Are Better Algorithms the Solution to Information Overload?

This post is about making our lives easier by developing better recommendation engines.

As a young child my grandfather would take me to the dump with him and let me wander through the piles of rubbish while he unloaded our trash. Of course we never brought anything but worthless garbage to the dump but I always found a few useful items in other people’s waste to take home with us.

Sometimes surfing the internet feels like going to the dump with my grandfather again. I climb over piles and piles of garbage looking for the good stuff.

The promise and curse of the internet is an abundance of information. So much information is available it’s not uncommon to hear people referring to this wealth as “information overload.” Most often we’re not overwhelmed by information, we are overwhelmed by sifting through all the junk trying to find what we want.
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