Netflix Improves Recommendations

Todd Yellin, Netflix's director of product management, and Jon Sanders, director of recommendation systems, announced on the company blog that Netflix has implemented some of the Netflix Prize submissions to improve suggestions.

Members who rate movies will now receive better guidance on how many stars they’re likely to give movies they haven’t seen (aka “our best guess for you”). These star predictions influence the movies we feature on many pages of the Netflix website, in particular in the Movies You’ll Love area. For most members the effect of the new algorithm will be subtle, and we hope rewarding. In the coming months we’ll be testing ways to use these improved star predictions so our members can create even more personalized websites that make it faster and easier to explore the more than 100,000 titles available on DVD and Blu-ray disc and the more than 12,000 streaming titles at Netflix.

Comments

[MCW]

so our members can create even more personalized websites that make it faster and easier to explore the more than 100,000 titles

That line was interesting to me. Hopefully by faster and easier, they mean making an alternative to the API that normal people can use. When it came out, I had hoped with my limited knowledge of web design, I could figure it out and put it to use to make the coolest Netflix widget ever.

That didn't happen, and my ideas have gone to waste. Even people who have gotten the API to work for them say that you can't do what I wanted to do with it.

[dAVe]

Let's talk API. The instantwatcher.com reports "National Lampoon's Animal House" as being an instant watch movie and yet when I log into Netflix to put it in my Instant queue my only choice is to get it on DVD. I put it in my DVD queue hoping the Play button would show up at some point. It has not.
Is this what Todd means by "personalized" - some members can access certain titles while others can not?

[Tino]

"Members who rate movies will now receive better guidance on how many stars they’re likely to give movies they haven’t seen"

Great -- now I don't even have to waste two hours of my life watching each movie. Netflix can just rate it for me!

[PushnDownHippys]

I have over 1300 films rated and now with the new implementation, there is 0 suggestions. I called the help line and they said it was due to too many low star reviews. Is anyone else having this issue?

[priv8pete]

I saw my recommendations drop dramatically when the new algorithms were installed. It was kind of nice since some categories (TV and documentaries) had so many recommendations before that I'd just avoid looking through the 6 or 7 pages of titles.

As for a suggestion to PDH, I was able to get my recommendations to increase a year or so back by removing all the Not Interested ratings I had made.

[JP]

I now have 4 recommendations. I'm certain that there is SOME more material out there that I would, in fact, like. But I've given a fair amount of 1 and 2 star ratings (the previous commenter said that NF said this was an issue).

[Mr Nethead]

I've rated 2691 movies and I have 9 recommendations. One of them is stand up comedy, 5 are documentaries, 3 are concerts.

I haven't had a lot of recommendations, but I think I had about 30 or 40 of them before Netflix implemented their improvements.

I guess people who rate a lot of movies don't get many recommendations. :P

[backrowecritic]

Anyone made the mistake of using the 'taste preference' tabs. Ugh! Since marking those, I've been slammed with recommendations, with more than half being less that interesting. Wish I could take it all back now.

[DaveB]

I don't know why so many people have so few recommendations, I've actually seen the number of recommended movies go up and get better. I have rated 236 movies and have 166 recommendations.

[Gir]

I've rated around 1,200 and my Movies You'll Love tab has been empty for quite some time. The change to the engine makes little difference to me - none before, none after.

It's strange too. There are plenty of predicted 4 and 4+ DVDs that I haven't seen. You'd think there would be some correlation between predicted ratings and recommendations.

[TheCrow]

I noticed a HUGE difference. I have rated almost 3500 movies and used to get about 80 recommedations. Then all of a sudden about a month ago it shot all the way up to 700 recommended. But IMHO it's all a waste. I can't remember the last time I actually watched a movie that Netflix recommended that I didn't know about. I've been clicking a lot on the Not Interested button lately.

[Mr Nethead]

It probably depends on how you rate movies. I'm pretty stingy with the four and five star ratings. In fact, of the nearly 2700 movies I've rated, only about 90 were given five stars.

[Orrin Otherwords]

The "Movies you might enjoy..." algorithm needs some serious work. Today it's suggesting a slew of action and romantic comedies that I don't usually rent, and don't rate highly. In fact, Netflix is even telling me that "people like me" typically give these movies (and there are a TON of them listed) about 2 stars. Here's a screen cap...

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3583/3526484154_6d21fbb8a1_o.jpg

Strangely, the very last movie recommended is Ghandi, which gets four stars. It's the only film on the entire list that I'd actually consider renting.

[Dr. Quasius]

I watch a lot of PBS documentaries. Suddenly the recommendation system has decided that I like PBS shows and started has started recommending Barney and Bob the Builder. Nice.

[George Jorgensen]

Why does Netflix recommend movies for me that I have already rented ???????

[BR]

@George Jorgensen

Did you rate the movies after you rented them?

[Walt D in LV]

I have 7640 ratings, and 2759 recommendations. Of my ratings, there are about 2400 Not Interesteds. These are mostly where I've gone to complete Genres and marked Not Interesteds. Genres such as Sports (I am NEVER going to be interested in watching Racing, BMX, WWF Wrestling, Hockey, etc), Religion and Spirituality, Yoga, and so on.

At the Movies You'll Love page, http://www.netflix.com/RecommendationsHome?lnkctr=mh2rh&lnkce=sntRc&lnkce=rmMylN there is a tremendous amount of movies on this page that I am incredibly eager to see.

Since the update, there probably has been an increase in recommendations, but not great.

I've always found the Netflix Recommendations system incredibly accurate and use it quite a bit to gauge whether or not I'll like a movie. It's not perfect, but doggone it works well!

Walt D in LV

[Dylan Emerson]

Netflix needs to have all Dragon Ball Z episodes and movies available,also all Pokemon,and Yugioh/yugioh gx episodes available for children.