Netflix “SmartLinks” Plugin

I installed this with the interest of having my Netflix queue show up on my weblog sidebar. The sidebar widget itself is fine, though very slow to load and I find that it slows the loading of the rest of the page. This was no matter to me, I liked having it there. Unfortunately, then I noticed the “Smart Links.” I had no option to turn those off and in fact did not want them – all I wanted was a way to easily display my Netflix queue to my visitors. I was debating whether to uninstall the plugin still when I received a comment today from, I believe, the person who created the plugin, asking me how the installation process went. I found this very disconcerting. While I’m sure the intentions were good, I did not like the idea of being followed around, essentially, because I installed a plugin. I know this is the “digital age” but that’s what clinched it for me: I’ve uninstalled this plugin and will instead be looking for a different (if possibly more difficult) way to display my queue.