Rating Videos
Why Rate Videos?
Yahoo! Music gives you the ability to customize a video experience based on your tastes. This guide will help you get the best experience enjoying videos.
In a nutshell, you tell Yahoo! Music Videos what you like and don't like, and the system will keep track of these preferences -- stored as your ratings -- and make recommendations of videos you might like based on what you tell us. You'll see these in your recommendations at the bottom of the video player, and as pre-populated videos in the Video Lineup.
RATING
The primary way to influence your video experience is by rating videos. Generally, the more music you rate, the better your video recommendations.
RATING VIDEOS
Under each video, you will see the four-star rating tool for video and artist. Simply drag over the tool to select your choice (including Ban, if you really don't like it) and we'll begin to make video recommendations based on what you like. These recommendations appear in the Video Lineup on the right side of the player.
MANAGING AND EDITING YOUR RATINGS
To review all the videos you've rated, and to re-rate them if you wish, visit the video ratings page. By changing ratings, you can tell the system what you no longer like, and the videos recommended to you will change accordingly.
Also on this page, you will find top recommended videos from our editorial staff. You can rate all the videos you see on this, and subsequent pages, to start telling us right away what you like and what you don't like. You could do a bulk rating, that is, just go nuts and rate every video on this page, then we'll have a terrific understanding of what you want and what you don't. Or, as mentioned above, just rate individual videos as you watch them, and we'll apply those ratings as well. It's up to you.
LIMITATIONS
There are some limitations on Yahoo! Videos. While rating videos improves your recommendations and the videos played in your video lineup, they don't give you an 'on demand' video station. We have to do this to comply with our video licenses with the record labels. However, we recommend videos you really will like, and you'll see the ones you rate highly on good rotation.
- Don't expect to see only videos you rated.
Yahoo! Videos is not an on-demand service. You should always expect to see videos you haven't rated, regardless of how many ratings you have.
- Don't go overboard with ratings, especially "never play again" (ban icon).
Because your lineup will always offer you unrated videos, it's important that you don't try to micromanage your recommendations by rating too many things "never play again." Also, remember that there will always be unrated videos, so if you rate ALL the videos you could potentially like, the only unrated videos left will be ones you don't like.
- Generally, you should only rate videos you really know.
It's generally not a good idea to rate an artist or video unless you are very familiar with them. Just because you don't like one song by an artist, you shouldn't rate that artist "never play again." It's a good idea to just rate that video. The more videos by an artist that you rate low, the less likely it is that other videos by that artist will play (and vice versa). Save your artist and video ratings for those that you are completely familiar with. Unless you're really sure, leave it unrated.
- Don't go crazy rating everything highly.
Save your highest ratings for your true favorites that you would prefer to see more often. Don't go crazy rating everything you remotely like 4 stars (100).
- Don't try to game the system.
The algorithms behind Yahoo! Videos recommendations change over time, so it's not a good idea to try to "game" the system to make it work a certain way. Just rate the videos and artists you know, and let the system select the videos.