depicting a compelling and realistic story on exactly the same theme.

          I'd rather watch the foreign language independent film that isn't scared to properly explore its subject than the widely acclaimed Hollywood virtue piece.

          • It's the other films that I haven't seen yet, that may actually be superb but too niche to receive mainstream recognition, that I want to see.

            That's nice but I don't think that is what Prime Video is offering.

            By mediocre, I mean just that - not unknown. Not indie or foreign. Mostly Prime movies are a lot of just OK movies that did not escape attention, they simply didn't warrant much.

            You mentioned Lilya 4-Ever, but I don't see it on prime video... but I do see Post Impact. And Mars Attacks.

            Meanwhile on

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Cederic ( 9623 )

              In the UK Netflix basically had no films at all, so I cancelled my subscription. They may now offer a broader range of foreign and independent cinema but I have a backlog of films from TV film channels and Amazon Prime.

              On Amazon Prime there's rarely anything worth searching but they do keep adding (then removing) films, and that's where I find the interesting ones. E.g. in the autumn they added The Handmaiden, the plot summary for which puts it nowhere near my normal preferences - but then I spotted the nam

      • Newer movies - with fewer reviews - are statistically more likely to hit the outliers. You're just seeing that effect. It doesn't say anything about how accurate the reviews are for the typical movie.

      • Not sure why I am being modded down. The "ratings" on Rotten Tomatoes mean nothing.

        It means that reviews liked something. Interestingly the some total of your comment can be summarised with: I disagree with a large group of reviewers on this case, which makes your post decidedly off-topic.

        • Who said I disagreed? My opinion on the movies doesn't matter. If you think that the "best" movies of ALL TIME (from the website) are Black Panther, Wizard of Oz, and Lady Bird (and two of them just happened to come out in 2018) then you are just stupid. If you don't think the system is gamed, I don't know what to same.
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • a movie is, it's a popularity contest. There's nothing wrong with that. If you're in the business of making moves you spend most of your time/money on figuring out what's going to be the most popular, not what's going to be the best artistically/thematically.

        RT not so good for film historians but great for consumer trends. If you're trying to build a stable of content it's a decent enough barometer.

      • Re:Certified Fresh (Score:4, Insightful)

        by lgw ( 121541 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @01:50PM (#58041376) Journal

        You're modded down because Slashdot moderation is almost entirely political reflex these days.

        Rotten Tomatoes critic scores are just garbage. They reflect whether a movie is "the sort of movie people should see" in the mind of critics, not whether a movie will be engaging or entertaining. That was fine back in the day when that just meant boring, incomprehensible art-house films would be on top: ask an enthusiast for a recommendation and you're unlikely to get something practical. It was easy to ignore those and get real value from critics. Now it's all politics, and fuck that noise.

        Rotten Tomatoes viewer scores are pretty good. Sure, you have to adjust for the lowest common denominator, and discount broad comedies and Transformers movies, but that's easy.

    • The top rated movie of ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes is "Black Panther". So....yeah.

      You mean ratings push the movie more people like for personal reasons to the top, rather than the movie with the highest cinematic quality? Hmm.

      • Or it is gamed by a bunch of script kiddies. Either way, the ratings are useless.

        • Or it is gamed by a bunch of script kiddies. Either way, the ratings are useless.

          Yeah, personal reasons is kind of a broad stroke which can of course include my bank account or my love of screwing with people.

        • Just because you don't value the rating (and frankly misunderstand what the rating is) does not mean it is useless to other people.

    • You're right. It's not the best. I don't think that's exactly what the rating means. I guess it means "of people who are interested in this sort of movie, what percent of them liked this movie?" So films that are unambiguously of a particular genre will score higher with audiences, because we have already filtered for people who like (in this case) the Marvel recipe.

      Similarly, ratings on boardgamegeek.com for expansions to games are generally higher than the ratings for base games, because of the select

    • Re:Certified Fresh (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anubis IV ( 1279820 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @12:25PM (#58040878)

      The top rated movie of ALL TIME on Rotten Tomatoes is "Black Panther". So....yeah.

      A) Actually, it's not. It's the top ranked using their "Adjusted Score" [rottentomatoes.com], but it's not the top rated, which should have been obvious, given that it has a 97% rating currently and there are plenty of films with a 100% rating [rottentomatoes.com].

      B) If you hover over the ? on the Best of RT page, you'll see that their Adjusted Score is calculated using a Bayesian formula that's designed to account for variations in the number of reviewers per movie. I.e. More reviewers in agreement will result in a higher Adjusted Score. As such, it should be fairly obvious that their Adjusted Score will be biased towards more recent films (i.e. ones with more reviews).

      C) A bias towards more recent films is a feature, not a bug, given that it helps their users discover films they haven't yet seen that are more likely to be available, which is basically the entire point of Rotten Tomatoes. They aren't the AFI, BAFTA, or Academy. They make no claim to being the arbiters of all that is good in film.

      D) Despite the bias, the top 10 still contains three films (The Wizard of Oz, Citizen Kane, The Third Man) from the last century, and every set of 10 after that contains 4 to 7 films from the last century, suggesting that it's still doing a pretty good job at bubbling up the best films, even if they're not necessarily ranked in the top 100 in the order we might think they should be.

      But, perhaps most importantly, your argument is missing the point entirely. The question of good vs. great—should Black Panther be ranked higher than Citizen Kane?—doesn't matter when we're talking about the overall quality of streaming libraries. What matters is whether they do a good job at distinguishing good vs. bad—that they correctly labeled Black Panther and Citizen Kane as "Certified Fresh" while not giving that label to most of the schlock that comes out each day. Towards that end, it seems like Certified Fresh is a decent indicator of quality, even if you (and I, just to be clear) might disagree with how they rank individual films within the Certified Fresh set.

      • Let me break it down for you guys, since apparently you don't understand until I spell it out: RT is gamed. RT is gamed by the movie studios, people with an agenda, Netflix, Amazon, whoever pays for favorable ratings, etc. In the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" list (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/top/), 7 of the top 10 movies are from 2017/18. Many of them weren't even seen by many people. Most of the "Certified Fresh" stuff is SCHLOCK. "Spider Man 10", "Batman 7". On the "BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME" list, the THI

        • That doesn't make sense, and doesn't even align with other review sites (7.4 out of 10 on IMDB) but 98% on RT.

          Actually, it does, but you're confused because you're comparing apples to oranges and expecting things to match.

          IMDb is a wiki and its scores are based solely on user reviews, whereas Rotten Tomatoes uses critic reviews for its top-line rating. Apples and oranges. That doesn't mean Rotten Tomatoes lacks user reviews, however. In fact, if you check the Audience Score for Lady Bird on Rotten Tomatoes [rottentomatoes.com], you'll see that it's at 79%, pretty much spot-on with IMDb's 7.4/10.

          You clearly prefer user reviews. I actual

    • Here is a link to the list in question:

      Rotten Tomatoes' Top 100 Movies of all time [rottentomatoes.com]

      I agree the list is shit. Looks like someone mispelt "Most popular."

      * Black Panther is ranked 1? In whose delusional universe? Most popular? Maybe? Best? LOL at all the stupid plot holes.
      * Mad Max: Fury Road is ranked 7?? It was meh. The Matrix was far better.
      * Dunkirk is ranked 20?? It is meh aside from the nice cinematography and I even went to the IMAX to see it.
      * Stupid Wars: The Latest Junk is ranked at 31??? Even Gladiat

  • How come they didn't analyze Tubi.tv, Crackle.com, Filmrise.com, Pluto.tv...There is more than just Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and HBO

  • Wither technical discussion (Score:5, Insightful)

    by chrism238 ( 657741 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @09:36AM (#58039848)
    Oh, how the articles on Slashdot keep getting less and less technical over time :-(

    • Oh, how the articles on Slashdot keep getting less and less technical over time :-(

      I noticed you haven't made any submissions since 2014.

      Slashdot is a democratic system. If you don't like what you see, do something about it!

      • P.S. I'd like to thank the current Slashdot staff. Recently I've made some hasty submissions, and they have cleaned them up into something readable by the masses. Previously, the staff would post stories exactly as they were submitted. I don't write copy for a living. It's nice to have some professionals do it!
      • You have an odd view of what democratic means. Just because I'm disappointed that an increasing number of articles are decreasingly technical, doesn't behoove me to post articles more to my liking. And, if by democracy you mean a right to free speech, then I have just as much right to complain about what I read.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ranton ( 36917 )

          You have an odd view of what democratic means. Just because I'm disappointed that an increasing number of articles are decreasingly technical, doesn't behoove me to post articles more to my liking. And, if by democracy you mean a right to free speech, then I have just as much right to complain about what I read.

          I think he meant Democracy as in each citizen has a duty in participating and maintaining the democratic institution. So if you don't like the quality of the discussion, participate. If you don't like the quality of the article submissions, participate. You certainly have the right to complain even if you aren't taking on any personal responsibility to do anything about it, but people will be less likely to care about your ranting.

        • Complaining about Slashdot stories and not making submissions is like complaining about the government and not voting.

    • How many technical articles have you submitted this week and how many of them were rejected? Is the problem Slashdot, or is it that people are more concerned with complaining rather than fixing a platform that is essentially heavily reliant on it's own users deciding what defines good content?

      Why not help fix the things you find wrong: https://slashdot.org/submissio... [slashdot.org]

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by garcia ( 6573 )

      As someone who has been reading since 1996 or 1997, people have been making this complaint all along but I don't see much of a difference between then and now.

      Plus, IMO, this is the sort of story which nerds may care about and falls under the tagline piece, "stuff that matters."

      YMMV.

    • keep getting less and less technical over time

      HEY! The article's got numbers in it, what ELSE do you want?

      • * four times
      • * many more times
      • * January 20

  • Bargain bins (Score:3)

    by TJHook3r ( 4699685 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @10:07AM (#58040000)
    Wading through films on Amazon is like looking through the ex-rental bucket at Blockbuster, can't speak for Netflix. Give me two episodes of a half-decent series over a crappy film anyday - who's got time for rubbish when there is so much choice available, at any time of day?

  • So? (Score:2)

    by p51d007 ( 656414 )
    Amazon Prime comes with my subscription, which, for me is worth it. I order a lot from prime that pretty much pays for the shipping I get. The video & music is just icing on the cake. I mostly binge watch older shows. You can get an entire season of 30 minute shows in one afternoon.

    • Prime is also good if you like documentaries. There are a lot on England, Scotland, Medieval times, that sort of thing, which I like.
      There's certainly no shortage of "C" rated stuff, but all in all it's worth it. All of modern Dr Who is available, and for the wife, Downington Abbey.
      I use Netflix too, never tried Hulu though.

    • Not sure how it works in the USA, but in Canada if I order 35 bucks worth of stuff "shipped by Amazon", shipping is free. Why would I pay for Amazon Prime? Sure it takes a few days, but it's free. Patience is a lost virtue.

      • Because with prime you get free shipping on $3 orders. This significantly impacts how well you can replace basic shopping with Amazon. It's very common for me to pick up my phone and order something whenever I see it's running out. That would be prohibitively expensive if I was paying shipping each time for my toothpaste.

  • Amazon has probably the worst interface on PC to get to their movies. Most apps to search are much better but not great. Until they fix the GUI the video that comes with Amazon Prime is just a bonus to the shipping option. Just copy Netflix and be done with it already!

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Amazon has probably the worst interface on PC to get to their movies. Most apps to search are much better but not great. Until they fix the GUI the video that comes with Amazon Prime is just a bonus to the shipping option. Just copy Netflix and be done with it already!

      At least with Amazon you can hover to see the rating of the movie or show. Easy to cherry pick good content. With Netflix, I don't know if a move is crap without bouncing over to Rotten Tomatoes and searching. And no, I don't trust Netflix's recommendation % outside of genre.

      Amazon has strong original content and an extensive library of quality British / Euro shows, which I personally enjoy. In aggregate, my feeling is that Amazon provides a better overall content experience that Netflix.

  • More, but good luck finding what you want (Score:5, Interesting)

    by doggo ( 34827 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @11:09AM (#58040408) Homepage

    Sure, Amazon has way more. But (at least through the ROKU app) good luck trying to find an interesting movie, even if it's not top-rated, that's free through Prime membership.

    Almost any worthwhile film, even old black and white movies, is usually for rent or sale, rather than free through Prime. And browsing through the entire mess is more trouble than it's worth.

    • It's soooo bad on a Fire Stick.

      The only way I can really make sense of it is to use my Fire tablet so I can filter to Prime only and tell my TV to start playing. That is not how I would prefer to interact with things.

    • There's a 3 part anime I wanted to buy (Kizumonogatari) and I had to wait an extra 3 weeks before parts 1 and 3 showed up in search results. I later found out if I'd drilled down into the categories they were there.
  • We only have Amazon Prime in our household. Trying to find a good family movie to watch (we have a son in kindergarten) is extremely difficult.

  • But (Score:3)

    by rossdee ( 243626 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @11:44AM (#58040614)

    Nobody gets Prime for the videos.

    Its for the 2 day free shipping.

  • Back to DVDs (Blu-ray)!!! (Score:3)

    by BishopBerkeley ( 734647 ) on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @01:52PM (#58041388) Journal
    I cancelled Netflix last year. I cancelled Amazon Prime last month. I did that because our local video store, Salzer's in Ventura, CA, is a superb video store with English and foreign titles that not many streaming services have. I pay $60 a year to access the PBS archives through my digital devices, and I have a large credit balance with iTunes for software and digital movie rentals. This arrangement allows me to find movie gems at my video store, get the best news and documentary through PBS and get all of the frivolous Hollywood stuff through iTunes. I no longer waste time scrolling through endless screens of stupid movies that some dickhead "suggests" to me. Support your local indie video store. Salzer's in Ventura. Cinefile in West LA. Please put up the names of your local killer video stores. Algorithms have yet to better good taste. Of all the Netflix suggestions, I must confess that the Dead Snow movies and Look Who's Back were truly excellent.

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