Qup users can decide whether they’d like to get an email every time Netflix adds new titles, or just daily or even weekly. The results can also be filtered further by adding minimum Netflix and Rotten Tomatoes scores, so your inbox won’t be flooded with B-movie fare.

Also neat: Users can simply add any title that catches their eye to their Instant Queue, which even works when you’re not logged into Netflix, for example while browsing the emails on your mobile device or in the office. This feature also explains the name, which is pronounced “queue-up.”

Qup developer Michael Bleigh told me via email that he built the service during a Kansas City hackathon called Hack the Midwest, where it promptly won the best in show prize. “I built it because I wanted to use it myself,” he told me, and added that he plans to add more filters for further customization soon, including Metacritic scores and genre-based filters.

He also has some more ambitious plans that could take Qup even further. One includes a wish queue that he described this way:

“You add any movie or show you want to it (even if Netflix doesn’t have it) and if Netflix ever picks it up we add it to your queue immediately and send you a notification.”

Also interesting are his plans for what he calls Qup anywhere:

“Text, email, or tweet @qup with the name of a movie and Qup will add it to your Wish Q or your Netflix Queue if it’s available. Great for when you’re out with friends and they say ‘You haven’t seen X?’ but then you forget what X was by the time you’re home.”

There are of course numerous tools already out there that help you to manage your Instant Queue and discover new content on Netflix, but I think Qup is definitely worth a look, because it’s squarely focused on getting the notification piece of the puzzle right.

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Care for a sample? Here you go:

I always knew those penguins were up to something…

Netflix has been using both user feedback and expert tagging to surface new and interesting content to its users, and the company has actually spent a lot of money to make sure these recommendations are accurate. In 2006 it invited outside developers, scientists, and math whiz-kids to take a crack at improving its algorithms as part of the Netflix price, eventually giving $1 million to the winning team three years later.

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