A “Netflix of wine” is impossible with current recommendation methods because Sight & Sound dominate Smell & Taste

This is #6 in our premium, in-depth series about the quest for the Netflix of wine.

 

• Article #1: How A Netflix-Style Recommender Is Vital to Reversing Wine’s Market Marginalization
• Article #2: Why solving the “Paradox of Choice” is a major reason Netflix’s recommender is worth $1 Bil/yr. And why wine fails at that.
• Article #3: Reviews and 5-Star ratings are so useless for recommendations that Netflix ditched its prized $1-million algorithm.
• Article #4: Wine wreck-commendations: Genes determine that no two people taste the same wine the same way.
• Article #5: Netflix Added Big Data To Amp Up Recommendations. Why Wine Needs a Touch of That Too.

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This series has been examining the substantial evidence of why wine recommendations and reviews fail. One of the big reasons is because no two people taste the same wine the same way.  However, wine’s recommendation attempts are immensely more complicated because your brain handles scent perception in a radically different way than any of the other senses.

 

Unlike sight, sound, taste, and touch, your brain gives odors immediate, direct, hardwired access to the PreFrontal Cortex (PFC) which is responsible for the highest levels of thought and reasoning. The PFC is the structure that makes us human … and determines why you are you.

 

In addition , odors — olfactory signals  — are the most complicated, numerous, confusing, and ineffable of all senses. Not coincidentally, they are virtually impossible for individuals to describe.

 

 

This means that wine recommendations cannot access the core advantages that have made Netflix’s algorithms and methods a  billion-dollar success.

 

Netflix has a massive and seemingly impossible advantage over wine because it deals with sight and sound rather than smell and taste. To understand that, we need to look at the metrics of senses, and  the way the brain handles them — especially the lavish celebrity concierge treatment offered to smells.

First, the Metrics

Netflix’s recommendation advantages are not surprising  given that most people consider vision and hearing as the most vital of all senses.

 

A brief look at the metrics of these four senses offers important insights into why Netflix has it easy.

METRICS: Sight/Vision

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METRICS: Hearing

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METRICS SUMMARY: Vision & Hearing

• Vision: 4 types of receptor cells.
• Hearing: 2 Types of auditory receptors.

Smell/Olfactory Problem: We don’t have a trillion words.

[Redacted]

Taste/Gustatory

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Vision and hearing = safety & well-being

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The radical way your brain processes smells makes describing them and creating recommendations from them almost impossible

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In First Class Seating: Olfactory by itself. All Others in Tourist

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Everybody But Odors Must Detour To The Thalamus For a Delay And Directions

[Mostly Redacted]

Look at this in a more familiar way: A corporate hierarchy

[Mostly Redacted]

 

And the Olfactory department?

[Redacted]

Smell gets primo access to the brain regions that make us who we are as humans

[Redacted]

What Makes the PreFrontal Cortex So Important?

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Knowledge from Misfortune

[Mostly Redacted]

How? Why?

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Sniff and survive

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A gut feeling

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Digging Deeper Into Consciousness

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Vision and hearing = shared perceptual communication (the Netflix advantage)

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ORANGE!

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A CONSPIRACY OF WORDS

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THE GENETICS OF EXPRESSION

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GENERAL, SPECIFIC, VERY SPECIFIC

[Redacted]

AGGREGATION AGGRAVATION

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OF ALMOND PASTE AND FLYING ROACHES

[Redacted]

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Further Reading

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