On Tuesday, Mai 06^th, there will be another DAS Lecture in Lecture Hall I (Christian Doppler), Jakob-Haringer-Straße 2a.

The Univ.-Prof.ⁱⁿ Mag.^a Dipl.-Ing.ⁱⁿ Dr.ⁱⁿ Christine Bauer will be the speaker on the topic:: You Can’t Always Get What You Want: When Algorithms Try But Biases Persist.

Algorithms increasingly shape what we see, hear, and engage with in daily life. Recommender systems, in particular, aim to connect users with relevant content through personalization mechanisms—yet, they often reproduce and amplify existing societal biases. In this talk, I examine the persistence of systematic biases, focusing on the complex interactions between algorithmic models, user behavior, and feedback loops.
Drawing on empirical research in music recommender systems, I highlight how underlying distributional patterns can undermine fairness interventions. Beyond identifying challenges, I will discuss approaches that integrate algorithmic adjustments with broader socio-technical considerations, raising important questions about responsibility, design choices, and how to evaluate systems beyond traditional performance metrics. This work reflects my commitment to developing systems that serve both consumers and providers more equitably.

Christine Bauer is a Professor of Interactive Intelligent Systems at the University of Salzburg and a Co-Lead of the focus area “InterMediation. Music—Effect—Analysis” at Wissenschaft & Kunst. She is involved in the EXDIGIT initiative, emphasizing interdisciplinary technologies in digital sciences.
Her research lies at the intersection of human-centered computing, data science, and artificial intelligence—with a focus on context-aware recommender systems, particularly in music and media. Her core interests include fairness and multi-method evaluation.
Her multidisciplinary background drives her research activities. She holds a Doctoral degree in Social and Economic Sciences (Business Informatics) and a Diploma in International Business Administration, both from the University in Vienna. Furthermore, she holds an MSc in Business Informatics from TU Wien. She also studied Jazz Saxophone at the Konservatorium der Stadt Wien. Throughout her academic career, she has held positions at various institutions in four countries, including Utrecht University, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Carnegie Mellon University, and WU Vienna.
She serves on the Editorial Boards of ACM Transactions on Recommender Systems (TORS), ACM Transactions on Information Systems (TOIS), and Information Technology & Tourism (JITT), and is active in initiatives like Women in Music Information Retrieval (WiMIR) and LEA (Let’s empower Austria). Christine has received several best paper awards, recognitions for her reviewing activities, and is an Elise Richter laureate.
For more, visit  https://christinebauer.eu.