Rotten Tomatoes is considering tweaking other aspects of its platform as well.
The site’s bosses insist that despite the changes there’s nothing wrong with past scores.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: So what prompted these changes?
Credit: Lucasfilm Ltd
We’ve been expanding content on Rotten Tomatoes, both written and video.
We’ve been looking at the product, as we relaunch the look and feel of Rotten Tomatoes.
Another big change was in the composition of critics as they moved from full-time to freelance.
We’re shifting our focus to approve more critics individually to help freelance critics become more visible.
How will these changes manifest in the scores, which are such a big focus of movie fans?
How will they change, presumably, moving forward?
PAUL YANOVER: The actual arithmetic of the score doesn’t change.
It’s a tally of reviews that recommend the movie.
We’re in a business where more is more.
Surely there must have been something about the results of the current system that inspired this.
What do you think will be the overall impact on the scores themselves?
PAUL YANOVER: No, actually, volume does matter to us.
The product is an aggregation product.
The more we can aggregate, the better product we have.
It doesn’t mean we don’t like our scores.
We love our scores.
We have an accurate, useful product.
The thing we care about is the composition of the reviewers themselves.
We recognize the world is always in change.
We care about the diversity of those voices.
We care about it reflecting the viewership.
We had criteria that were tough for them to overcome.
Credentialing them as Tomatometer-approved actually raises their profile and gets them on the list.
We’re also creating a fund to help critics get to places like Cannes and Sundance.
Presumably, this means that a lone critic will have less sway?
“Fresh” still set at 60 percent I assume?
PAUL YANOVER: All the thresholds and methodology are not changing.
PAUL YANOVER: Not any changes at present.
But there are lots of things that are on our roadmap.
It’s not what we’re focused on at this juncture.
Will what constitutes a “Top Critic” remain the same?
PAUL YANOVER: Currently yes.
I would put it in the “ongoing” category as we continue to look at these products.
PAUL YANOVER: No.
Think of us operating like an independent news bureau.
There’s no operational connection to any kind of corporate ownership.
Anything else in your changes that you think fans would be interested to know?
I think this will be a great way for them to discover new critics.
