i'm not going to even pretend ranked lists haven't played a large part in helping shape my tastes in everything from film to music and neither should any of you because you'd only be playing yourself
I agree and disagree. I would say I use lists as a great jumping off point for anything. A way to get your feet wet. This can go from publications to friends to random online people. I think they are a great way to also refresh your memory on certain things (like I'm not a horror guy so I would look up some Top 100 horror movies to jog my memory and probably take note of some of the newer releases on that list cause I really don't have a clue what good horror movies came out in the last 10 years, since it's not my cup of tea).
But even with finding use in lists I have never looked at the Pitchfork top of the year lists (and they seem to be popular cause if any music publication lists are bitched about it's that one) or Rolling Stone or whatever the movie equivalent of magazines is. I think the only movie lists I ever looked at were Roger Ebert and Siskel shooting the shit on their old TV show where they would talk about their favorite movies of the year. And I didn't even watch that until Siskel was long gone.
So I agree that lists have a great purpose for discovery. After that though I think my curation goes to other places (my own rabbit hole, friends, podcasts, youtube channels, stuff some teacher showed me back in school, specific people who I feel know me well enough or vice versa to know if if there is a good chance if I will like said thing.)
A cool list I still have bookmarked, but haven't checked on in some years is the They Shoot Pictures Don't They.
Hmm... maybe I'm being too defensive and I put more stock into lists than I think? I will concede if it seems that way. My feelings for official award shows for artistic things remains the same though. Recognition is nice, but I don't give them much power.