Princeton Undergraduates Challenge For $1,000,000 NetFlix Prize

How good are undergrads from Princeton's Computer Science Department? When it comes to solving the hardest problems, they can beat just about anyone. This year, Lester Mackey '07, David Weiss '07 and David Lin (Math '07) took part in the NetFlix challenge to improve their movie rating system. Despite stiff competition against 2000 other competitors, many of whom were professionals with Ph.D.s, the Princeton trio was actually leading the competition 1 day prior to the competition deadline on October 1st, 2007. At the last moment, they were overtaken by a group of researchers from AT&T labs and the University of Toronto and wound up finishing second -- an unbelievable result for a group of kids using their free time to compete against the best the rest of the world could offer. Read the full article at the Princeton Paw.