Let’s F*ck the Algorithm
Drowning in dross? It's your own damn fault...
During COVID-19 lockdowns, we all streamed a bunch of terrible shows. At the time we thought the Tiger King and Emily in Paris were just a bit of harmless fun.
Now, a few years down the track, the streaming algorithm is here for its pound of flesh. It’s happily spraying an undiluted stream of stinking digital bong water in our eyes because we once watched Designated Survivor.
Like most forms of artificial intelligence (A.I.), the algo thinks it’s doing what it thinks we want it to do.
It’s the digital equivalent of that distant relative who gives you a stuffed toy frog every freakin’ Christmas because once, out of politeness, you said you liked them.
You have become ‘frog cousin’ in the same way that Netflix has me pegged as a ‘zombie-apocalypse-meets-disco-documentaries’ guy. Which, to be fair, is just about bang on.
What A.I. fails to understand about human nature, however, is that we rarely want the things we want. As the Go-Betweens once put it, ‘I want surprises, just like spring rain!’
Taking back control
So, what can be done to put the algo back in its box? You could get all nerdy, open all your accounts, and erase your past to reset your future. But as anyone who’s watched plenty of middling sci-fi shows with this exact plot can tell you, it never ends well.
A better option is to ignore the computer generated corporate prompts and seek personal recommendations from family and friends instead. Slowly but surely, this will retrain that pushy A.I. bastard to give you ‘better’ rather than ‘more’.
In that spirit, here’s a pair of fantastic shows that for some reason never found the audiences they should have.
Tales From the Tour Bus
Two seasons of mixed live action and animated musical documentary narrated by award-winning animator Mike Judge. The first season dives headlong into the cray-cray would of American country music. As you would imagine, booze, heartache, drugs and madness feature heavily. Less expected is the Shakespearean tragedy of George Jones and his make-believe duck. Season two tackles the fractured freakadelic, funk-outs of early 70s black music. The story of Bootsy Collins accidently spiking James Brown’s soft drink with industrial strength LSD would be salutatory if it wasn’t so funny. It’s on Binge.
The Leftovers
Relax, it’s not a political documentary about the post-Morrison Liberal Party, though it does wallow in a similar swamp. It’s a dark yet jaunty series that poses the question: what would happen to the rest of us if a random 2% of the world’s population suddenly disappeared one day? Spoiler: we basically lose our shit. The third season is set in Australia and features a congregation of naked lion worshippers holding an orgy aboard the Spirit of Tasmania in Bass Strait. And if that doesn’t drag you in, the algo has won. It’s on HBO.