Reduce the minimum size for IMDb user reviews

Hi teachersuw -

We have updated the minimum length for reviews to 600 characters to ensure the most value to our users. For more information on what to include and what not to include, please review our Help page.

Cheers!

1. I'm at nearly half "Your Review" box & still need another 150 characters (assuming a space is not a character). 
2. Why add time wasting as a desirable trait both for the writer & for the reader? 
3. You are forcing reviews to approach the "spoiler" stage.
4. Why reward prolonged, excessive wordiness when succinctness of thought is the desired trait. (We're not 19th century Russian writers with nothing else to do with our lives. Outside of Vodka, of course.)
5. Most importantly many movies are simply not worth the words (i.e. time). 
6. More is the desired goal? Sounds a lot like American consumerism. You're not a true American contributor unless you buy more & bigger. A true indicator of value is more?
7. To sum up (Am I at 600 yet?) I'm very disappointed. 

Hi, Michelle. Thanks for the response.  But that many characters to not define quality. There are dozens of big reviews that tell me so little about what really matters on the movie having lots of personal experiences or writing the film's plot, which is not the idea of a review. And short ones that tell me just what I need to know to build an opinion and watch the movie. I personally find long reviews so boring and a shame to be making people write them. 

@Michelle​ Hi, Michelle. Thanks for the response.  But that many characters to not define quality. There are dozens of big reviews that tell me so little about what really matters on the movie having lots of personal experiences or writing the film's plot, which is not the idea of a review. And short ones that tell me just what I need to know to build an opinion and watch the movie. I personally find long reviews so boring and a shame to be making people write them. 

Hello there @teachersuw,

My name is Vic from IMDb Support, thanks for your feedback.

We've changed the minimum character limit for user reviews to raise the quality bar for reviews we get from customers. The intention is to make user reviews as helpful as possible for all our customers.

Reviews which are padded with junk text will be discarded. Our detailed guidance is available here:

https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/contribution-information/user-review-guidelines/GABTWSNLDNFLPRRH

Thanks for your support.

Interestingly, ballpark, half the movies produced themselves do not even contain the 600 character equivalent number of words that most of us would define as intelligent or worthy of remembering. 

@Michelle​ Interestingly, ballpark, half the movies produced themselves do not even contain the 600 character equivalent number of words that most of us would define as intelligent or worthy of remembering. 

@snoots​ Interestingly, ballpark, half the movies produced themselves do not even contain the 600 character equivalent number of words that most of us would define as intelligent or worthy of remembering. 

After over 330 reviews, on 27-Aug-2022, I stopped contributing my reviews to iMDb because you have now imposed a 600-character minimum on reviews.

FYI, the intention of my reviews were for family, friends, and the general iMDb community to be able to quickly read my review, and if they relate to it (especially after seeing my taste from other reviews), make a decision on viewing content. As such, up until now, my reviews have averaged only 36 words per review (or 209 characters per review) and average about a 50% helpful rate from over 6,000 user critiques.

@Michelle​ @Vic Imdb support staff

Why are yall deleting people's responses to this post? I've noticed that my comments and other users have been deleted, and my account blocked.

Your response is disappointing. These  actions and the decision to change the character minimum makes it seem as though you are trying to silence users. If people disagree, you delete and block them from commenting?

Please address the people who have taken the time out to voice their concerns with no less than 600 characters. Give us a qualitative response. 

Well, @Vic, I am not sure exactly which types of unhelpful reviews you are attempting to weed out with this new requirement, but for the 50% of people that found my concise reviews to be helpful, you will not hear from me any longer :-(​ 

Users comments on this post are being deleted!

Users are also being blocked from the community!

Comments that werent offesive. That were considerately written. 

Why?

@Michelle​ 😀

Add the Date here when changed to 600 characters ??

https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/contribution-information/user-review-guidelines/GABTWSNLDNFLPRRH#

User review guidelines
The minimum length for reviews is 600 characters 
to ensure the most value to our users. 
Reviews which are padded with junk text will be discarded.

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Marco
Sat, Jan 27, 2018
Make sure reviews are reviews again (minimum of 50 words instead of 50 characters)

https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/make-sure-reviews-are-reviews-again-minimum-of-50-words-instead-of-50-characters/5f4a7b3e8815453dbacfe95a

  

Current situation:

Recently, IMDb has decided that a user review should at least have 50 characters....

   

Reviewers: Quality and Quantity.

https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/make-sure-reviews-are-reviews-again-minimum-of-50-words-instead-of-50-characters/5f4a7b3e8815453dbacfe95a?commentId=5f4a7cb48815453dba1004b8.

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Shakespeare: "Brevity is the soul of wit."

Orwell: "If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out."

Nietzsche: "It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what others say in a whole book.”

Potter: "The shorter and the plainer the better." 

Twain: “A successful book is not made of what is in it, but what is left out of it.”

Kerouac: “One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.”

T. Jefferson: “The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.”

Hemingway: “My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way.”

The Elements of Style: “When a sentence is made stronger, it usually becomes shorter. Thus, brevity is a by-product of vigor.”

Thoreau: “Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify.”

I was wondering why I want to make a review, it h as to be about 600 characters or more. Yet I see other reviews from others that are barely 100. Is there something I am doing wrong? I would like not to have to make 600 character reviews due to the fact some times there isn't that much review to post.

I am not a certified review artist. I just made a review out of 400 characters and you now need 600 characters. I understand the point but the people coming here and reviewing a movie or

series are not professionals. It defeats the purpose. It just took all the fun out of it. Every review needs to be approved. What’s the point in making it more difficult? 

@Valentinasf​ probably because the comments made valid points. There was nothing offensive, no bad language, it was just opinions that opposed their decision.

My old account was blocked and all my  comments erased.

@Michelle​ Then what's the point of those "Helpful" thumbs up buttons below the comments?

Come on guys, 150 is enough for an objective and consistent review.

Is there any employee or moderator that could come down to discuss with us like adults instead of deleting comments and blocking people from the community without any explanation not even an email to notify why??

As we can see so far it's clearly unanimity among users that this new rule is unreasonable.

And what is this community's purpose? Where is the healthy debate spirit?

@teachersuw​ Is there any argument after this?? Does anyone want to refute those guys about writing?

@jeorj_euler​ 

Yes.  A ten minute short may well not warrant 120 words.

cheeseworld 😀
Joined February 26th, 2023
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Marco
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/users/5f495614c17a0660597f5707

Saturday, January 27th, 2018
Make sure reviews are reviews again 
(minimum of 50 words instead of 50 characters)
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/make-sure-reviews-are-reviews-again-minimum-of-50-words-instead-of-50-characters/5f4a7b3e8815453dbacfe95a

teachersuw
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/users/61da41f6f5b9527873e6e9bb

Saturday, August 27th, 2022
Minimum Number of Characters to Write a Review
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/minimum-number-of-characters-to-write-a-review/630a78bac5eeb86e2c3b056b

cris
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/users/62b0cdc41186097eca932468

Friday, January 20th, 2023
Reduce the minimum size for IMDb user reviews
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/remove-required-characters-from-review/63caee1c6bcb48295247b565

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? ?

Marco

Saturday, January 27th, 2018
Make sure reviews are reviews again (minimum of 50 words instead of 50 characters)
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/make-sure-reviews-are-reviews-again-minimum-of-50-words-instead-of-50-characters/5f4a7b3e8815453dbacfe95a

teachersuw
Saturday, August 27th, 2022
Minimum Number of Characters to Write a Review
https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/minimum-number-of-characters-to-write-a-review/630a78bac5eeb86e2c3b056b

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Then increase in the lower limit on the quantity of letters, numbers, punctuation and non-redundant spaces needed to publish a review was implemented for the purpose of at least making an attempt to improve the overall quality of new reviews posted going forward. The minimum quantity isn't really what constitutes a long passage, but there may indeed exists contexts where no more than a single sentence is really needed for somebody to outline what he or she considers to be the pros and cons of the content of a movie that has an unusually short running time. I was thinking about coming up with a sort of Q&A tool that could serve as a guide to the process of constructing a meaningful review, but in theory, something like that can be found by using a preferred Web search engine. Another idea could involve some sort of stock template that could be adapted into a unique body of text. Meeting the requirement can be hard, but is it ever truly impossible. The only time it would be impossible is when somebody tries to review a movie that he or she hasn't even actually observed and about which nobody else has published any information.

There are tons of reviews that have fewer than six hundred characters apiece, and the reason for it is that those reviews were live on the site prior to the minimum limit being increased from 150 to 600, and prior to that, from 50 to 150.

@jeorj_euler​ That is not  true. I see reviews for episodes of shows that came out last week that are this short. Something else is going on. Either these people abuse the system by putting spaces after their review, or they are paid critics or bots who get to still deliver their reviews using the old system...

The "permalink" URLs to those low-character reviews ought to be shared in this thread then.

@commander_bb_shockwave​ 😀

Short Samples??

Black Mirror (TV Series)
Demon 79 (2023)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27731671/reference/

TV-MA | 1h 14min | Drama, Mystery | 15 Jun 2023 | TV Episode
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27731671/reviews

63 Reviews

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@ACT_1​ Here, just a few examples.

I've not found a single review of any episode of the latest season of Black Mirror that is comprised of fewer than 600 characters (i.e. letters, digits, punctuation, spaces and line breaks together). Where are they?

@sweety20​ Please see our reply above -> https://community-imdb.sprinklr.com/conversations/data-issues-policy-discussions/reduce-the-minimum-size-for-imdb-user-reviews/63caee1c6bcb48295247b565?commentId=63cb3f00bc21074e2a4712b7&replyId=63cb3f0ebc21074e2a47136d  

600 characters is between 90 and 150 words in English, which is typically only a few sentences (unlikely only two sentences unless very long ones). 

Your position may be legitimate for you (600 characters minimum), but in reality, I can confirm that this minimum requirement is causing you to lose a lot of people exponentially, (especially among the new generations), who prefer to go to another increasingly well-known platform (which I won't name) because of it. I recently spoke with a fairly productive director and producer here in Montreal (Canada), and that's one of the reasons they decided to put their productions (tv series, films) on this other website, because they like the idea that people can write short, user-friendly reviews on the pages of their productions. 

Exponentially as in a multiplier of four fifths for every decade?

@Col_Needham​  Does this character count include spaces? 600 characters is between 85 to 150 words with spaces included in the character count. If spaces are not included in the character count, 600 characters are between 100 and 200 words. 

This is a review that I left which is 600 characters. It needed much more than a few sentences to reach the minimum. I was able to reach 599 characters without spaces and 726 with spaces. Using paragraphs and extra punctuation were needed to reach the goal. Normally I wouldn't do a synopsis of the movie, but it was a must in this case.

Tatami: I believe that the minimum used to be only 50 characters.

Please change this limit to something like 50-200 characters. It's absurd to invoke this requirement, who says a movie review is better or worse based on the character length? Both short and long review should  be possible. It seems like imdb are creating more problems here instead of solving others.

I also don't believe "to ensure the most value to our users" is any  good explanation for this change.

Seems like 450 characters might be the most popularly-acceptable lower bound limit, both for readers and writers.