erika_gabler's profile

22 Messages

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538 Points

Saturday, December 29th, 2018 9:37 AM

No Status

6

Tracking of watched movies etc

Hello,

i'd like to keep track of what i have watched already. Over the years i've watched many movies etc; too many to remember them all. Which isn't good, because i'd like to watch all movies from some actors/directors etc. So i always have to think hard, when i go through the lists of those people, which titles i haven't watched yet. I have to watch trailers or read the plot to remember, which both i hate, because it costs time and i don't want to be spoiled.
By reading some of the articles on here, i came across the check in feature, but that doesn't fulfill my needs completely. It only helps a little, that i can see - after selecting a title - that i have watched this already.
I want markers/icons like already watched and on watchlist next to every title in all lists of any actor etc. As of now these lists are double-columned with title on the left and year to the right. I envision 2 tiny, new columns to the left of the titles with these icons. Alternatively you could place those icons to the right of the titles without creating new columns. Whatever is more pleasing to the eye. (2 pictures down i gave you an example)

There are other websites out there, which take the data from imdb and provide the feature i'm talking about. The following picture shows an example. The site doesn't have lists or tables; they chose a poster format, where the icons are below each title. This could be a useful alternative to watch lists for imdb as well.


I love the imdb feature, which splits up the directorial etc activities to movies, series, documentaries etc. How about for each category a progress summary. I made an example:

Here i marked two titles with a "D" for done and one title with a "W" for watchlist. You can substitute these letters with stylish icons as well. Next to the heading i added the progress. We currently got 30 movie credits for this actress. "2/30" i have watched already. This adds up to about "6 %" watched. From the remaining 28 titles, i got one on my watchlist.
You can argue about the counting method, because you can also have already watched titles on the watchlist, if you want to rewatch them. I'm not sure either, what would be best, but i think i'd kinda like to see the number 28 go down with every new title that i watch. Same as i like to see the watch percentage go up.

A few other subfeatures worth considering are:
  • to select single episodes or seasons from tv series to mark them as watched
  • to give a specific watch date, when marking a title as watched (for example "right now" for just watched, "release date" for watched close to release of the title and "specific date", where i can choose a specific date in history or a year, where i think i might have watched this
  • give me timeline of all my consumed movies etc (sorted by watch date, release date etc)
  • when i mark a title on the watchlist as watched, delete it from watchlist (this might already be in place; haven't tested that yet)
  • let me mark future movies, tv episodes on my watchlist (and maybe give me a notification when they are out)
  • publish the watched list/watchlist on imdb for others to see
  • add up the runtime of all watched movies, tv series etc (if you are a movie buff, you can easily end up with a few hundred days of watchtime; i love those numbers, lol)

The reason why i want this on imdb is that i love imdb. I use it for years. But now that i have found these other sites which provide this watch feature (that i want for ages and have realized poorly on my own), i rarely browse through imdb anymore, because i pretty much have the same lists on the other sites, where i mark stuff watched on a daily basis.
But imdb is the bigger site. It has a better backbone/performance and the data is more accurate/up to date.
I've used the other site now for 2 weeks and have recorded a few hundred movie titles and tv series as watched. I still haven't reached the point of no return to come back to imdb, but i guess if i mark a few thousand movies as watched on another site, i wouldn't want to do that "work" on imdb again and you might lose me for good. I'd like to only use one movie site :(

Is there any chance, that such a feature might be added to imdb as well?

Thank you and kind regards,
Erika

1.8K Messages

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55.3K Points

6 years ago

The best way to track watched movies is to rate them. Once rated, the movie is in your 'Rated' list that can be searched and sorted in some ways. An annoying thing here is the rated mark is not shown anywhere except lists - this is the real problem.

The same is for movies selected to watch later (watchlist). They may be (un)selected with checkbox as the other sites do, but on IMDb they can be operated only in lists (yours or other users).

So, there is nothing about 'new' features, but the existing features really need to be accessable on all pages (titles, actors, etc.), not only lists.

22 Messages

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538 Points

I thought about rating things as a work around as well, but a) i don't want to mass rate thousands of movies (many of them i haven't seen in years; i would just end up giving everything an 8 and be done with it; spamming defeats the purpose of rating) or episodes of tv series (this would just be too much as well), b) if it's not shown in the actor etc lists as well, it's the same like the watchlist feature (it doesn't help much, if i have to select everything one by one, i want that in the overview)

Champion

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14.2K Messages

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328.1K Points

6 years ago

Regarding stats, on name pages you can find a link to 'How Much Have You Seen?'
https://www.imdb.com/seen/nm0736622/

But it could probably be better integrated into the site.

1.8K Messages

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55.3K Points

Congratulations upon your midway to 10.000 posts here ))

I've never used the 'seen' feature, just because there is no sign it exists. Moreover, after your advice I can not find the link on the actor's page 8/

Anyway, thank you very much for pointing it up!
Not so comfortable, but may be used as link-substitution.

PS: found it at last under 'How Much Have You Seen?'

22 Messages

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538 Points

Thanks for this. I won't use it though, because it's just too messy compared to the real actor lists. And again, i would have to rate every episode etc to get it done. That's too inconvenient if you've already watched much, but have not rated everything after watching it. Just clicking a few thousand times the "watched already" button would be enough work.
It can't be hard codingwise to just duplicate the rate button and just make it on/off for watched already. That would be okay-ish for the start. The other features i mentioned would be the icing on the cake.

Champion

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14.2K Messages

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328.1K Points

On the page I referenced you can click the star to mark a title as seen, and it counts in the stats. This carries over to other seen lists (eg, for other actors in the same film), but on the other hand the seen status is not displayed in other places such as title pages.

22 Messages

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538 Points

Ahh, now i got it. I thought that was only active by rating it.
It's a start, i guess. I will start marking titles as "seen" and i hope they expand this feature or integrate it in the actor etc lists as well.

22 Messages

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538 Points

It's a bummer, that the "seen" feature doesn't seem to work on the actual title sites. There you have to rate and can't just click "seen".
Would be great, if imdb could add this there as well. It's even more complicated to go to the 'How Much Have You Seen?' link and search for the title again; just for that.

PS. there doesn't seem to be a "seen" list. The ratings list only shows 1-10 star, but not the seen. And the "seen" titles don't show up under Check in, which is odd: isn't that kinda the same?
PPS. it oddly works the other way around. If i check in to a title, it shows up as "seen" ^^

2.7K Messages

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47K Points

@Peter_pbn

Thank you for the tip on the "IMDb Seen" tool for actors and actresses. I had never even heard of this before. You always have the best scoop on IMDb features.

1 Message

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80 Points

4 years ago

Hi there, Erika! Have You found a solution with this issue? If You still would like to have this feature, I think I might help You out...

5 Messages

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134 Points

2 years ago

Hello Erika. Thanks for writing this article. This is what IMDb needs. Too bad that even 4 years after you wrote it, IMDb still didn’t expand on the “seen” feature. I wonder why? I’ve seen hundreds of movies on IMDb and rated hundreds but I gave up on rating. I need a “seen” button that works all over the website and I need a “seen” list that automatically adds all the movies I’ve seen into that list and lets me sort them in useful ways. (Just like other movie websites and apps offer as a feature)

please IMDb, as an 18 year IMDb member, don’t let us down and implement this feature so we don’t have to migrate. Thank you!

1 Message

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64 Points

2 years ago

Indeed it is amazing how imdb still have not introduced this simple feature. I have been waiting for years to be able to mark those movies that I watched. Because of lack of this I have to use other movie app/website, although imdb would be my preference if it had that feature.

To those suggestions to rate movies and by rating you can put it to a different list - I do not want to rate the movie, some of which I watched many years ago. I just want to mark them as seen. Simple as that.

Please.

5 Messages

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134 Points

@arturs_maksimenko​ thanks for that post. It’s true, rating and “seen” are two different things. I can’t rate all the movies i have seen. I rated 400 movies but at some point i stopped and i can’t go back and do it again. Also i felt rating a movie always depends on my mood. Sometimes i see a movie twice and i feel it deserves a different rating the new time around. How do i manage that? 

a seen feature with a seen list is what’s needed on IMDb!