The Algorithm Has Taste Now. Does It Have Judgement?

Eighteenth-century automata astonished courts by imitating life: a bird that sang, a frog that hopped. Today’s recommendation engines imitate something subtler: taste.

Optimising for the average

Algorithms learn from what most people click. Luxury depends on what most people cannot have. The two logics collide quietly, every time a feed nudges a shopper toward the best-seller instead of the piece that makes the collection.

Keeping a human hand on the dial

The answer is not to abandon personalisation but to edit it: curated rails written by people, rules that protect scarcity, and a willingness to show customers something they did not ask for.