Including Just Watch links

February 19, 2024 1:41 PM

Is Just Watch a useful resource to include in posts?

I know for a while including Just Watch links was popular. But then I noticed how unreliable it is. Often movies that are available for streaming on resources like Tubi aren't listed, and I've gone back to just googling to see where a movie is streaming. It would be great if it was accurate, but considering how often it isn't, should we continue including it in posts?

posted by miss-lapin (6 comments total)

Sigh
posted by miss-lapin at 1:44 PM on February 22

Also, it's not universal.
posted by biffa at 3:13 PM on February 28 [1 favorite]

Is reelgood any better? It does show Tubi links for movies. Googling a supposed Tubi exclusive.. Tales of a Fifth Grade Robin Hood, JW vs RG. It might have more garbage links, idk.

I never use justwatch, but it's purely habit.
posted by fleacircus at 11:36 AM on March 9

JustWatch generally works for me. I do come across errors where it is spotty about listing the exact places a movie can be purchased digitally. Often, it will say Google Play isn't an option, but it is. I've also learned to ignore movies still in theaters showing up as "available on Vudu" because they're inevitably just pre-orders.

I don't really watch Tubi, so virulent is my hatred of ads. (The problem isn't even that the ads exist in some services, it's that the frequency with which I pause and resume seems to quintuple the amount of ads I personally have to sit through.)

So maybe it would bother me more if I did if there are a ton oferrors there.

For me, it's the least bad option. If it's 85-90% right but updates regularly and has international options, that's about as good as it gets, for something you can post for posterity. I find it's very accurate about Netflix, Hulu, Max, Paramount, and the other big name streamers, so that covers a lot. It has actually made me aware of services I didn't know existed (Metrograph, Mubi) and that's kind of cool, too.

The alternative to using something like JustWatch is researching it, compiling a great list, then having it become inaccurate with time. Or providing nothing. I used to do the former, but the links becoming inaccurate bugged me. When I have tried the latter, something like 85% of my posts triggered a "Where is this streaming?" comment at the top of the page, which sort of set my course.

That's just me and how I do it though.

I think the bare minimum to include is where you saw it, which is at least temporarily useful and isn't asking for any research at all.

I don't know mean is meant by "it's not universal"? It's got about 140 countries, so maybe that's what you mean, it's missing some? It covers about 500 services, which is still not all, but I don't think there's another app that comes close to that.

Honestly, it's the Letterboxd integration that keeps me with JW. I'm always going to be on LB anyway, so tying them together makes things easier for me.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 1:25 PM on March 12

Don't get me wrong though, if something came up that was definitively better than JW, I'd drop it in a heartbeat.

And again, it doesn't matter to me what other folks go with. I do think there should be an optional field in a FF post labelled "Availability" and then people could decide what they want to put there. JW, RG, a direct link to a streamer, whatever.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 2:01 PM on March 12

I like this "availability" field idea.

It would be cool if JustWatch, or ReelGood, or…something could use the IMDB link as the search key, which would make this more automatic. It would solve the problem of linking to the right version of, say, Robin Hood, which apparently gets remade every 10 years. Alas, that doesn't work.
posted by adamrice at 8:47 AM on April 18