# How does IMDB work? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 13, 2005, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394 "2005-09-13T04:20:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/21 "2005-09-20T04:39:29Z")
> [@Ficer67](#): > > They give wonderful reviews to crappy movies, and negative reviews to really great films. And they skew the reviews of the people who comment on those movies. Just look at the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, the movie sucked, but IMDB gave it a phenomenal review, and stiffled anyone who made negative remarks about it. 😕😕😕😕 IMDb doesn’t give reviews. They do link to websites that have reviews, and they allow registered members to post under “User Comments” in a mostly unmoderated fashion, but the IMDb staff doesn’t write any reviews. The user ratings are often at odds with the perceived quality of the film, but then that’s no surprise; after all, Adam Sandler, Mike Myers, and Rob Schneider all maintain high profitabilty in their films despite the fact that they suck. Obviously, there are many people who like suck (with apologies to those who don’t count these leads on their List Of Actors Who Suck). Ditto for their Top 100 and Top 250 lists; these aren’t created by any objective assessment of the film, but rather just by the unregulated submissions of users, hence why recent popular films often appear highly ranked even though their “greatness” is highly questionable. With _Hitchhiker’s_, for instance, I happen to share your assessment of the film (at least insofar as I consider it a very painful near-miss), but I fear that we are in the minority on that issue; while it failed to take the movie-going public by storm and it is doubtful (and thankful, IMHO) that the take will justify a sequel, it is my observation that response by fans is largely, if not unreservedly, popular, and the 6.7/10 rating seems to reflect that sense of apologia about the film. If you look under the “External Reviews” you’ll find plenty of criticisms of the film by professional and online critics. Just looking under this category, I find that Ebert gives it two stars (out of a possible four), James Berardinelli gives it two and a half of the same, and [filmcritic.com](http://filmcritic.com) generously offers it three and a half out of five. (Mr. Cranky gives it four bombs, which by their legand says that it is, “As good as a poke in the eye with a sharp stick,” surely not the highest of recommendations.) I’m afraid I don’t see any censorship or underhandedness here. And you’ll have to cite for me at this “phenomenal review” that “IMDB” gave it. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/22 "2005-09-20T04:57:06Z")
> [@asterion](#): > > F. Gwynplaine McIntyre–isn’t he a science fiction writer? I could swear that I have a couple short stories of his in old issues of Analog. Yes, McIntyre the reviewer is the same man as McIntyre the writer. ---
**Author:** ![KGS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/90ced4/32.png) [@KGS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KGS)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/23 "2005-09-20T05:30:16Z")
I’ve submitted info to IMDB several times over the years, but the only thing they published was a goof for the film [_Rogue Trader_](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0131566/)…and I screwed up on it! Tried submitting a correction (twice) but they never changed it. You’d think it’s common knowledge that the Kobe Earthquake was in 1995 and not '92…certainly everyone who reads that goof must wonder what kind of idiot must have submitted it. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/24 "2005-09-20T05:36:09Z")
I love the resource, but the updates can be very erratic, and it’s annoying. I remember submitting what I thought was a very clever trivia item to them, and they never used it. I also remember (correctly, I hope!) that their page for Walter Matthau said his real name was Walter Matachuskyanskyasky - a joke he once made on Larry King’s show - which is kind of amazing, to me, from a movie site. But I sent them a correction and that’s gone now. ---
**Author:** ![Ficer67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c57346/32.png) [@Ficer67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ficer67)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/25 "2005-09-20T10:23:01Z")
> [@Stranger On A Train](#): > > 😕😕😕😕 > > IMDb doesn’t give reviews… > > I’m afraid I don’t see any censorship or underhandedness here. And you’ll have to cite for me at this “phenomenal review” that “IMDB” gave it. > > Stranger Ok, well all I did was to go to [IMDB.com](http://IMDB.com), search for Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and click on the movie which was released in 2005. Under User Comments, Transbottom from the UK wrote: Overall a tremendous success. It’s very funny, very kooky and visually gorgeous. I saw it with about 2000 media persons and we all loved it, which is a pretty hard thing to accomplish. ---
**Author:** ![Ficer67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c57346/32.png) [@Ficer67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ficer67)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 10:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/26 "2005-09-20T10:32:56Z")
Ok, so the power failed and I had to restart the computer its Louisiana people! Transbottom from the UK also gave the movie 9 out of 10 stars. The thing I am trying to point out is that, I have never seen a bad user review on IMDB. Yes, I can search for bad user reviews, but the IMDB does not show poor reviews with the same frequency that it shows the good ones. Why do they do this? They want the movies that they endorse to be successful, so that they can get more hits, and generate more revenue through ads and endorsements. Quite a book that you wrote on the subject Stranger, are you affiliated with IMDB in some way? ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/27 "2005-09-20T11:14:43Z")
Someone at IMDb arbitrarily picks one of the User Comments on the films to be the one cited at the bottom of the main page for the film. In no way does this mean that this opinion by some random user of the IMDb is the offical opinion of the IMDb. At most it means that somebody working for the IMDb thought that this was an interesting opinion. All the other User Comments are still available, although it may take you a while to read them all since there are occasionally thousands of them for a single film. It may be true that the User Comment that happens to be chosen to be the one at the bottom of the main page is more likely to be favorable than unfavorable. Frequently unfavorable comments consist of nothing but “This is junk” repeated several different ways. People who like a film are more like to say something interesting about the film than people who don’t like it. Occasionally the User Comment at the bottom of the main page will be unfavorable because the person working for IMDb will think that that is the most interesting review of the film. In any case, the choice of which review is at the bottom of the main page is about which review is interesting, not about it being the official opinion of IMDb or about it being favorable. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/28 "2005-09-20T11:18:07Z")
Ficer67 writes: \> Quite a book that you wrote on the subject Stranger, are you affiliated with \> IMDB in some way? That was a book to you? Look, you might as well get used to the fact that a good answer to someone’s question here on the SDBM is often long. To explain something right, it often takes several paragraphs of careful detail. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/29 "2005-09-20T13:38:13Z")
> [@Ficer67](#): > > Ok, so the power failed and I had to restart the computer its Louisiana people! > > Transbottom from the UK also gave the movie 9 out of 10 stars. > > The thing I am trying to point out is that, I have never seen a bad user review on IMDB. Yes, I can search for bad user reviews, but the IMDB does not show poor reviews with the same frequency that it shows the good ones. Why do they do this? They want the movies that they endorse to be successful, so that they can get more hits, and generate more revenue through ads and endorsements. > > Quite a book that you wrote on the subject Stranger, are you affiliated with IMDB in some way? I think the user reviews are chosen based on how many other users thought that this review was helpful. There might be a bias that people tend to find enjoyable reviews more helpful that ones that diss a film. But I’ve certainly seen my fair share of negative reviews on the front page. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/30 "2005-09-20T14:25:11Z")
> [@Ficer67](#): > > Ok, well all I did was to go to [IMDB.com](http://IMDB.com), search for Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and click on the movie which was released in 2005. Under User Comments, Transbottom from the UK wrote: > > Overall a tremendous success. It’s very funny, very kooky and visually gorgeous. I saw it with about 2000 media persons and we all loved it, which is a pretty hard thing to accomplish. :rolleyes: So you pick one _user comment_ (which is not a review and is made by some random member of the public who is presumably not an employee of IMDb) and expand it into being the official position of IMDb. Looking under “User Comments” (not just the single excerpt from one user) on the first page I find a one star assessment entitled “Get the BBC series, save your money.” Boy, someone in Information Suppression sure missed that one. Paging on to additional comments, I find more and more negatives. The reason that mediocre films often have unreasonably high ratings and comments is that the persons most likely to comment, especially with long involved commentaries, are those who enjoyed or cared about the film. If you are “meh” on a movie, are you going to bother writing five paragraphs of commentary, or even log in and vote on it? You can see the same thing on Amazon’s user book comments; most are to either end of the scale, with relatively little ambivilency. And to answer your question, I’m neither affilliated with IMDb, nor its parent company, [Amazon.com](http://Amazon.com). Heck, I’m not even a registered user. I’ve used the database for years, going back to the days when the client was text email rather than prettified HTML pages. I find it a generally reliable source for production and cast information, though as many have already pointed out the user supplied trivia and comments are of questionable certification (though generally no worse than Leonard Maltin’s often erroneous errata or Roger Ebert’s constant stream of technical misinformation). And a three paragraph response is for me on the short end of the scale, especially when it comes to correcting as many misapprehensions as were condensed in your original post. There are plenty of criticisms to be leveed at IMDb (the defective pop-ups ads and their annoying “celebrity news” columns from WENN being but two of them) but your complaints are predicated on false claims. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Ficer67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c57346/32.png) [@Ficer67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ficer67)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/31 "2005-09-20T23:25:27Z")
> [@Stranger On A Train](#): > > :rolleyes: > > So you pick one _user comment_… but your complaints are predicated on false claims. > > Stranger Well, I hope I have conveyed to you that I have looked at more user comments than merely this one… Like I said, I have never seen a negative user comment come up when I use IMDB, I can search for and find negative reviews, but IMDB does not display these reviews when you read about a movie on their web page. It might be nice to see a negative user review, it would convey a sense of objectivity, but it just doesn’t happen on IMDB. I don’t think I am discussing this with you anymore, you are taking this way too personally stranger. I don’t like IMDB, they do not work for me, because I do not buy into the hype which surrounds all movies. The same hype which IMDB seems to be full of and spreading around. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/32 "2005-09-20T23:55:40Z")
Nobody at IMDB chooses which reviews go on the front page. Nobody has time, It’s entirely done by a computer program. Given that the computer program doesn’t even know how to read reviews to see if they’re good or bad, I don’t even see how it would be possible for the imdb to introduce bias. Stranger posited a likely hypothesis, people who liked the movie write more about it and reviews that are longer get voted up more. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/33 "2005-09-21T00:48:43Z")
In a few minutes I was able to find the following movies where the User Comment on the main page was unfavorable: _Showgirls_ _Bolero_ _The Real Cancun_ _Glitter_ The User Comments are the least interesting aspect of the IMDb. What the IMDb does brilliantly well are the objective things: the name of the actors and the crew, the release date, the filming locations, the amount of money earned and spent on the film, etc. These things are done by the staff of the IMDb and are pretty much always accurate. The other brilliant thing about the IMDb is that all these movies and actors and crew are linked up so it’s easy to do fast research on the IMDb. The User Comments, the trivia and goofs in the films, the actors’ biographies, etc. are somewhat subjective and hence are rather haphazard. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/34 "2005-09-21T04:48:33Z")
> [@Wendell Wagner](#): > > What the IMDb does brilliantly well are the objective things: the name of the actors and the crew, the release date, the filming locations, the amount of money earned and spent on the film, etc. These things are done by the staff of the IMDb and are pretty much always accurate. For the most part, those things are _not_ done by the IMDb staff. The IMDb is famously a user-supplied database. People like you and me and thousands of others have supplied those titles, credits, release dates, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/35 "2005-09-21T04:58:36Z")
I can imagine that originally, the database was populated by end users who typed in the credits for older movies, but for new movies, how can the end users have that data? So I assume that, for new and upcoming movies, the IMDB gets the info from the studios directly (perhaps they receive the production notes?). ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/36 "2005-09-21T05:28:05Z")
From Col Neeham, founder and managing director of the IMDb, on Dec. 31, 2004: > [@](#): > > Submissions for 2004 totalled 12,772,550 items which is an increase of 3.75M items over the submissions for 2003 — to put things in perspective, this _increase_ is more than the _total_ number of items submitted in 1999! During 2004 we added close to 44,000 new titles with the total now standing at 426,791 and there are now 1,661,651 names covered in the database (+230K over 2003). The number of filmography credits grew by over 1.5M, giving a total of 9,134,245 and it therefore looks like the 10 millionth credit will go live in 2005. A total of 139,115 people submitted information in 2004, which is over 25K more than 2003. Since we began keeping detailed comparable records in 1996, nearly 500,000 different people have submitted a total of well over 50 million items of data! ---
**Author:** ![PBear42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@PBear42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PBear42)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/37 "2005-09-21T06:23:08Z")
Like most others posting here, I use IMDb mainly (almost exclusively) for credits information. For which I have found that it is usually reliable, and far-and-away more reliable than any other single Internet source. For reviews, I usually turn to [Rotten Tomatoes](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/), which is the best Internet compilation of published reviews I’ve yet found. The compliation of reviews for [Hitchhiker](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/hitchhikers_guide_to_the_galaxy/), for example, is suitable ambivalent. ---
**Author:** ![PBear42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@PBear42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PBear42)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/38 "2005-09-21T06:25:43Z")
Arrgh. “… suitably ambivalent.” ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2005, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/39 "2005-09-21T14:06:21Z")
> [@Ficer67](#): > > I don’t think I am discussing this with you anymore, you are taking this way too personally stranger. Okay, Ficer, I haven’t been arguing with you about this, so I hope you’ll be willing to help explain your argument here to me. You started by saying: > [@](#): > > Just look at the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, the movie sucked, but IMDB gave it a phenomenal review, and stiffled anyone who made negative remarks about it. Stranger pointed out that: > [@](#): > > Looking under “User Comments” (not just the single excerpt from one user) on the first page I find a one star assessment entitled “Get the BBC series, save your money.” You then replied by quoting from a different user review: > [@](#): > > Transbottom from the UK wrote: > > Overall a tremendous success. It’s very funny, very kooky and visually gorgeous. I saw it with about 2000 media persons and we all loved it, which is a pretty hard thing to accomplish. So what are you trying to say? That because IMDB displays _any_ positive reviews that they are biased against negative reviews? I think it’s been pretty clearly demonstrated that there _are_ negative user comments on IMDB. Do you still claim that they don’t exist? Can you explain your position? Well, I hope I have conveyed to you that I have looked at more user comments than merely this one… Like I said, I have never seen a negative user comment come up when I use IMDB, I can search for and find negative reviews, but IMDB does not display these reviews when you read about a movie on their web page. It might be nice to see a negative user review, it would convey a sense of objectivity, but it just doesn’t happen on IMDB. I don’t like IMDB, they do not work for me, because I do not buy into the hype which surrounds all movies. The same hype which IMDB seems to be full of and spreading around. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394/40 "2005-10-14T03:28:05Z")
I’ve checked dozens of movies on the IMDb and I can say the following: The User Comment that is displayed on the main page for a movie is not always favorable. The User Comment that is displayed there is also not the one that has the most votes for it (or the best percentage of votes). I have no idea how the IMDb chooses which review to post on the main page. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-imdb-work/321394.md?page=3)