RECSYS: What Is A Recommendation In The Age Of Machine Learning by BBVA Data & Analytics

What is a recommendation in the modern age? We explore this question with RecSys, a modern fable that examines through an every day event (a birthday party) the news ways we explore the world filtered by algorithms.

Recommendations are as old as civilization, but today's experiences are directed and driven by algorithms that leverage massive amounts of other people's actions. Can we finally have access to every content ever created or every person on the planet?
We argue that these new systems help us shorten time and space and position ourselves in a space of knowledge in which we could eventually always find the person, book, movie or product that we need at any given moment.

This project was presented as an open debate and a unconcluded research that poses questions about unentended consequences of Recsys, such as echo chambers, lack of hunger for discovery and exploration, and privacy issues.