In an age of online shopping, commercial algorithms and streamed entertainment, most of us rarely face up to things that have not been digitally matched to our previous interests or prejudices. Few will have avoided the suggestion "if you've enjoyed X, then you'll like Y and Z" as they surf the internet looking for books, films or music."
But now there are efforts to fight back against it. In both the arts and the media, a series of new projects are celebrating the importance of coming across the unexpected.
A new self-help book by Neil Farber; an American academic and doctor focuses on the vital role that chance plays in enriching our lives and thoughts. An unconventional service, Trade Journal Cooperative is offering to send a random publication direct to your door four times a year, from Professional Pasta to American Funeral Director or Plumber Magazine.
A new radio app, Stack, deliberately delivers music chosen by someone else. Stack has been set up in response to the vast areas of unknown music available to download. The music on Stack is instead chosen by a number of DJs and musicians and, importantly, listeners cannot influence what it plays. "It's not designed around your usage," says Wigram, who is an art dealer. "But it removes the anxiety of having to 'like', or 'liking' something by mistake, and suddenly being recommended tracks that you don't even like. Algorithms reduce diversity and chance. And it's that element of chance, of discovering a new track, that an algorithm can't compete with. I do believe that human beings can do it better than algorithms."
So the hope for an interesting future, according to Wigram, depends upon a good mix of blind chance and trusted human recommendations — a bit like the shelves of the old independent record stores and bookshops.
