Readings 7: Suggestions, Recommendations, and Algorithmic Culture
07 Mar 2011 Leave a Comment
in Readings Tags: Algorithm, eHarmony, pandora
Hitting It Off, Thanks to Algorithms of Love
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/29/science/29tier.html?_r=1
I always hear the eHarmony commercial saying that one in five relationships now start online which is pretty impressive, I also just found out that eHarmony was responsible for 2% of the marriages in America last year which is also impressive, and that 19 million people filled out there questionnaires but how do they do it? All these new matchmaker websites are coming up with these algorithms for love but there is no way for people to learn how they are doing it. Everyday you hear of a new matchmaker website and they all offer different services. As I said before those facts are impressive but it would be nice to understand how these websites actually work and how its possible to match two people. Theres definitely more to theses websites than matching two people based on your everyday traits like being funny, adventurous, liking football ect. but they have not yet produced any scientific evidence so far on how these systems actually work. I just feel like there must be something else happening to get facts like the ones above but cant prove how it works. I have never used one of these sites but I know of people who have and some relationships worked out and led to marriage and some failed which I’m sure will always be the case with these websites because it just feels like it would be impossible for them to match people and always lead to marriage or a relationship.
Do you think these sites are somehow messing with fate and taking away from life?
Artifacts From the Future: Online Dating Site
By Sarah Douglas 
http://www.wired.com/culture/culturereviews/multimedia/2009/07/found
This is pretty funny, what will the online dating site look like in 2020. What will any website look like in 2020 0r 2100? The internet is becoming an extremely powerful place and has grown tremendously since 1995 so I feel like there is no question that it is going to look like something completely different in 2020 then it does now. Give us your saliva well give you your mate may sound like something funny now but I’m sure match.com or facebook would have sounded that way 15 years ago. I don’t think that anything proposed now that could be available in 2020 or 2100 is a stupid idea because well most likely have more and more technology by then. With all the technology and research put into these matchmaker websites now, whats not to say that it will be possible to do a DNAmatch.com in the future with your life expectancy, legs 11% longer than average, verbal skills, ect. I think that this site could definitely be around in the future.
What do you think the future holds for matchmaking websites??
Roommates who click
By Lisa W. Foderaro
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/nyregion/22roommates.html
This is something that more and more universities should start to look into, my freshman year I filled out a form of what kind of roommate I was looking for and what my likes and dislikes were and got the complete opposite of what I was looking for in a roommate. As I stated in an above article, matchmaker sites may not be able to prove how there algorithms work but there facts show that they do somehow work so all universities should now offer a URoomSurf.com website. Universities should at least offer this type of roommate match site when the student is initially accepted into the school, he should have the choice which is matched randomly or fill out this questionnaire and it will match you with a compatible roommate. The article says that 70% of the websites users so far are women and I have known a lot of girls that were matched with roommates they couldn’t stand and had to find new roommates so for them this website could work well but if 30% are guys then that shows that they really don’t care who they are roomed with. In my experiences freshman year was hell living with someone that lived differently than I liked to live but you meet many new people during the year and a lot of people end up living the next couple years with the friends they met and not having a random roommates selected for them. Universities should experiment with website like this and see how it results during the year, if it works than more universities should consider it.
With a school like Rutgers now issuing Co-Ed rooms do you think this kind of website would work??
Search Takes a Social Turn
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/13/technology/13search.html
I have seen this with amazon but other sites also, many websites now have a facebook icon or a twitter icon on them that let you share what your looking at with your friends. I feel that this is clearly showing how powerful facebook and twitter have become. I think its a great idea you can link other websites with your social networking sites and get feedback from your friends or your community. I really liked this article but that just my opinion and to the top right I can link this article with facebook or twitter and see what other people think of this same article and get different feedback from my friends. Like Mr. Cutts said in the conclusion of this article, these sort of trends are definitely expected to continue. I think that polling your friends through facebook and twitter is a great idea in getting feedback.
The Song Decoders
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/18/magazine/18Pandora-t.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
To me music is either good or bad and I have never sat down and thought about why I thought the music was bad. I didn’t know it was even possible to strip apart a song and look at the scientific method put into making it and honestly the whole thing sounds kind of stupid. Pandora on the other hand is something I listen to everyday but never had any idea that there was a science behind it. I like how Pandora ignores the crowd which is something that a New York City radio station should look into because if Pandora can become attract 35 million people and 65,000 signups a day they are definitely doing something right. My life is surrounded by music and reading this article makes me think about stuff that I don’t really want to think about like why a hit is a hit. I feel like Pandora is a play off of Satellite Radio a little bit because they also break down different genres and play music that everyone has heard before and music that you could have only heard if you bought the CD. Like I said Pandora seems like a play off of Satellite Radio but as I continued to read on in this article about the new Indian genre and what the analysts had to do to get ready to introduce it for there listeners seemed a little crazy. With 65,000 people signing up for Pandora a day, it seems that whether what there doing is crazy or not its clearly working for them.
Do you think Pandora is in competition with Satellite Radio??
Recommender system
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recommender_system
This seems like a great idea especially for companies that want there products looked at and advertised but personally I don’t know how well a system like this would work because how many people look at something that says recommended to you, I know I don’t. I’m sure for some people this recommender system is a great idea but for me I’m really not intrigued by it. I can say though there are sometimes when this system could become useful for example doing research for a class and breaking down all the different things you may need in a paper.
What would you use a Recommender system for?
How to Have Culture in an Algorithmic Age
June 14th, 2010 | Electronic Reading
http://www.thelateageofprint.org/2010/06/14/how-to-have-culture-in-an-algorithmic-age/
Okay its a little creepy that amazon can track what your highlighting through there 3G network and kinda makes me wonder what else they can do or for that matter what anyone else can do. If Amazon can track what you highlight on your kindle it really makes you think about what other companies can see you doing on there item. It kinda makes me uncomfortable to know this and I’m sure that other people feel the same. Its information like this that Amazon shouldn’t let the public know.
Do you think that other companies like Apple is following your highlights though there Ipad?
