I wanted to start a conversation about a measurement that I think is problematic: gender.

Here are some of the issues I see with it:

• Potential confusion between sex and gender: although the definitions vary vastly between regions, countries, languages and cultures, a more modern, respectful and accurate language (as I understand it) would be to use "male" and "female" as units of sex, and "man" and "woman" as units of gender (even if the reality is that gender and sex are very much interconnected).
• Strong binary enforced: only two answers are possible here. If we are talking about sex, this is ignoring a very significant part of the population who is intersex. If we are talking about gender, enforcing this binary goes against the reality of gender diversity, and risks being insulting to artists by misgendering them. Given the diversity of gender identities, classifying gender in AcousticBrainz is not feasible.

I am not exactly sure what the way forward should be, but in my opinion, what is looked at here could be named better (probably "sex" rather than "gender"), come with a strong disclaimer, and use looser categories (for example "male-sounding" and "female-sounding"). However, this is far from ideal, in my opinion. Consider for example the diversity in sex and gender in the transgender community.

This model is the only model that really qualifies the person rather than the song, which is why it has to be handled carefully and thoughtfully.

We might also ask ourselves: depending on the accuracy of the modelling, how much value is there in the data, and does the value justify the problems that inevitably come with it? If it is not possible to design a model and use language that are respectful to all, should we even have it?