When you fire up Netflix, you’re looking at it...and it’s looking back at you. Which is weird, right? Even though you already paid for Netflix’s entire service, and even though it shouldn’t matter to Netflix how you spend your time there, every image you see is calibrated to sell you what they’ve decided you want. Did you know that process is going on? And did you know they might know some things about you that’d surprise you?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt sits down with Jason Pargin (better known as David Wong) to explore Jason’s latest column, their shared Netflix histories, and what that system means for every one of us. They’ll examine the burgeoning new-ish field of data science, its laughable limitations, and its about-to-explode future. They’ll dig into businesses that already stick entire segments of the population with lousy choices, just because the businesses decided those people are A Specific Segment. And they’ll consider the inevitable world of number-crunched choices we could all get stuck with if companies don’t treat us like actual people.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/ZdxLqo