I've seen this a few years ago on a VOD platform.
Imagine you are browsing through your media files, what am I going to watch tonight ...? Imaging you are browsing through your movie library. You are looking at a movie with .... Paul Newman and Tom Cruise. Based on these criteria (and among other things genre) you are provided with more movies with one of those two actors, maybe in the same genre. But also other movies in that genre.
For each movie you are looking at, the criteria selection gets adjusted, added and refined. Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman? If now Paul Newman was only a lucky strike (a one time hit) then Paul is no longer the main criteria, but more of a secondary or lower in rank.
So it is the combination of all criteria that makes that the platform helps you in your choices. In Plex you can handle filters, but you need to do it manually. Or you need to enter on or more criteria for the search, and go back and change them if you want to refine and search again. Kind of cumbersome...
The other option Plex has (I use this sometimes on my Roku) is to have a look at the cast, then go one level down on a specific actor, and then you get a list of all movies with this specific actor. But again, this is a very limited guidance.
I am talking about an artificial intelligent system that remembers your choices as you go, and looks at the big picture of your interests in order to help you in what will be served on TV tonight. (... all without the need of having to think about entering filters manually)
The layout could be that a floating semi transparent top banner is showing clickable suggestions, while the main screen is the actual movie information you are looking for. For each click you do in the banner the content in the banner can be updated based on the selections you made. F.ex. if by coincidence a few movies with Paul Newman a western movies, then the system will say : OK, so maybe you are in for some western? First choice maybe with Paul, second choice possible western movies with some other co-actors from the movies you have been looking at, and so on.
It will be based on a database that sorts your interests, translated in "%". The combination of criteria that scores highest in "%" will be your biggest interest, and so one.
The system can remember your personal interests for the next time you do a search. Your interests are most likely different then your spouse her interests. Plex can use this based on the user authentication, or for those with only one username, add a "preset" when searching. My name is Johnny: Please remember my interests. My name is Suzy: Please store my interests in a seperate list.
I was searching the internet for the VOD solution I was talking about. Could not find it anymore, but this text explains exactly why this feature is so truely wanted:
Beyond EPG, Beyond Search, <br>
True Personalization for TV and Media Providers
In today's content-rich world, consumers are overwhelmed by the choice available to them on TV, Video on Demand, etc. Initially this is exciting for the new consumer, but it rapidly becomes an irritating experience as, each time, they click through channel-after-channel on the EPG or wander through the VOD library. The result - people stick to watching what they already know, and after a while begin to question whether they are getting value for their subscription money. In this situation customer retention becomes a problem, and raising ARPU similarly challenging. The fact is consumers cannot select what they don't know - so 'Search' is the wrong approach to a constantly moving EPG or large VOD library. Intelligent, personalized 'Recommendations' solves this problem, thereby improving retention and raising ARPU.
