Tech tutorials, howtos and walkthroughs

Netflix have been made available to the Caribbean and Latin America for almost a year now since its initial release from September 5-12 and I must say the collection made available is a bit shabby well in a way it’s a bit of a disrespect, if one connects to Netflix via a Caribbean IP in my case a Jamaican IP, the collection of movies and TV shows are about 95% of out dated content (and that is my optimistic figure).

I find this strange because Jamaica has access to several American TV stations via FLOW and many of the countries citizens often keep up with the most up to date of TV shows and the same goes for movies, even in some rare cases Jamaican cinema theaters air some movies before America even airs them (as I stated this is a rare occasion) but for the most part we usually air the movies on the same date or a little after it is released in America. So I am a bit mind boggled why the movies and TV shows issued to us are so dated for the most part. Is it that the Caribbean is suppose to be so far behind the rest of the world that we should be happy with the selection offered to us?   Or is it that we are so backwards that these movies and TV shows would be new to us and thus it should be entertaining to the average Caribbean folk?  So what exactly is it Netflix?

Anyway I was never interested in these online TV series and movie sites but when I bought my Laptop it came with a month free trial so I gave it a shot (hey it was free, why not?) the initial stages Netflix tries to get a feel of you as a consumer asking you your different genres of interest which I take it was to narrow down what it would recommend as the type of content that I would like to see e.g. I ticked nothing that had to do with horror (my imagination is a bit too powerful for my own good) so I would have been surprised well more like disappointed if I saw any horror titles after I went through such a detailed filtering process, separate from that there seems to also be a slight intelligence system that monitors what you are watching and then in turn recommends other movie or TV show titles which are similar and thus which you may also enjoy.

more on Geezam.com:  Blue Origin breaks records as Captain Kirk goes into space

The interface is attractive your genres of interest titles are above and below them are pictures of the titles as you slide to the right you see more titles of that genre and if you hover over the the picture you get a small synopsis of the title and an option to read even more about the title as well as information such as how many episodes or season if it’s a TV shows.  Then there is the more detailed way of searching to the top left (this is where one could go dig up some horrors if that was so their interest) by things like genre, new arrivals and for the parents out there a section for children friendly titles, etc… this is where you can narrow down specifically what you want to be viewed e.g. Drama then Drama can be broken down into sub genre like “Medical Drama” this is of course where titles like “House” is King. If not one can search using a search bar via title to the top right (this is also where your account information and help is located) don’t expect too much from it though it could use some work in regards to how accurate it is and how how many hits it gives you for a relatively simple search request, it would have been nice if one could search by actor/actresses name also but that is not that big of deal.

more on Geezam.com:  How Huawei Partner and Energy Summit 2021 facilitates the Global Energy Revolution

To me it’s more of just an overall lack of content that could be due to the regional restrictions because new titles (there are very, very, very few on it) as well as even old classics e.g. Rambo, Terminator, Die Hard etc…. (and if they were there I sure could not find them) are not available I’m not sure how Netflix decides what to have or what not to or what dictates what they have access to content wise but I think it’s more than just a bit limited.  Overall for those looking to watch some of the old titles and TV shows from the yester years Netflix is one to consider but overall as a source that should be an online movie and TV show database to me it leaves much to be desired.

About the Author

Read more on Geezam.com

6 responses to “Is Netflix a Netjoke?”

  1. Wow Ramano, sorry to hear that about your experience with Netflix, that sucks though…well, hmm at least for you case it was free. I never got into the hype about Netflix, just not my thing. Whether if its a book, an anime or a damn good rpg I am not renting it, am buying it and keeping it for my own pleasure. I had no idea Netflix was like that, something in that milk is not clean.

    • Well I believe that any of quality is worth paying for so I really don’t mind paying for such services if they provide me with what I want. There is a very bad bootleg culture here in Jamaica and most people would prefer to download, stream off some illegal site (because of course its free but the quality is usually terrible) or purchase a burned DVD off the side of the road for little and nothing than to actually pay for what something is worth.

  2. THe only shame of all you wrote is that you haven’t learned that many people in the US are saying the same thing, so it has nothing to do with Jamaica in particular. They don’t have much in the way of recent movies full stop. Also note that Jamaica is lumped into Latin America. So, not everywhere is able to see what is seen in the US. There are legal agreements that allow the stations to be seen on your tv that don’t necessarily match the agreements of what regions of the world can see movies when. But, put aside that fact, and you are speaking of a service that delivers physical discs in the US as well as streaming. The streaming is lackluster even in the US. The media companies aren’t making amenable requests of Netflix (some want them to pay per subscriber). So, it is not an issue targeted to the Caribbean. It is how it is for the streaming portion of their service full stop.

    • Only shame? I am aware of the lack of availability of Netflix in the US and even in the UK also I’m glad that you are aware of what Netflix in the United States faces, now with that knowledge of what is available to the US online just go ahead and subtract that drastically and that is what is available to the Caribbean and Latin America. Separate and apart of the “new” releases the online services of Netflix provide some of those old classics that I mentioned above for those who love those oldies e.g. Terminatior and several other titles, do not get me wrong JA2BK I wasn’t blindly shooting in the open when I wrote this article (or I try to think I did not).

      I have seen a very minute portion of both US and UK content in the same manner depending on your IP address that is the content which is delivered to you so UK has access to some series that American does not a visa versa all I was stating is that a country that has content never seen by another country and thus now not accessible by their Netflix is one thing but the Caribbean has had Cable (United States Cable to be exact, not UK or Latin America Cable Channel) for years a lot of children of my generation were grown more on American TV series than our local shows so all I’m stating is that we should have at least have access to titles that we have seen for years on Cable before Netflix even reached our part of the world that is all I was trying to get across.

      The funny thing is most of the Caribbean does not even speak Spanish and yet we are bundled with Latin America I have associates in Barbados, Trinidad, Guyana etc… and they all speak English (well the Queens English but English none the less) most of us apart from our local Creole don’t even know a second language.

      • I think you read my statement with a different tone from how it was written. I even deleted my entire response I just wrote because my goal isn’t to debate you. I am speaking from a place of very good knowledge is all I will say.

        • Well JA2bk to me there a healthy debate and an argument are two different things, I have no issues with an healthy debate I think its a good learning practise so by all means go ahead and point out whatever it is that you are “speaking from a place of very good knowledge” 🙂