Ryan tipped me to the Netflix contest: they're offering a million dollars to the team that improves the reliability of their customer recommendations by 10%.
It's apparently a realistic goal, software recommendation programs have been improving dramatically, they're quite good now, and they're getting better all the time.
In less than 5 years (if it hasn't happened already), algorithms will be far more knowledgeable about human tastes than any human critic.
Eventually, the big wave in robot recs will be having AI anticipate life trends, so when the teenager who listens to punk is ready to make the switch to country or jazz in his twenties, the robot will already know ahead of time which crossover artists to use to ease the transition, and will automatically substitute Hank Williams for Henry Rollins. And the AI will be ready again when he switches to easy listening in his forties. The robot might also recommend appropriate changes in dress and select items from the IKEA catalogue to go along with his chosen aesthetic.
Will AI also soon be ready to predict what social policies we're most likely to adopt, or is politics somehow distinguishable from fashion?
This seems like a fun idea, but in principle, how well will this work? There are too many parameters. Computing power can eventually handle these parameters, but who is going to do the data entry? Not the majority of society.
ReplyDeleteI'll give you an example: One of my favorite bands, Muckafurgason, was discovered by accident. They are a cross between They Might Be Giants and Tenacious D. I discovered them at a Giants show. I owned neither a Tenacious D nor Giants CD. I now own two Muckafurgason CDs.
So how does the system know my personal taste for Muckafurgason? Possibly my friends' backgrounds might have helped, but the friends that introduced me to the band I would not have linked to because I very rarely match up to their musical tastes.
I don't imagine that people would necessarily solely use whatever algorithmic recommendation becomes most reliable, but I wouldn't put the same faith in corporations and production companies.
How will consumers then ensure that the AI tool for recommending music (et al) will be available without being abused by producers?
In the end they are only recommendations. It's a tool to help the consumer find more music he might like. But offcoures it's not the only one. Worth of mouth is my primairy tool in music selection and the internet happens to support conversations very well.
ReplyDeleteIn the end it's up to you and your personal taste to decide if you want to buy an album or go a concert.