A lot of people comment on youtube videos. A LOT! Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance has more than 1 million comments. What are all those people talking about? Since I’m too lazy to actually read the comments, I’m taking a different approach: I’m building a Markov Model Lady Gaga Fan Simulator (MMLGFS).

The MMLGFS will require training, taking some comments as input. After this, you are able to actually talk to it. Just provide the first 2 words and the model will output the rest of the phrase. Check out the code here.

Now that we have a virtual Lady Gaga fan, let’s ask him some questions:

Web Mining for Dummies reporter: Who are you?
Lady Gaga fan: I am… aspiring to become a succesful pokemon trainer.

WMfD: How would you describe Lady Gaga’s music?
LGf: Her music… is the best christmas gift ever.

WMfD: What’s the hidden meaning of this song?
LGf: It’s… about being in bed with another guy.

WMfD: And how do you feel about that?
LGf:I like… a few but i was apparently wrong as i caught her in all videos and tweet peoplechoiceawardsgaga.

WMfD: A lot of people think Jennifer Lopez is so much cooler. What do you think?
LGf: Jennifer Lopez… and pitbull is worse and they still wiped the floor is going to say stupid things btw is the latest dreamwork animation puss in boots.

WMfD: Thank you for this interview, mister fan, and have a nice day.
LGf: You are… going to the paradise because of this song so please support a dedicated and hungry newartist from seattle you will be funded for my mp3player anyone have suggestions like heavy metal or alternative.

Let’s try a different example (or people will say I am making fun of Lady Gaga [which I am, btw]). This time, I’m choosing lecture 1 from Stanford’s Machine Learning course, presented by Andrew Ng. Side note: Stanford announced a set of new free online courses starting January/February 2012, like Natural Language Processing or Game Theory:

There were only about 180 comments for this model, so it’s not as advanced as the previous one. Still, it does turn out to be silly:

WMfD: Why do you follow Andrew Ng’s lectures on Youtube?
Machine Learning student: It is… a much better experience than listening to my boring professor at our university.

WMfD: Did you find the lectures useful?
MLs: I know… some people who like to learn after my day job very useful and it will even make us realize more the complexity of our mind and the power of the creator who designed it.

WMfD: What would you tell Andrew Ng if you met him?
MLs: Andrew Ng… thanks stanford for the knowledge that i ve always been wanting to learn will not give it consciousness instead it will give me an opportunity learning something valuable for free but for real.

WLfD: Thank you for your time.
MLs: You are… a terrorist.