Personalized Recommendations in the Wall Street Journal

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120647589356663209.html

I always find it noteworthy when leading edge technology is written up in the popular press. This week the Wall Street Journal published a good article about Personalization and Recommendation technology.

The reporter focused third party suppliers that can help sites boost profits - sometimes by working together.

Four providers of recommender technology were highlighted. Here are the links:

http://www.ratepoint.com/

http://www.aggregateknowledge.com/about.html

http://www.optitex.com/index.php

http://www.webcominc.com/

Weekly Recommender Log

Well, it's another week of disappointments with the iGoogle Recommendations tab. Or should I say, just more of the same.

Once again I have 50 sad "Recommended Pages" which shows no relationship to my preferences or persona. Once, again (and the last time if results are not improved) I tried and rated all 50 pages. Here's a bad sign - I have always rated new items as negative, but more than 1/3 recommended pages are news items. At the same time, the box where I am supposed to get news recommendations is always empty.

And, just like last week, I have yet to receive any recommendations in the boxes labeled "Recommended Videos", ""Recommended News", ""Recommended Searches", or ""Recommended Groups". Somebody is asleep at the wheel.

So, here's my new plan. In the coming week I a considerable amount of Google searches on all things automotive. Let's see if the Recommendations tab takes notice.