Netflix Makes Big Change That Makes It Harder to Choose What to Watch
Netflix's summaries of TV series and movies aren't quite as descriptive anymore.
Wading through the massive list of titles available to stream on Netflix and trying to choose your next binge is now a little more difficult thanks to a recent and unpopular change made by the streamer. Those perusing the library, which numbers in the thousands, in recent months may have noticed that Netflix descriptors, the one- or two-sentence blurbs giving a synopsis of what a selected TV series or movie is about, have disappeared, a move that seems to be the result of recent behind-the-scenes restructuring at the company.
Descriptors appear on the title page of content in Netflix's streaming library. While these blurbs previously provided viewers a rundown of what the title was about, many descriptors now offer little to no information actually helpful to users trying to decide whether or not to press play. Many of these descriptors now simply list the actors and director or pull a sentence from a critic review. The summary for Awake, for example, simply reads, "This 2021 dystopian sci-fi thriller features Gina Rodriguez and Jennifer Jason Leigh." Meanwhile, The Midnight Sky's descriptor states, "This 2020 dystopian drama based on the book by Lily Brooks-Dalton is directed by and stars George Clooney," without ever revealing what the movie is actually about.
It seems that the removal of what seems to be such a key feature is due to Netflix's layoff of around 400 employees last summer. After TheWrap's Benjamin Svetkey published a column last month about the lack of useful descriptors, speculating the layoffs were the root cause of the issue, several former Netflix employees confirmed the synopsis team was "decimated" by the layoffs. One member of the team who asked to remain anonymous told Svetkey the team was "absorbed by the localization department. Within a few months the in-house writing team was outsourced." The source added that "since then, what was intended to be an effort to maintain a brand-distinguishing style of blurbs has disappeared. It seems like the approach to algo assistance has been to just set it and forget it."
"The synopsis team was decimated last year, Svetkey's hypothesis is correct," former Netflix writer Lorena O'Neil added on Twitter/X. "And I will say they were among the most talented, creative, kind coworkers I've had to this day. We were a very tight-knit team and were devastated as we got cut down round after round of layoffs."
According to Svetkey, Netflix has insisted that there has been no strategic shift in the blurbing of its content and has claimed the company "continues to maintain a sizable team of descriptor writers."
