People Spend Twice As Much Time Watching Netflix As Socializing

Megalith

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Who needs friends when you can stream content? But in regard to lack of social interaction, I think it’d be interesting if Netflix experimented with Twitch-style chats in some of their shows/clients.

According to our calculations, the average Netflix subscriber watches 1 hour and 40 minutes of Netflix each day (you can check out the math in our piece on Netflix’s commercials – essentially, we just took the total number of Netflix streaming hours per day as reported by CEO Reed Hastings and divided it by the number of Netflix subscribers worldwide). On its own, that statistic isn’t so bad – especially when you think of all of the time those Netflix users are saving by skipping commercials. But maybe we should all get out a bit more often, because when we compare the results of our calculations with data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, we see that we are spending a lot more time with Netflix than with our own friends.
 
Although i sometimes watch a bunch of netflix, I can easily go a month without watching it at all. I'm surprised people can watch it for 2 hours a day.
 
Is this any worse than all the time we use to spend watching TV or cable? I'd guess no.
 
Although i sometimes watch a bunch of netflix, I can easily go a month without watching it at all. I'm surprised people can watch it for 2 hours a day.

Why would 2 hours surprise you. It's just a replacement for regular TV:
Average American watches 5 hours of TV per day

I would actually expect an increase with the addictiveness of binge-watching and the urge to watch "just one more" episode.
 
Although i sometimes watch a bunch of netflix, I can easily go a month without watching it at all. I'm surprised people can watch it for 2 hours a day.
I watched all 5 seasons of Game of Thrones over a long weekend.
 
I binge watch things sometimes myself, but have never been a Netflix user myself.

I'm looking forward to The Grand Tour coming out on Amazon Prime in a few months.
 
So? I live in a large city. Beers are around 10$ a pint. Friends are expensive and scarce. And I see work colleagues for a minimum of 10hrs a day.
 
Why would 2 hours surprise you. It's just a replacement for regular TV:
Average American watches 5 hours of TV per day
I would actually expect an increase with the addictiveness of binge-watching and the urge to watch "just one more" episode.

I guess, because on a busy week, I watch about 15 hours, but there are plenty of times when virtually nothing new is on and in the summer, I might watch 2-3 hours.

I watched all 5 seasons of Game of Thrones over a long weekend.
That's great, but do you do that every weekend? I've binged through stuff on HBO or Netflix, but on average, it's a few hours a month, not 14 hours/week.
 
I would be watching House of Cards, going "All hells yea, she just murdered that guy like Hillary murdered Vince Foster". "Is this the Clinton, biography?"
People would get all mad and try to defend, their candidate. Then I would post some link where someone with the show says they based the story off of the Clintons and supporters would rage quit watching the show. It would be awesome... please allow me to troll Netflix.
 
I guess, because on a busy week, I watch about 15 hours, but there are plenty of times when virtually nothing new is on and in the summer, I might watch 2-3 hours.

And you never realized the average was MUCH higher? I thought it was pretty obvious that most people watch >20 hours/week.
 
Is this any worse than all the time we use to spend watching TV or cable? I'd guess no.

Considering I had friends with parents that were never home and therefore were "raised" on TV/Cable I doubt this matters. I would be much more concerned with what my children where watching on Youtube since that covers a much wider range of idiots who think they are "so fab" with 200k subs. Social media also is much greater issue.

This report just confirms the more things change the more they stay the same. Also I bet half the time people spend watching Netflix they aren't actually watching it and are instead fucking and let it run in the background.
 
And you never realized the average was MUCH higher? I thought it was pretty obvious that most people watch >20 hours/week.

Yeah, the audience here tends to lean more heavily toward "seeks other entertainment," IE tech forums and other more detailed web content.

But for the rest of the world TV is a great distraction. The brainpower required to enjoy it can be pretty low.
 
I have youtube in the background basically 24/7. This could easily be the same, I used to do it with netflix as well.
 
Yeah, the audience here tends to lean more heavily toward "seeks other entertainment," IE tech forums and other more detailed web content.

But for the rest of the world TV is a great distraction. The brainpower required to enjoy it can be pretty low.

Yeah I can't speak for others but I don't spend much time watching TV. I tend to spend a lot more time on the web and videogames, although I do binge-watch shows occasionally when I find one I like. That being said there is a lot of "low brainpower" content on the web too. CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT WHY. ;)

Is this any worse than all the time we use to spend watching TV or cable? I'd guess no.

I'd say it's better since at least that time is spent on something people enjoy, instead of 1/3rd of it being the same annoying commercials over and over.
 
That's great, but do you do that every weekend? I've binged through stuff on HBO or Netflix, but on average, it's a few hours a month, not 14 hours/week.

Just did three seasons of The Arrow over the last week or so. That was about 10 seasons worth since they are 20+ episodes each.

My watching is split between FIOS, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon though. Easily 50 hrs a week I say. I'd be gaming some of that, but my kids have been hogging the PCs and Steam login!
 
I know several people that always have something streaming in the background. I have OCD and must only have a single thing active at a time. I've never been good at multitasking multimedia.
What are they watching for that long on Netflix? I have a hard time finding anything on it. Although, watching Lost - passed over it the first time. I've been watching it for the last few months (and am almost done). After that, thinking of picking up Fringe.
 
I used to have Bones or Family guy running in teh background. Both require little thought. Nowadays, just lets play or commentary/presentations of one type or another.
 
I cancelled my Netflix long ago, I did watch an episode of Red Foxx on Crackle yesterday though but that was free.
 
Been with Netflix since the days of unlimited DVDs for one price. Threatened to quit when they doubled the price for physical media but never did.
 
I love Netflix streaming. I never know what I'll be in the mood for, and I'm lazy about mailing shit back, so Netflix DVD never appealed to me.

There are so many amazing shows I watched just in the last month. Occupied is fantastic, as and The Ranch (I liked That 70s show, and I always like Sam Elliot). And on the anime end of things, Your Lie in April was depressing and addicting.

That's just the short list of shows I discovered existed in the last couple months. There's a huge list of things I still need to watch, including a new season of Grace & Frankie released this weekend. Netflix is full of addicting bits if you know how to search.
 
Do they count "Netflix & chill" as socializing or watching Netflix?
I was going to say the same thing. Is it considered socializing if your friends are over and you're watching Netflix together? A lot of people go home after a long day and just want to kick back and relax, watch a show/movie. Others play video games. Perhaps it's a way for them to get away from reality if just for a an hour or more.
 
Although i sometimes watch a bunch of netflix, I can easily go a month without watching it at all. I'm surprised people can watch it for 2 hours a day.
Some people may consider 2 hours to be a very short period of time especially if they are engrossed in a show or movie. If a person watches 2-3 episodes of a show or split between several shows, those can be longer than 2 hours. Just saying.
 
Do they count "Netflix & chill" as socializing or watching Netflix?

I think they are forgetting one important fact. Most people dont particularly care for most other people, and dont give two shits about socializing with them. But why people use netflix so much is beyond me, when there are other services out there that have a library 100 times as large as netflix, but which are free.
 
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