Social Network Event Invitation Suggestion System

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Solution Overview

Problem

Social networking systems face challenges in helping users comprehensively select appropriate connections to invite to events due to large numbers of connections and the difficulty in identifying interested individuals.

Innovation Solution

A social networking system suggests users to invite to events based on factors such as location, availability, affinity between users, event history, and other user profiles to predict the likelihood of attendance and invitation acceptance.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Ease of operation

If a user manually selects connections to invite to an event from their entire connection list, then the user can choose invitees based on personal judgment, but the process becomes cumbersome and time-consuming due to the large number of connections

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveease of selecting inviteesVSAvoidtime to identify and select invitees
Core Design Contradiction:
Ease of operationVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The system pre-calculates and stores affinity scores between user pairs based on historical interaction data, co-attendance patterns, and social graph analysis. When event invitation is needed, these pre-computed scores are immediately retrieved and used to generate suggestions, eliminating the need for real-time manual evaluation of each connection.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system automatically generates and updates affinity scores and event suggestions without requiring user intervention. The affinity calculation engine continuously processes interaction data, co-attendance records, and connection information to maintain up-to-date recommendation lists, allowing the system to serve itself rather than requiring manual curation.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #25Self-service

2Reliability

If a user invites all connections to an event, then all potential attendees are covered, but irrelevant or uninterested connections are included reducing event quality

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveaccuracy of invitee selectionVSAvoidcomprehensiveness of invitation coverage
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSProductivity

Solution Approach 1:

The system applies different selection criteria and affinity thresholds based on event characteristics. For example, professional events may prioritize connections with high work-related interaction scores, while social events may emphasize co-attendance history and personal interaction frequency. This localized quality approach ensures each event receives appropriately tailored invitee suggestions.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #3Local quality

Solution Approach 2:

The affinity calculation incorporates multiple dynamic parameters including interaction frequency, recency of interactions, types of interactions (messages, likes, comments), co-attendance history, and explicit relationship indicators. These parameters are weighted and combined to produce a composite affinity score that dynamically adjusts based on the specific user pair and event context, enabling precise filtering of relevant invitees.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #35Parameter changes

3Measurement precision

If the system suggests users based on comprehensive analysis of multiple factors, then the quality of suggestions improves, but the computational complexity and data processing requirements increase

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveprecision of attendance predictionVSAvoidcomplexity of prediction system
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The affinity calculation system is divided into independent modular components: interaction analysis module, co-attendance analysis module, social graph analysis module, and score aggregation module. Each module processes specific aspects of user relationships independently and produces intermediate results that are combined to form the final affinity score. This segmentation allows parallel processing and reduces computational bottlenecks.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The system pre-computes and stores affinity scores for all user pairs in the social network, updating them periodically or triggered by significant interaction events. This pre-computation approach transforms complex real-time calculations into simple lookups during event creation, dramatically reducing the computational burden at the moment of invitation and allowing the system to handle large-scale networks efficiently.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

Data Source

PatentUS10601761B2Generating guest suggestions for events in a social networking system
Publication Date: 2020.03.24 META PLATFORMS INC
  • US10601761B2 patent drawing
  • US10601761B2 patent drawing
  • US10601761B2 patent drawing

AI summary

Social networking system users may create events where a group of other users invited to the event meet at a specified time and location. The social networking system suggests users to invite to an event based on a prediction that the users would attend the event if invited. Various factors may be used to make the prediction, such as an affinity between the inviting user and the other users, the availability of the other users at the time of the event and/or the proximity of the other users to the location of the event. An inviting user receives the suggested users and selects suggested users to invite to the event or invitations may be automatically sent to the suggested users by the social networking system.