Quote Originally Posted by Comic-Reader Lad View Post
People here are asking why the "Want to See" feature existed in the first place because who cares how other people feel about a movie.

The reason the feature existed is to make Rotten Tomatoes more of a destination site and a larger part of the pop culture conversation.

Audience participation means clicks and becoming part of the social media experience is a great way to get clicks and increase traffic.

If CBR removed its messageboard, would you still come here as much or stay as long in each visit? I definitely just briefly scan newsarama since they removed their messageboard. Don't spend more than a couple of minutes there each visit.

So, "Want to See" and "Audience Reviews" aren't done to benefit the film industry; they're done to benefit Rotten Tomatoes and to ensure that RT keeps getting talked about.

Like this thread, for instance.

Only when things get so toxic that it could adversely affect RT do they decide to take the feature down. I'm sure "Want to See" will be back after Captain Marvel opens.
This is all a very good point. Back when the Richard Dawkins site had a real message board, I was there a lot. They took it down because half the arguments were redundant and toxic yet the board lost at least half it's regulars by doing that. It's sort of like the audience participation part in some stage plays.

I think that, after The Last Jedi and other stuff, the Captain Marvel situation was just the last straw. It was getting too toxic. Yet, other sites that don't allow as much "audience participation" probably are not as popular as RT.