Fireþy is a music and movie recommendation service that recently spun its way out of the MIT Media Lab into a Web site run by Agents Inc. The idea behind Fireþy is simple: you tell the computer what music and movies you like, the computer matches up your proÞle with other people of similar tastes and makes recommendations on what you should buy.
Computer science geeks call this "reputation brokering," and it works pretty well in the lab. To the mix, Fireþy adds interesting graphics, an overdesigned Netscape-enhanced user interface, and the option to act on the service's recommendations by typing in your credit card number and having the music delivered to your door. (The fulÞllment order is done through an OpenMarket server and Newbury Comics Interactive. Albums are cheaper than retail but have a US$4 shipping fee. Mine showed up in two days.) Fireþy even asks you to rate its ads.
The underlying technology is "agents," the newest fad in artiÞcial intelligence. Agents are autonomous software robots that go around doing their master's bidding. Fireþy's agents, though, are simply a database of preferences that are analyzed using statistical and clustering software.
The Fireþy service is slow, however. On the day I tried it, the database took 30 seconds to repaint my Web page during the music-rating process. Quite a drag, considering it wanted me to rate more than 100 albums before it would give me a recommendation.
At last, Fireþy made some recommendations. I like Kate Bush, The The, and Pink Floyd, so it suggested that I listen to The Beatles, The Monkees, and Spinal Tap. But when I probed deeper, I discovered that the service predicted I wouldn't like its suggested albums very much, anyway. Fireþy did better picking movies, suggesting that I watch Fellini's masterpiece 8 1/2 .
Fireþy offers a message box and Internet chat rooms, allowing you to electronically meet people who share your tastes. But its JavaScript crashed my Mac. I'm sure there's great technology here, but right now, Fireþy just looks like an unwieldy front end to another online record store.
Simson GarÞnkel
Firefly: on the Web at www.ffly.com/. Agents Inc.: +1 (617) 234 5400.
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