The Meaning of a Viewing Suggestion

DigitCult - Scientific Journal on Digital Cultures, [S.l.], v. 6, n. 1, p. 37-50, oct. 2021. ISSN 2531-5994
Ferraro, Guido; Santangelo, Antonio; Botta, Anita
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October 2021

This paper, which takes its cue from the question at the heart of an article previously written by two of us, reflects on the effectiveness of the algorithmic apparatus used by Netflix: the aim of the work was to understand whether the supply system of the well-known company manages to respond adequately to the interests of its viewers, suggesting meaningful links between the audiovisual texts offered. Reasoning on the way the service labels films, a process defined tagging by the company, we therefore considered a science fiction film in the Italian Netflix catalog, a film considered interesting by the writer for its complexity of meaning. The goal of this choice was to build an analysis sheet with a sociosemiotic approach, which was then used to reflect on the adequacy of the links proposed by Netflix, suggesting, as an alternative to the interpretation provided by the company, new tags that could correctly understand the similarities of meaning between the stories. It was therefore tried to draw, in the end, some guidelines that Netflix taggers could adopt, in order to improve and make more meaningful the experience of fruition of its users.