Recommendation system with reduced bias based on a view history

A computer-implemented method, comprising:

• accessing, by at least one computer processor, a view history of a user account, the view history stored in and accessed from a storage device accessible by the at least one computer processor, the view history collected from a media device associated with the user account, the view history comprising at least a first item and a second item viewed by the user account in sequence within a predetermined time interval, the first item and the second item viewed on a display device associated with the media device, the storage device storing a plurality of view histories associated with a plurality of user accounts and collected from a plurality of media devices, the plurality of user accounts including the user account and a plurality of additional user accounts;
• generating a co-watch graph based on the view history of the user account, wherein the co-watch graph comprises a plurality of nodes including a first node corresponding to the first item viewed by the user account, a second node corresponding to the second item viewed by the user account, and an edge between the first node and the second node;
• for a current item being viewed by the user account represented by a current node of the co-watch graph, selecting, based on the co-watch graph, a recommended item represented by an associated node in the co-watch graph, wherein the selecting the recommended item comprises:
• generating an ordered sequence of nodes of the co-watch graph coupled to the current node, wherein:
• each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes represents a corresponding item being viewed by the user account,
• each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes has an adjusted node weight respectively based on a context of the respective node and a predetermined watching history context factor, and
• at least one pair of nodes in the ordered sequence of nodes has an ordered-pair edge between a first ordered node of the pair of nodes and a second ordered node of the pair of nodes, a weight of the ordered-pair edge representing a number of co-occurrence times that a first item represented by the first ordered node and a second item represented by the second ordered node have been viewed in sequence within the predetermined time interval, the weight of the ordered-pair edge being adjusted to remove bias;
• for each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes, determining a corresponding probability of the corresponding item being viewed by the user account based on a corpus including a plurality of items viewed by a plurality of additional user accounts;
• and
• selecting the recommended item as represented by a maximal node of the ordered sequence of nodes having a maximal probability of being viewed by the user account among the probabilities of the corresponding items of each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes;
• determining a probability that the recommended item will be viewed by the user account as the maximal probability of being viewed by the user account;
• and
• commanding the media device to display the recommended item on the display device based on the selection of the recommended item.

A non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one computing device, cause the at least one computing device to perform operations comprising:

• accessing a view history of a user account, the view history stored in and accessed from a storage device accessible by the at least one computing device, the view history collected from a media device associated with the user account, the view history comprising at least a first item and a second item viewed by the user account in sequence within a predetermined time interval, the first item and the second item viewed on a display device associated with the media device, the storage device storing a plurality of view histories associated with a plurality of user accounts and collected from a plurality of media devices, the plurality of user accounts including the user account and a plurality of additional user accounts;
• generating a co-watch graph based on the view history of the user account, wherein the co-watch graph comprises a plurality of nodes including a first node corresponding to the first item viewed by the user account, a second node corresponding to the second item viewed by the user account, and an edge between the first node and the second node;
• for a current item being viewed by the user account represented by a current node of the co-watch graph, selecting, based on the co-watch graph, a recommended item represented by an associated node in the co-watch graph, wherein the selecting the recommended item comprises:
• generating an ordered sequence of nodes of the co-watch graph coupled to the current node, wherein:
• each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes represents a corresponding item being viewed by the user account,
• each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes has an adjusted node weight respectively based on a context of the respective node and a predetermined watching history context factor, and
• at least one pair of nodes in the ordered sequence of nodes has an ordered-pair edge between a first ordered node of the pair of nodes and a second ordered node of the pair of nodes, a weight of the ordered-pair edge representing a number of co-occurrence times that a first item represented by the first ordered node and a second item represented by the second ordered node have been viewed in sequence within the predetermined time interval, the weight of the ordered-pair edge being adjusted to remove bias;
• for each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes, determining a corresponding probability of the corresponding item being viewed by the user account based on a corpus including a plurality of items viewed by a plurality of additional user accounts;
• and
• selecting the recommended item as represented by a maximal node of the ordered sequence of nodes having a maximal probability of being viewed by the user account among the probabilities of the corresponding items of each respective node of the ordered sequence of nodes;
• determining a probability that the recommended item will be viewed by the user account as the maximal probability of being viewed by the user account;
• and
• commanding the media device to display the recommended item on the display device based on the selection of the recommended item.