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When Purchase Recommendations Go Bad

Posted by Zonk on from the tech-just-smart-enough-to-be-dumb dept.

nixman99 writes "An article on MSNBC describes what happens when 'View Similar Products' recommendations go bad. From the article: 'The company said it was alerted to the problem early yesterday afternoon after word began spreading among bloggers. When visitors to Walmart.com requested Planet of the Apes: The Complete TV Series on DVD, four other movies were recommended under the heading Similar Items. Those films included Martin Luther King: I Have A Dream/Assassination of MLK and Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson.'"

14 of 370 comments (clear)

  1. That's quite funny by MountainMan101 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Amazon recommended some adult entertainment to go with the Madagascar (rated U) when I ordered the other day. My other interest was nature books, so how it put two and two together no one knows.

    1. Re:That's quite funny by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Maybe they figured out that if you're an adult who reads nature books and watches Madagascar, you're never going to get laid...

  2. Re:The Eye Of The Beholder by eclectro · · Score: 5, Funny

    Were you to be a glass is half empty kind of person, clearly the system is racist.

    Or to put it another way, if the banana is half eaten.

    --
    Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
  3. Are bad recommendations from trolls bad? by CurbyKirby · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... or funny?

    E.g. http://www.speakeasy.org/~curby/swg/text/jellypong .gif

    I vote for funny.

    --

    --
    "Extra Anus Kills Four-Legged Chick" -- Headline
  4. Essential .NET purchase recommendation by enkafan · · Score: 4, Funny

    On Amazon.com, when browsing for Essential .NET Amazon.com was nice enough to tell me that fellow purchasers also wore "Clean Underwear". I was a bit disturbed that Eddie Bauer felt it was needed to specify that the underwear I was buying was in fact clean.

  5. Someone should notify Kanye West immediately... by Floydius · · Score: 2, Funny

    so he can educate everyone on how Walmart doesn't care about black people.

  6. Amazon... by IainMH · · Score: 4, Funny

    I love 'The West Wing'. In fact, I like it so much that I've got every single dvd box set (1-6). All purchased from Amazon.

    So what did they recommend to me?

    This. Yeah - great thanks.

  7. Re:I can see how it might be a good recommendation by etrnl · · Score: 2, Funny

    Mojo-jojo... and I'm ashamed to even admit knowing that.

  8. Re:The Eye Of The Beholder by ArsenneLupin · · Score: 3, Funny
    Heck black soldiers fighing over in France during the World War were ridiculed by people asking could they see their {monkey} tails.

    You must not be very fluent in French. The word queue does indeed mean tail, but it also has another much more interesting meaning ;-)

  9. Let me be the first to say... by User+956 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Walmart doesn't care about black people.

    --
    The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
    1. Re:Let me be the first to say... by Wilson_6500 · · Score: 4, Funny

      That mistakenly implies that Walmart cares about everyone else. I don't think Walmart cares about anyone.

  10. Re:hierarchies by sjames · · Score: 2, Funny

    (although I don't exactly see how anyone thought it would be a good idea to have it be suggested by using apes).

    Because if they had chosen mice, the movie would have been a comedy.

  11. Re:what exactly is so offensive? by GMontag451 · · Score: 2, Funny

    It's a low brow version of religion with very violent people involved.. Both of those adjective clauses are redundant.

  12. Strange recommendations by base_chakra · · Score: 4, Funny

    A few years ago, Amazon offered me this bizarre, yet strangely appropriate, recommendation. I believe the screenshot I took speaks for itself (yes, it's real and undoctored):

    http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/8897/sa6iz.png