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Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

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Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#61

Post by ghostbrainalpha »

greggarious wrote: post #11

I'm a film buff and I think so. A lot of people don't seem to go out of their way to obtain films aside from looking at Netflix recommendations. Back when I used OkCupid I could tell when something older went on because it immediately got listed under "favorite movies" by a certain type of hipster ;) (I distinctly remember how overnight everyone looooovveeed Amelie when it went up) Sadly it's a lot harder to find new…

I think everyone is overestimating the importance of the "favorite movie" section of a dating profile.

Once a dating profile has been created it is RARELY edited in anything but photos.

No one was going back to put Amelie into their favorite movies. They just were filling out the BEAST LIST of requirements and personality tests, and quickly filled in that field with a non embarrassing movie they had seen recently.

I think this years most favorite movie was probably "GET OUT". But that shit will be a footnote except for film buffs in 3 or 4.

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#63

Post by nitwit005 »

greggarious wrote: post #11

I'm a film buff and I think so. A lot of people don't seem to go out of their way to obtain films aside from looking at Netflix recommendations. Back when I used OkCupid I could tell when something older went on because it immediately got listed under "favorite movies" by a certain type of hipster ;) (I distinctly remember how overnight everyone looooovveeed Amelie when it went up) Sadly it's a lot harder to find new…

> I'm a film buff and I think so. A lot of people don't seem to go out of their way to obtain films aside from looking at Netflix recommendations.

I suspect that's not Netflix's recommendations, but just having it added to Netflix. Anything new tends to get a lot of views, as people actively go through the "New" category.

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#64

Post by majormajor »

chc wrote: post #56
wavefunction wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably the people who liked Amelie would have enjoyed it both before and after they saw it, but how could they know they liked it until they knew enough about other people liking it and why those people liked it to like it themselves? I can't tell if you think all/most the people who claimed they liked Amelie are dishonestly reporting they liked it because it is important for them to like something other people l…

I think the point is not that they are being disingenuous, but that even people who are deliberately trying to like obscure things nowadays are primarily just consuming what Netflix shows them.

In 2018, if you're primarily using Netflix you're not deliberately trying to find obscure stuff. ;)

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#65

Post by gowld »

pnathan wrote: post #39
nileshtrivedi wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they also allow for a free-range wandering over the stacks, rather than keeping you in one specific area of "you may also like" You mean like the "Random" links on Wikipedia and Reddit?

no. libraries are curated, organized, and structured to allow browsing. random does nothing of the above. meaning is a polyspectral space, and libraries are a lower-dimensional reduction of that to allow perusal through multiple bands of meaning. while the result may be arbitrary, it's within the bounds of the arc in the meaning-space. In addition, the curation of books means that arrant nonsense is culled (hello r/o…

Libraries are also tiny though. Subreddits also have curated lists of related subreddits in sidebar. /r/popular and /r/all give you a sample of posts from various subreddits (curated by users), which then link to related subs. Each sub itself is a browsable and sortable collection of related content.

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#66

Post by gowld »

vlunkr wrote: post #30
firasd wrote: post #9

Really interesting article. Weird thing is that in the social media era, humans ourselves seem behave in algorithmic ways. My Twitter feed is full of Beyonce worship every few months even though I've been mostly-indifferent to her music for 20 years. But when people come together like a hive and retweet how they excited they are about some shared interest, there doesn't need to be a recommendation engine pushing a sp…

I don't know that algorithms are the sole cause, but this behavior, where nearly everyone has the same opinion, really annoys me. As you said, Beyonce worship is a common one. Or that Empire Strikes Back is the best of the original Star Wars and Return of the Jedi is the worst. I hear these ideas all over as if they were facts rather than opinions. Just have an original thought people.

There are only 6 original thoughts about ranking 3 movies, and a billion people who have seen them to form opinions.

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#67

Post by cirgue »

pnathan wrote: post #26

> No one is original anymore, not even you. Article opens with the quote, but that's the essence of a vast amount of art through the ages: only the thinnest bit of art is truly original, and looking to get rid of the non-original bits generates absurd junk. I would argue that the cult of original and the cult of individualism-via-consumerism is largely an 1800s ideology filtered through post-war marketing. "only by c…

> The internet removes serendipity

It also removes the social context around the production of taste. Taste, in addition to being a set of personal preferences, is also a conscious and unconscious way of both signaling social status and creating empathy between people. This is largely absent in algorithm-facilitated media consumption. Facebook/spotify/whatever else is an intercessor between you and your group of friends and peers, removing the patterns of social interactions surrounding our formation of likes and dislikes and replacing them with an anonymized distillation of what other people enjoy. I don't think that's a good thing. There's a huge chunk of human interaction that's being elided here.

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#68

Post by raleighm »

Asdfbla wrote: post #58

On the topic of algorithms helping you discover your own 'taste' (whatever that may be), some time ago when the topic came up on HN someone linked this interesting paper: "Recommender Systems for Self-Actualization" [1], which suggests some methods how filter bubbles could be avoided. I really liked it and its suggestions like having extra recommendation lists for things the user will likely hate, items that are very…

Cool paper. Thanks

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#69

Post by mc32 »

pnathan wrote: post #26

> No one is original anymore, not even you. Article opens with the quote, but that's the essence of a vast amount of art through the ages: only the thinnest bit of art is truly original, and looking to get rid of the non-original bits generates absurd junk. I would argue that the cult of original and the cult of individualism-via-consumerism is largely an 1800s ideology filtered through post-war marketing. "only by c…

>Gently, I would suggest that we are neither original nor should we find our identity in material goods

While I agree with the first part, identity is tied to society, unless we are to become reclusive hermits. I would suggest that while better, even people who look back to a pre-consumerist lifestyle, are engaging in lifestyle (and thus identity) unless it's a completely unattached choice (again reclusive hermit).

It reminds me of my High School anti-establishment, anti-in-crowd anti-jocks who in being all things-anti were a definable entity in itself with a prescribed set of attitudes and behavior -and music specially.

Re: Taste is increasingly dictated by algorithms

#70

Post by AndrewKemendo »

mc32 wrote: post #69
pnathan wrote: post #26

> No one is original anymore, not even you. Article opens with the quote, but that's the essence of a vast amount of art through the ages: only the thinnest bit of art is truly original, and looking to get rid of the non-original bits generates absurd junk. I would argue that the cult of original and the cult of individualism-via-consumerism is largely an 1800s ideology filtered through post-war marketing. "only by c…

>Gently, I would suggest that we are neither original nor should we find our identity in material goods While I agree with the first part, identity is tied to society, unless we are to become reclusive hermits. I would suggest that while better, even people who look back to a pre-consumerist lifestyle, are engaging in lifestyle (and thus identity) unless it's a completely unattached choice (again reclusive hermit). I…

identity is tied to society, unless we are to become reclusive hermits

Ah, but the reclusive hermit is a response to the society - an active rejection - such that the hermit is one of the lifestyles most consumed with society's affects!

Similarly the "hipster" has a finely refined vane on popular culture. Calling a hermit/hipster disconnected from society It's like calling an antihistamine disconnected from pollen.

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