I've been sitting on this one for a few days since finding it over the weekend. It is a great read though. Which digital video streaming service do you currently use? Hulu? Amazon? Netflix? HBO? YouTube?
Here is a great read on Netflix.
What do you do if you design a system that is used by 10 people? Chat with them and see how it works, maybe make some minor adjustments, and plan on the next big update to help them out. What about if you have 10 million people using that system, or many more like say 62 million?
That becomes a pretty big challenge right? Sure is. Read more here.
http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/22/8642359/the-science-behind-the-new-netflix-design
Here is a snippet from the piece:
Back in March, a developer named Renan Cakirerk wrote a small piece of code that made a big impact on Netflix. Cheekily named "god mode," it addressed one of the most annoying aspects of trying to use Netflix in your browser: scrolling through the company's ever-growing list of movies. Once enabled, it would simply give you one, big list. Instead of sitting there, holding your mouse in anticipation, you could simply find the title you wanted and get on with watching.
The web lit up with stories hailing it as a crowning achievement of little-guy ingenuity. TechCrunch called it a fix for a "wonderful problem." CNET dutifully noted that it "saves you from the slow monotonous horizontal scrolling." Mashable, meanwhile asked, "Are you listening, Netflix?"
Inside Netflix, though, god mode was old news. In fact, the company had already tried it out on thousands of unsuspecting users years earlier. And it was a total disaster.
Good stuff. I like the A/B testing at play there. Release it to a scientifically controlled sample size with a control group and analyze the results. Is the impact significant? If so, in what way? Does it "help" or "hurt" the user experience?
I'm a user of Netflix after coming back in to the fold recently. I hadn't used them for years since I previously received DVDs through the postal service. I like the digital service and am blown away by the 4K presentation of shows like 'House of Cards' on my fancy new LG set. Good stuff and a fun company to follow.
Happy Reading,
J.W. Gant
The web lit up with stories hailing it as a crowning achievement of little-guy ingenuity. TechCrunch called it a fix for a "wonderful problem." CNET dutifully noted that it "saves you from the slow monotonous horizontal scrolling." Mashable, meanwhile asked, "Are you listening, Netflix?"
Inside Netflix, though, god mode was old news. In fact, the company had already tried it out on thousands of unsuspecting users years earlier. And it was a total disaster.
Good stuff. I like the A/B testing at play there. Release it to a scientifically controlled sample size with a control group and analyze the results. Is the impact significant? If so, in what way? Does it "help" or "hurt" the user experience?
I'm a user of Netflix after coming back in to the fold recently. I hadn't used them for years since I previously received DVDs through the postal service. I like the digital service and am blown away by the 4K presentation of shows like 'House of Cards' on my fancy new LG set. Good stuff and a fun company to follow.
Happy Reading,
J.W. Gant
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