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ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu

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Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#181

Post by alpaca128 »

jltsiren wrote: post #45
tomcam wrote: post #29

I can personally vouch that Amazon, Twitter, and YouTube all do horrible horrible jobs predicting my taste. And they have got worse over the years, not better

My favorite experience with Amazon: I had just preordered novel 9 of The Expanse, and I got an email recommending something else from the same authors: novel 8 of the Expanse. A more sensible recommendation engine might have assumed that someone who preorders part n+1 of a series may already have part n. Not to mention that Amazon should have known that I already had novel 8 on my Kindle. I guess generating personali…

> Not to mention that Amazon should have known that I already had novel 8 on my Kindle.

Amazon doesn't seem to understand many things surrounding the Kindle. For example, it calculates the progress reading through a book by the last page I looked at. That means if I finished a book and jumped to the introduction it'll now be convinced I only read 1% of the book. This is so dumb, and I don't know why they even do it that way - the Kindle hardware should easily be capable of precisely keeping track of what pages I looked at.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#182

Post by incone123 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #180
vasco wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meanwhile if you fatten up by 20kgs you fly for the same price. Just eat your clothes!

The baggage weight limit has nothing to do with the weight of the aircraft. It is about keeping the bags light enough for handling, to protect the backs of baggage handlers (and automated equipment/belts). Unlike thier heavy bag, a heavy passenger is generally capable of walking themselves onto the plane.

If that's so, why is the luggage weight allowance applied cumulatively across multiple bags for one passenger? And why is it different between airlines and between ticket classes?

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#183

Post by bergenty »

jrumbut wrote: post #118
malkia wrote: post #75

Some years ago, I worked on a team "Ads Human Eval" - we had raters hired to do A/B testing for ads. These evaluated questionaires carefuly crafted by our linguists, and then analyzed by the statisticians providing feedback to the (internal) group that wanted to know more about. So the best experience was this internal event that we had, where the raters would say that certain Ad would not fare well (long term), whil…

> automation is not going to fully replace us You say that the AI gave a bad answer, but it did give an answer right? Really fast? And it was cheaper than convening the panel of experts? That's the fear of AI replacing humans. It's not that it works so well, it's that it works poorly (but fast and cheap).

It doesn’t even work that poorly. DALLE2 came up with better designs for my mobile app than anything mid tier designers on upwork have.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#184

Post by Kiro »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #49
mgraczyk wrote: post #42

Always interesting to see outsiders writing papers about this, using anecdote and unrelated data (mostly political and real world purchase data in this case) to argue that ML doesn't make useful predictions. Meanwhile I look at randomized controlled trial data showing millions of dollars in revenue uplift directly attributable to ML vs non-ML backed conversion pipelines, offsetting the cost of doing the ML by >10x. I…

Are you really sure you're not just fooling yourselves with your randomized controlled trials? As Feynman famously said, the easiest person to fool is yourself. And in business even more than science, you might even like the results. Have you ever put this data up against something similar to the peer review system in academia, where several experts from a competing deparment (or ideally competing company) try to pic…

Why are you doubting them? Nothing in the comments indicates what you are suggesting.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#185

Post by wumpus »

stackbutterflow wrote: post #179
Melatonic wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont think most people are arguing that machines will replace everyone anytime soon - it is that they will replace a huge portion of people. If one person can do the job of 10,000 by being the tweaker / approver of an advanced AI that is still 9,999 jobs eliminated. That might be hyperbole (you still probably will need people to support that system)

You don't even that to go as high as 10,000. Imagine someone suddenly doing the job of 10 persons, that's entire teams being decimated. Go to a job board and imagine 9 of out 10 job postings not existing. How much harder it'll be to seek another job.

Decimated means 1/10 killed.

I know people don't use it properly, but it's worth knowing.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#186

Post by semi-extrinsic »

Kiro wrote: post #184
semi-extrinsic wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you really sure you're not just fooling yourselves with your randomized controlled trials? As Feynman famously said, the easiest person to fool is yourself. And in business even more than science, you might even like the results. Have you ever put this data up against something similar to the peer review system in academia, where several experts from a competing deparment (or ideally competing company) try to pic…

Why are you doubting them? Nothing in the comments indicates what you are suggesting.

Nullius in verba. That is how good science has always been done.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#188

Post by mellavora »

mgraczyk wrote: post #58
nojito wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Always interesting to see outsiders writing papers about this I don't think you know who andrew gelman is. Additionally, that's not the conclusion derived from this study.

The actual conclusion of the study is so absurd that it's not worth engaging with seriously. That is, to maximally understand, and therefore predict, consumer preferences is likely to require information outside of data on choices and behavior, but also on what it is like to be human. I was responding to the interpretation from the blog post, which is more reasonable.

ok, let me help you out:

http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Gelman

which would give strong prior evidence that the author's writing is not absurd.

Note also that he has strong connections to a leading psychologists meaning he has some background on human choices and behavior.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Gelman

Please be careful with attack statements such as "so absurd that it's not worth engaging with seriously" which some feel are out of character with HN.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#189

Post by soco »

rusticpenn wrote: post #166
Melatonic wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont think most people are arguing that machines will replace everyone anytime soon - it is that they will replace a huge portion of people. If one person can do the job of 10,000 by being the tweaker / approver of an advanced AI that is still 9,999 jobs eliminated. That might be hyperbole (you still probably will need people to support that system)

and new jobs and industries will be created.

Yes, in the future, while this job goes away now. The problem is likely the interval between "now" and "then", when suddenly this mine closed and you have thousands of miners out of work and unprepared to do anything else. The kids will probably learn to do a new job in a new industry, while their pops will stay at home drinking or go out to kick some butt (or both) - neither outcome very pleasant for the society.

Re: ML is not that good at predicting consumers' choices

#190

Post by rusticpenn »

soco wrote: post #189
rusticpenn wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and new jobs and industries will be created.

Yes, in the future, while this job goes away now. The problem is likely the interval between "now" and "then", when suddenly this mine closed and you have thousands of miners out of work and unprepared to do anything else. The kids will probably learn to do a new job in a new industry, while their pops will stay at home drinking or go out to kick some butt (or both) - neither outcome very pleasant for the society.

Yes, that’s where things like basic pay become important.
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