According to Wikipedia, the list length effect means: “a smaller percentage of items are remembered in a longer list, but as the length of the list increases, the absolute number of items remembered increases as well.”
Every now and then, Netflix does a trick. They move ’my list’ all the way at the bottom of the page so I’m forced to scroll through all their own suggestions:
- ‘Trending now’
- ’Just added’
- ‘Because you watched x’
- ‘Because you watched x’
- ‘Because you watched z’
- And so on..
It works. I’ve learned more about their product range and I have watched films because of it. But I really, really hate it. Why? Because they take control without any warning and I can’t do anything about it. It’s almost like an invisible person rearranges the furniture in my living room every week, it’s creepy.
Netflix, alas, can afford it’s dark patterns. But if you’re another company: don’t push it, please..