Of all the announcements at the “It’s Only Rock and Roll” Apple event, I was initially most excited for Genius for the App Store. As an iPhone-lover and friend of more than a few iPhone developers, I was really hoping this could add discoverability to the App Store and help some unsung heroes get attention.

No such luck. It mainly seems to recommend apps that do exactly what apps I already have on my phone do.

Then came OS 3.1 and with it, Genius for apps. Woo hoo! Even off the bat we could see that Apple’s recommendation solution wasn’t going to be ideal but at least it was a good start, right? Unfortunately, not so much. As you may have read elsewhere by now, many people — us included — have found Apple’s Genius recommendations a bit lacking so far. In fact, the system is basically laughable at this point. Now, many of you probably already know this but recommendation systems are tricky business to say the least. The technology behind them is extremely complex and the amount of information considered can be staggering. That said, there are many companies out there that have done incredible things with the science of recommendations. Apple probably should have worked with one of them.

While iTunes Genius seems to base it’s recommendations off of the purchases of like-minded individuals, App Store Genius feels as though it’s pulling random apps from similar categories and dumping them in your lap.  Paypal was recommended based on my use of CBC Radio.  NFL 2010 was recommended because I have Pac-Man Remix.  While these things might technically fall under the same category, their purposes and audiences couldn’t be less similar.

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Looking at your purchases on the whole and making recommendations based on those might have made a little more sense.  If it did Genius would learn pretty quick how much I love tower defense games, and recommendations of those would have been a welcome addition to the sea of nonsense that’s currently presented.  It may break from the system used by iTunes Genius, but maybe that’s what’s needed here.  Music and apps are two very different beasts, and those beasts need two very different approaches to be tackled effectively.