Thanks to Creighton for sharing an interesting link: For tomorrow’s edition (dated 1/10 but it’s online today), the New York Times took Netflix data and turned it into a mouseover map showing who’s renting what in a dozen cities, including Seattle. Click on Seattle at the right side of the page (direct link’s not possible since it’s all Flash) and mouse over to see each zip code’s top 10 list, including West Seattle zip codes. Here’s the start page.
I LOVE looking at data this way. So cool.
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I have to say I’m a bit surprised that there is such a lag in the titles everyone seems to be watching now, especially considering that many of these were last year’s Oscar contenders.
Christopher: last I looked at the Netflix Top 100 (just a few weeks ago), “Crash” was still ranked very highly. It came out nearly five years ago. Obviously, the average American is a bit behind the times.
I also find it funny that within Seattle, “Milk” and “Slumdog Millionaire” consistently rank really highly. Yet if I look at the south, north, or east ends of the map, “Milk” is usually nowhere in sight, but suddenly “Paul Blart: Mall Cop” ranks. Reminds me of why I love living in Seattle, not in the ‘burbs.
Huh. I haven’t watched a single one of the 10 most popular movies of my neighbors. But we usually watch really, really old movies.
Thanks, this is really interesting. The difference in the zip codes is pretty funny.
great, another index to allow urbanists to feel culturally & intellectually superior.
As demonstrated above we may not rent “Mall Cop” but we’re petty enough to mock those who do.
Yep, I judge people who watch stupid movies.
There, I revealed my deepest shame. ;-)
Truly, though, I don’t know how anyone can say it’s not telling that virtually none of the ZIPs in the suburbs list “Milk” in the top rentals. It’s very illustrative of the political divide between urban and suburban.
(Look at any of the other maps for liberal cities and you’ll see the same phenomenon – “Milk” ranked very highly in the urban centers, then not placing at all in the ‘burbs.)
The list doesn’t seem to be real time. It says 2009. Some of the titles could have been heavily rented after the Oscars.
SarahScoot: It might be easy to jump to the conclusion that suburbanites aren’t as gay positive as urbanites. However, the data might also suggest that the film was marketed more effectively in the various markets the studio was hoping to attract. A targeted media buy for a $20 million feature can be pretty sophisticated in terms of maximizing its ROI. And content aside, biopics and/or Sean Penn might not evoke a particularly strong response in the burbs.
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