Liz S ([info]ixwin) wrote,
2004-07-06 19:02:00
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Livejournal interests suggestion meme!

Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. writing score: 36
2. books score: 31
3. music score: 27
4. harry potter score: 24
5. anime score: 20
6. poetry score: 20
7. cats score: 19
8. monty python score: 18
9. movies score: 17
10. chocolate score: 17
11. terry pratchett score: 17
12. drawing score: 15
13. dragons score: 15
14. love score: 15
15. fantasy score: 14
16. comedy score: 12
17. dogs score: 11
18. manga score: 11
19. photography score: 11
20. tori amos score: 11

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.

coded by [info]ixwin
Find out more



What is this?

It's a way of identifying livejournal interests you don't currently have listed, but which you might be interested in, based on what other users have listed.

Why?

Basically just for fun. But I hope it might also point some people towards interests (e.g. authors, bands) which they haven't come across but have a good chance of liking.

How does it work?

In everyday language

It finds your unusual interests (those which are shared by fewer than 20 other users), and identifies the users who share those interests and what interests they list.

Then it gives each interest listed by those users a score which is based on both the number of users sharing your unusual interests who list it, and the number of your interests which they share. For example a score of 2 could arise from 2 people listing this who each share 1 of your unusual interests, or from 1 person listing this who shares 2 of your unusual interests.

It then prints a list of the twenty highest-scoring interests on this basis (excluding the ones already on your interests list).

In technical terms

It's a perl script, which works off info provided by livejournal at

http://www.livejournal.com/misc/interestdata.bml?user=foo
and
http://www.livejournal.com/interests.bml?int=bar&usescheme=lynx

for user foo and interest bar.

A copy of the script can be found here. Feel free to modify it, whatever, but obviously credit would be nice if you do.

Why 20 interests?

Just trying to find a balance between ensuring most people would have some listed, and not making the processing time too long.

It doesn't work for me!

That could be because
a) All of the things you list as interests are also listed as interests by 20 or more other users OR
b) All of your interests are unique OR
c) There is a problem with the server e.g. too many other people trying to use the meme OR
d) You don't have any interests listed

It suggests really common, boring interests for me like 'music' and 'movies' and 'computers'

Well, a lot of people have those listed, so it's unsurprising they'll come up. If you'd like to run a version of the meme that filters out really common interests [info]ouwiyaru has produced an adapted version of the meme here. At time of writing a Popularity Ceiling of 100000 will knock out the top 30 most common lj interests, and one of 25000 will knock out the top 300 or so.

Have you written any other memes?

Nothing that works off livejournal data, but I did write the Mystic Pig

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[info]erming

July 6 2004, 11:40:45 UTC 7 years ago

It is good thanks, but it would be nicer if you had links to each of the interests, rather than just a list.

Ian

[info]ixwin

July 6 2004, 11:53:37 UTC 7 years ago

Good idea - done!

[info]erming

7 years ago

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[info]yvesilena

July 6 2004, 14:12:52 UTC 7 years ago

Ha HA! This is fantastic! Well done!

[info]robert_jones

July 6 2004, 15:41:41 UTC 7 years ago

Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. music score: 20
2. writing score: 16
3. jesus score: 13
4. photography score: 11
5. ecumenism score: 11
6. singing score: 11
7. science fiction score: 10
8. harry potter score: 10
9. monasticism score: 9
10. mysticism score: 9
11. sleeping score: 9
12. movies score: 8
13. epistemology score: 8
14. choral music score: 8
15. hiking score: 7
16. drawing score: 7
17. rain score: 7
18. the bible score: 7
19. cats score: 7
20. spirituality score: 7

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.

coded by [info]ixwin
Find out more

I'm not remotely interested in photography or cats, but otherwise it seems pretty accurate.

[info]restlesseyes

July 8 2004, 12:10:41 UTC 7 years ago

i too got cats and photography

[info]neonrose5

7 years ago

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[info]roxy641

July 7 2004, 05:31:51 UTC 7 years ago

My interests

Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. radiohead score: 6
2. muse score: 4
3. pixies score: 4
4. idlewild score: 4
5. feeder score: 4
6. weezer score: 4
7. pj harvey score: 4
8. the strokes score: 4
9. massive attack score: 4
10. queen score: 3
11. keane score: 3
12. alanis morissette score: 3
13. jeff buckley score: 3
14. badly drawn boy score: 3
15. primal scream score: 3
16. starsailor score: 3
17. u2 score: 3
18. the verve score: 3
19. snow patrol score: 3
20. the white stripes score: 3

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.

coded by [info]ixwin
Find out more



Thanks for that :-)

Roxy641

[info]i_am_famous

July 9 2004, 01:26:48 UTC 7 years ago

Nearly everything you SHOULD be interested in I AM interested in.

Crazy.

[info]calieber

July 7 2004, 07:11:44 UTC 7 years ago

Of course, I'm interested in things I don't list (mostly bands that are going to be common). It just occurred to me that this throws off the results in two ways: not only is, say, celibacy (which fascinates me intellectually but isn't something I'd likely want to do on purpose) eligible to be listed in the results, but if it were rare, people who list it would contribute to interests' scores less than they otherwise would -- possibly even to the extent of altering the composition of the top 20.

Also, some of the things I list are shorthand for "being the kind of person who would list X." I think "competititve sausage racing" falls in that category.

Hm. I may have to join [info]blog_sociology just to promote and discuss this (with your permission, of course).

If I might offer some constructive criticism: It might be more meaningful -- not that it isn't meaningful now -- if more weight were given to number of common interests. Intuitively, I'm more likely to share an interest with someone whom I already share three interests with than with three people I only share one interest with each (although if it's the same interest ... we have too many things for me to keep track of). As it is now, an interest shared by one person who lists "ethical culture" and one person who lists "jewish geography" and one person who lists "stand-up philosophy" (to take three of my less common interests) gets the same three points as one listed by one person who lists all three, and I think I have more of an affinity with that one person than with the first three combined.

[info]livredor

July 7 2004, 07:27:52 UTC 7 years ago

Ooh, Jewish geography! Good thought, I'm definitely interested in that, I can't think why I never listed it before!

[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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[info]bridgetester

7 years ago

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[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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[info]bridgetester

7 years ago

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[info]bridgetester

7 years ago

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[info]whitcomb

7 years ago

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[info]heiligennacht

July 7 2004, 08:12:28 UTC 7 years ago

I would love a copy of the script if that is okay.

[info]ixwin

July 7 2004, 12:57:41 UTC 7 years ago

Sure. E-mail me ( ixwin @ fluffhouse.org.uk ) and I'll send you a copy.

[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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[info]heiligennacht

7 years ago

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[info]bassfingers

July 7 2004, 09:26:19 UTC 7 years ago

Well, I fall into the group of people not able to access the script, with it timing out after 60 seconds. I was wondering what kind of caching you're using? One would think, that after a number of attempts to run, eventually enough interests would be cached to allow the script to complete? Or is the slow-down happening after the data collection stage, and really halting at the processing of said data?

[info]ixwin

July 7 2004, 13:36:41 UTC 7 years ago

*looks embarrassed*

erm...I'm afraid it's not caching at all at the moment, simply because I wasn't sure how to write that part of the code (I really am a beginner at this - this is only the fourth program I've written).

When testing it definitely was the data extract stages which were taking the time rather than the processing.

Having said which, remember it's only extracting data for those interests which 20 or fewer people have listed, so it wouldn't necessarily help that much (though it would speed things up when the meme was propagating between people with a number of shared unusual interests - quite likely).

[info]purplepiano

7 years ago

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[info]purplepiano

7 years ago

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[info]purplepiano

7 years ago

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[info]justjohn

July 7 2004, 10:47:56 UTC 7 years ago

You've done the work, now can I steal it?

I was trying to get to your homepage (as listed in your user info page) in order to see if I could steal the Perl code (it's how I learn), but access to the site timed out. I'm guessing your site's very busy.

Anyway, do you have the code handy in some form, for nosey people like me to look over and maybe appropriate bits of?

[info]ixwin

July 7 2004, 12:55:05 UTC 7 years ago

e-mailed!

[info]ruakh

July 7 2004, 13:03:11 UTC 7 years ago

Bug:

Note that LJ presents all data in UTF-8; your site interprets and reports this data as though it were Windows-1252. This can cause French/German/etc. text to be hard to read (as when "montréal" is reported as "montréal"), and Russian/Greek/etc. text to be impossible to read (as when "музыка" is reported as "музыка").

To fix this, I think all you need to do is replace this line in your HTTP header: 
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1
with this: 
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
and optionally add the tag 
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8">
to the head of the actual HTML document.

Big thumbs-up on this meme overall; it's really interesting. And you serve valid HTML1, which is always a plus. :-)


1. Technically it's not 100% valid, since you're include Windows-1252 characters in a page whose headers declare it ISO-8859-1, but close enough.

[info]ixwin

July 7 2004, 13:30:23 UTC 7 years ago

Re: Bug:

That's very helpful - thanks! (I must admit I don't know anything about character sets, so I needed it spelt out to me as you have done)

I've made the change you suggested, and tried it on your list and it now displays montréal correctly.

Thanks again :)

[info]ruakh

7 years ago

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[info]beccastareyes

July 7 2004, 13:37:48 UTC 7 years ago

Okay, I need to know how browser compatable thing sucker is -- I've been trying all day to get it to work (I run Mac OS X and Safari at home and Linux Red Hat and Mozilla at work).

[info]ixwin

July 7 2004, 14:02:09 UTC 7 years ago

Hmmm. It worked fine in Mozilla for me when testing and I've just tried it again now, and it worked on the second attempt. (I haven't tried it in any Mac browsers). It does seem noticeably slower to connect and run than in Internet Explorer though. I don't know why that would be - I'll point the person who maintains the server at this comment to see if he has any explanation.

In the mean-time, here are your results...
Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. lina inverse score: 33
2. reading score: 33
3. trigun score: 30
4. inuyasha score: 30
5. yaoi score: 29
6. fruits basket score: 29
7. music score: 28
8. final fantasy score: 27
9. bishounen score: 26
10. dragons score: 26
11. doujinshi score: 24
12. gravitation score: 23
13. art score: 23
14. rurouni kenshin score: 23
15. valgaav score: 23
16. allen schezar score: 21
17. gourry gabriev score: 21
18. fushigi yuugi score: 21
19. japan score: 21
20. computers score: 21

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.

coded by [info]ixwin
Find out more

[info]purplepiano

7 years ago

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[info]ruakh

7 years ago

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[info]bridgetester

7 years ago

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[info]thedougz

July 7 2004, 14:38:05 UTC 7 years ago

Very cool idea!

Can I request an emailed copy of the code too, please? (djh300@psu.edu)

[info]ixwin

July 7 2004, 14:43:47 UTC 7 years ago

On its way!

[info]astatine210

July 7 2004, 15:53:52 UTC 7 years ago

Why not generate the HTML for the list with <ol> and <li> tags? The numbering will be much less bother, the whole thing lines up better, and it saves you the bother of putting the <br /> tags in.

[info]purplepiano

July 7 2004, 16:02:07 UTC 7 years ago

If I was doing it I'd format the list as a paragraph, like interests lists are usually, with the numbers in brackets. But it's a matter of taste - I just don't like too much blank screen space, and it might mean that people wouldn't need to lj-cut the results on their journals.

[info]omnifarious

3 years ago

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[info]vvvexation

July 7 2004, 17:35:57 UTC 7 years ago

You know what would be cool? Listing the uncommon interests it finds in step 1. I've got a nearly full interest list and don't know offhand which ones are really all that rare, and I'd like to be able to see more clearly what the link might be between those and some of the ones on the suggestion list.

[info]ruakh

July 7 2004, 18:54:46 UTC 7 years ago

If you visit http://www.livejournal.com/misc/interestdata.bml?user=vvvexation (it's a simple text file; if you're using Internet Explorer, you might have to tell it to open it in Notepad or Word or the like), each line lists one of your interests. The second number on the line with each interest is the number of users listing that interest. (The first number is a number internal to LJ, designating the interest. The first interest anyone ever listed - "linux" - was assigned #1, the second was assigned #2, etc.)

[info]vokzal

7 years ago

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[info]vokzal

7 years ago

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[info]vvvexation

7 years ago

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[info]macoto

July 7 2004, 22:01:09 UTC 7 years ago

What if you don't have any unusual interests?

Also, I'm [info]macoto of the My Best Friend meme; sup?

[info]macoto

July 7 2004, 23:10:45 UTC 7 years ago

My Best Friend is [info]robert_jones
Our 24 common interests are: arcadia, art, blackadder, c.s. lewis, cambridge, cathedrals, cooking, enthusiasm, history, hugs, lord of the rings, philosophy, questions, radio 4, reading, science, shakespeare, sunsets, tea, theatre, trust, walking, wine, winnie the pooh
Who is your best friend?
Username:
Created by [info]macoto

[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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[info]zarfmouse

July 8 2004, 01:50:01 UTC 7 years ago

I'd love if you could send me a copy of your script to twiddle with. I think I'd like to add some filtering out of common interests from the results so that the results are more obscure.

[info]ixwin

July 8 2004, 15:44:47 UTC 7 years ago

Script now up on my website here.

Adding filtering for common interests should be pretty straightforward - it's something I might add myself at some point - but don't let that stop you playing around with it in the mean time!

[info]ouwiyaru

7 years ago

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[info]ouwiyaru

7 years ago

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[info]curly

July 8 2004, 06:43:41 UTC 7 years ago

i really enjoyed this meme. thanks!

[info]ixwin

July 8 2004, 15:39:50 UTC 7 years ago

Glad you enjoyed it!

[info]empressvesica

July 8 2004, 09:59:26 UTC 7 years ago

Very interesting!! I have had great fun following the little rabbit trails to see why certain interests are turning up on the final lists. Not that am I a coder or anything but this is tight piece of work. Go you! ~EV

[info]ixwin

July 8 2004, 15:41:03 UTC 7 years ago

Glad you enjoyed it - it's been great fun watching this spread!

[info]nguinn

July 8 2004, 10:46:00 UTC 7 years ago

Quite fun! And rather accurate, it seems. Thanks!

[info]nguinn

July 8 2004, 11:00:52 UTC 7 years ago

a quick follow-up comment

Erm, nine of the items from the meme result are already in my interest list. I thought it wasn't supposed to do that?

But it's still fun and entertaining! And that's from a guy that ignores most of the memes, and the majority are lame and/or boring.

Thanks again!

[info]plumosa

7 years ago

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[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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[info]nguinn

7 years ago

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[info]ashfae

July 8 2004, 17:15:26 UTC 7 years ago

This is showing up all over my friendslist, and has been since about two hours after you posted it. And it's showing up throuhg people who, to my knowledge, have no connection to you except through me. Memes are fascinating. *gryn* Well done you though, it seems to be a good one!

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 01:22:01 UTC 7 years ago

It's great, isn't it? I've spent far too much time tracking it through random people's ljs and their friendslists.

(and yay! I have nesting comments! *is comment whore*)

[info]kaimi

July 8 2004, 17:53:28 UTC 7 years ago

This is beyond neat.

Now, I have to spend time cleaning out my interests and trying to figure out who the other crazies are that have "hot dog buns" in their interest list. ;)

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 01:05:36 UTC 7 years ago

(you might know this already but)

If you go to http://www.livejournal.com/interests.bml and type an interest in the box labelled 'Find people and communities interested in:' it'll tell you who else lists that as an interest. Looks like there are nine people and one community listing hot dog buns, but if you only got 2 that means most of them don't share any of your rarer interests.

[info]kaimi

7 years ago

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[info]formatreinstall

July 8 2004, 19:11:37 UTC 7 years ago

Hey, is there anyway to mod it so you can just find the person or people who have the most interests in common with you?

real cool though!

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 01:20:43 UTC 7 years ago

Well [info]macoto has done one which shows which person on your friendslist has the most interests in common with you, which you can find here, but I don't know of one that checks all users. LJ itself used to have something like that a year or so ago but I think they took it down.

[info]not_fade_away

July 8 2004, 22:48:30 UTC 7 years ago

I have no interests?

I got none whatsoever :(

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 01:15:10 UTC 7 years ago

*looks at your interest list*

The problem is that all of those are very common interests, and the program only looks at interests that fewer than 20 people list (none of the ones on your list) otherwise it would take too long to run. Sorry!

[info]jennae

July 9 2004, 01:30:14 UTC 7 years ago

I was all excited about this meme, however, the interests that came back were all so damn ordinary. I couldn't believe it was based on the most unusual shared interests. Bummer!

I'm sure that's not YOUR fault...I must just have lame friends. ;)

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 05:47:03 UTC 7 years ago

Yes, I might make an alternative version that filters out the most common interests from the results to avoid this problem - or if I don't one of the other commenters above was saying he might.

[info]o0olellyo0o

July 9 2004, 02:45:37 UTC 7 years ago

problem...

i've tried this a few times and it gets to step 3 "retrieving other users interests" and says done and then no results show up...I've left the window open for a long time...
i know i have some unusual interests, so I'm a bit confused??

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 05:45:29 UTC 7 years ago

Re: problem...

That sometimes happens for people who have a lot of unusual interests - the program just gets overloaded and breaks. Sometimes if you wait a bit and try again when there aren't as many other people using it, it then works.

[info]o0olellyo0o

7 years ago

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[info]pedrofeo

7 years ago

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Deleted comment

[info]ixwin

July 9 2004, 09:01:03 UTC 7 years ago

Re: should I be interested in Letters? WTF?

Okay, that's just weird...looks like the scores have gone strange as well.

I'll have a look at the code to see if I can work out what's going wrong and get you a result that makes a bit more sense...

[info]ixwin

7 years ago

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