I’ve been a Netflix user for a long time, ever since I was in high school. I’ve seen the company grow and change in ways that are both good (does anyone else remember when your streaming hours were limited to how many dollars you gave Netflix a month?) and very, very bad.
The company has obviously done some things really well, like being the first streaming service to really nail the “original content” game, but for some Netflix has never been really great at making its platform social.
Yet, it continues to try. The latest attempt, launched on Friday, is called Flixtape, which it describes as “like a mixtape, but for Netflix.”
Meet flixtape…it’s like a mixtape, but for Netflix! https://t.co/tDPX9pDr3V pic.twitter.com/XjIJQpw7ia
— Netflix US (@netflix) July 15, 2016
Flixtape is basically a list of Netflix titles that users can curate, based on a theme or mood, which they can then share with their friends.
Here’s how it works: first, I was asked to name my Flixtape, with either my own word or phrase, or something suggested by Netflix.
For example, Netflix suggested that I create “The I Love NY Flixtape,” so I went with that. When I clicked on it, I was shown three titles that were automatically added to my mix, “Marvel’s Daredevil, “How I Met Your Mother,” and “Mad Men.”
Since there’s a chance I could hate all of those things (I actually do like one of them), I was given a choice to replace those titles, or to add new ones. There’s currently limit of six titles for each playlist.
Once all the titles are locked down, I was brought to a screen to create a cover for the Flixtape, containing a photo and interchangeable doodles.
Honestly, I found it a little difficult to create a good cover; I couldn’t change my picture, and the doodles, change depending where on the photo you put the cursor, so it’s hard to get the right ones you want. I hope that Netflix eventually makes this a little more intuative.
Anyway, mine wound up looking like this:
Once that’s all done, the Flixtape can then be shared on Facebook, Twitter or via a URL link.
Social on Netflix
This is just the latest way that Netflix has tried to introduce a social component to its service. Its something the service has, for whatever reason, failed at numerous times over the years.
Back in the day, when it was still known for being a DVD by mail company, Netflix allowed users to friend each other, and then view their friend’s queues. It was a pretty great way to find new and cool movies to rent. Then that went away.
In 2013, Netflix unvealed its Facebook integration, in which anything that the user watched would automatically be posted to their wall, if they signed in through Facebook. A lot of people were unhappy about that, though, since they didn’t want everyone to see what they were watching, which is pretty understandable.
With that in mind, the company replaced that feature with private recommendations, where, after finishing a movie or TV show, each user would then see a row of the pictures of their Facebook friends. It also included a box for adding an optional message.This feature also seems to have gone away. As well.
According to Netflix’s help page, “We no longer offer social sharing features through Facebook. If you previously connected your account to Facebook, you can still sign in using Facebook and your Facebook profile picture will continue to be your Netflix profile picture.”
In fact, the entire Facebook integration seems to be gone, as the company warns users, “once you disconnect, you will not be able to reconnect in the future.”
So, it’s pretty clear that social is something that Netflix has been trying to make work. As Netflix CPO Neil Hunt said in February, it’s just not something that the company has been able to crack because users don’t really seem to want it.
“We have played with social components for a long time,” he said. “We have had three major attempts at it and none of them have worked well, so we’ve retired them all.”
He pointed to problems that included issues of privacy, especially when it comes to automatic linking to another network, and the fact that Netflix isn’t going to ever create its own network, so the best it can do is get on board with an existing one, like it tried to do with Facebook.
“It’s unfortunate because I think there’s a lot of value in supplementing the algorithmic suggestions with personal suggestions,” Hunt said.
It really is a shame. I like watching movies, and I especially enjoy finding new and interesting titles that I haven’t heard of previously. With Netflix expanding to nearly every single country around the globe earlier this year, there is a real opportunity for people from different countries to get a better sense of other cultures.
After all, what better way to get the best of what a country has to offer, especially when it comes to their art, than what the people who are actually from there recommend? Having a social aspect would be a great way to break down cultural barriers. Hopefully, one day, Netflix can figure out a way to make that a reality.
(Image source: flixtape.netflix.com)
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