Recommendation Algorithm Wants To Show You Something New

Several sources are reporting on a new metric that computer scientists are going after with respect to recommender systems — recommendation diversity. "In a paper that will be released by PNAS, a group of scientists are pushing the limits of recommendation systems, creating new algorithms that will make more tangential recommendations to users, which can help expand their interests, which will increase the longevity and utility of the recommendation system itself. Accuracy has long been the most prized measurement in recommending content, like movies, links, or music. However, computer scientists note that this type of system can narrow the field of interest for each user the more it is used. Improved accuracy can result in a strong filtering based on a user's interests, until the system can only recommend a small subset of all the content it has to offer."

Tricky Business

[miasmic]

Every recommendation algorithm I've seen does one or both of two things. The first being staying extremely close to things I have already expressed an interest in - never broadening my horizons.

That, or it suggests really popular things, for example with music always getting a string of well known, popular bands and artists like Radiohead or Pink Floyd suggested as bands I might like - because many people who like similar sorts of music to me like Radiohead, the algorithm thinks I would like Radiohead too - they can't seem to figure that I would already know if I liked Radiohead or not at this point. I've never found a way to tell a recommendation algorithm that Pink Floyd is OK but I want something less popular...

Re:That's called an "contextual ad engine".

[martin-boundary]

I like to use the [ and ] keys in mplayer to speed up time when watching movies. It's not difficult to keep up with the plot and dialog up to about 1.5x the speed, and this makes the typical 2 hour movie run in 1 hour 20 min, or the typical 40 min series run in 26 min. I'll speed up time more when the movie is crap, and less if I want to really enjoy everything.

The point is you have more than the binary watch/don't watch choice available to you, if you're willing to assert control over your own time in creative ways.

Re:That's called an "contextual ad engine".

[Skreems]

Last.fm used to have a setting that was basically like this... they gave you an "obscurity" slider which let you set a preference for stuff that was a good match (via the usual "people who like x also like" algo) but removed the stuff that was over a certain threshold of popularity. I found a ton of bands that I really like this way, but at some point they took away the feature, or hid it in some way.

Long story short, I have found systems like this very useful, and hope to see more of them.