Friends and digital communication

[notrightinthehead]

I would like some feedback from this community please:

Like for many, my social contacts are mainly digital at present. I have a friend who often recommends articles to read, movies to watch, or sends me little interesting clips. Not all she sends me is interesting for me, some clips I have been sent by others before, and the movies she recommends make me wonder why she would think that I would enjoy them.  Recently she sent me the link to an article about alien invasions, which I did not bother to read but flippantly replied that I had seen Men in Black, MIB2, MIB3 - so I knew all about aliens living on earth.

I normally do not state when  I have seen the clip before,  nor do I give negative feedback, I see it and move on.

When I recommended an interview with a gossip columnist to her,  which I thought was well done and interesting, she told me, she did not finish listening to it, because she found it excessively boring.  This hurt me. Especially as I recently had sat through a two hour boring coming of age movie, she had recommended. When I asked her what specifically she liked about the movie the reply was - love and betrayal. Which was not much information.
This is not the only dismissive remark I have gotten from her when I recommended something, but it is the first that seriously annoyed me.  Now I have not replied to her messages for a day and she has sent me several forwarded clips,  some of them I have been sent a couple of times already. It would be easy for me to let her know, but it would feel like a cheap payback to me.

My question is - am I too sensitive?  Am I making too much of this? Is it too much to expect from others to quietly go over forwarded stuff that is not that funny, or entertaining, or interesting like I do?  Do you give feedback to your friends by letting them know, "I had seen that already." "Did not see the funny side of that."

Thanks for your feedback!

[SparkStillLit]

I don't say anything. I pass this stuff over. I might say "thanks for the recommendation" or you know, something along those lines, or maybe some non committal type response. I just don't get engaged with this kind of thing.
I personally wouldn't tell somebody the movie was boring, no. Is it necessary? Our tastes differ, so what? The person might feel like you did, if I said that. 
I think if it were me, I'd try to branch away from these seemingly unsatisfying and even distressing communications, and see if there's anything else that can be discussed, dimming these down and getting them more in the background. I know there are some people just obsessed with sending clips and memes and the like, but maybe you can thwart that to some degree.

[notrightinthehead]

Thanks for your reply Spark! I really appreciate it.
Like you suggest, I think I will just lie low for a while and then go back to a slimmed down communication.

[clara]

There's nothing wrong with saying, sorry, not interested.  But since many of us have spent a lot of our lives trying to please and understand others, it's hard to get past the feeling we're disappointing them somehow by turning down their suggestions.  However, a healthy person won't take offense.  If you say, nah, I don't think so... they will understand.  They have the maturity to know that not everyone has their tastes, interests etc.  They don't take it personally. 

Honestly, I don't like it when people tell me I really should see this movie, or read this book, or this article.  Unless it's pertinent to the discussion at hand, I find it kind of condescending.  Maybe they don't mean it that way, but when combined with what else I know about the person, more often they do.  I then proceed accordingly. 

[notrightinthehead]

I agree. I also find that condescending. Especially when they think that my suggestions are boring.