Four stars it is
American Journalism Review has a nicely-executed article entitled What the Mainstream Media Can Learn from Jon Stewart. AJR’s Rachel Smolkin closes the piece with marching orders to her colleagues:
Don’t underestimate your audience. Be relevant. And be bold.
Along that same line of reason, maybe stop wearing the term “mainstream media” as a badge of honor. I’d bargain that a media outlet proudly calling itself mainstream these days is not very bold, not very relevant, and often focused toward the least sophisticated audience.
This ties into another item I ran across today, from the always relevant Jeffrey Zeldman. On the topic of Web-based form choices, Zeldman argues that ‘Maybe’ is one option too many, and also suggests that online rating systems should use four stars and not five. Why? Because given the opportunity, people will gravitate to the safety of middle ground.
I’d never given much thought to online rating systems, but his comment immediately struck a chord. Netflix uses a five-star ratings system, and if I were to go back through the many dozens of movies I’ve rated upon return, no doubt I’ve chosen ‘three stars’ far more than the other options. This gives me a quick, mindless fix as the evaluator, and accounts for the many many movies these days that are somewhat entertaining, but nothing more. The central ground of that rating is essentially useless for others (even when packaged in the cumulative), and probably doesn’t help Netflix provide me with accurate recommendations, either.
So now I’ve got a plan. Movies are either good, or they are bad. They are not just okay.