

Data-based Recommendations - Maro
http://bytepawn.com/2008/08/04/data-based-recommendations/

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maryrosecook
Most sites do recommendations as a big Venn diagram. If my_upvoted_items
intersection your_upvoted_items > x then recommend me your_upvoted_items union
my_upvoted_items(complement).

I don't think this is a great approach. If you and I have similar tastes,
chances are that I have intentionally avoided the things that you like but
that I have not voted on.

I'm working on a music recommendation site that, I hope, will avoid this
problem.

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ks
That would be a nice improvement for Hacker News.

I assume that it is possible to track my votes and compare them with other
users. If I voted for an article, I should get a recommendation for another
article that people with similar votes have found interesting.

This would also give an additional incentive to use the vote button, since it
would improve my experience.

~~~
Maro
I agree. Similarly, if IMDb would have good recommendations, I'd cast far more
votes just to get better recommendations.

~~~
dangoldin
Isn't this what the Netflix prize is all about? Based on a history of user
rentals and ratings you want to find recommendations.

~~~
Maro
Unfortunately, Netflix is not available where I live, so I can't comment on
it.

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sanj
data >> algorithms

Which is why I asked: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=265728>

~~~
Maro
My point in this regard is not so much about data vs. algorithms. It's the
fact that even the sites that use the data they have suck.

~~~
sanj
I think that the much, much larger user base of Amazon that is voting with
dollars rather than diggs is the big issue.

