While sites like Clicker and RottenTomatoes have integrated Facebook recommendations for movies and TV shows, the feature has been noticeably absent from Netflix. Now there’s word they’re clearing the decks to work on it.
Netflix posted on its blog this week that it’s discontinuing a two year-old Facebook Connect feature that lets you share movie and TV show ratings with your friends. “Very few of you have signed on for this so we’re pulling it back today to regroup, which includes testing new concepts, and ultimately finding a more appealing program for all of our members,” explains Tom Willerer.
While some may think that’s bad news — like this PC World story — it’s actually Netflix wiping the slate clean to create a more useful, integrated Facebook strategy that will likely tap into the social network’s relatively new social graph API. “We’ll add new ways for our members to find interesting TV shows and movies to watch based on friends’ recommendations,” Willerer explains, adding that testing will begin in the next few months.
We reported back in November that Netflix is ramping up its Facebook engineering team, so they’re not pulling back, but pushing forward. We just hope the Facebook integration isn’t limited to Netflix.com, but extends to its TV apps, as well.
