Social Graph Watch System for Influential People Tracking

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Solution Overview

Problem

Current social networks lack the ability to effectively track and provide information on influential individuals, as they often do not promote themselves and prefer to maintain a low profile, leading to information being presented in a flat format without connections between individuals.

Innovation Solution

A system that organizes information using a social graph, continuously updates data by crawling various sources, and allows users to track influential people, providing context on their connections and relationships.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Ease of operation

If social networks use a flat information format to present user data, then the system complexity is reduced and ease of operation is improved, but the ability to show connections and relationships between individuals is lost

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveease of information presentationVSAvoidconnection information
Core Design Contradiction:
Ease of operationVSLoss of information

Solution Approach 1:

The patent transitions from flat, two-dimensional information presentation to a multi-dimensional social graph structure. Nodes represent entities (people, organizations) and edges represent relationships between them, adding the dimension of connectivity and relationships to the information architecture. This allows the system to maintain operational simplicity while preserving and visualizing connection information through graph-based data structures and path-finding algorithms.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #17Another dimension (Dimensionality change)

2Loss of information

If the system tracks influential people who maintain a low profile, then the value and relevance of information increases, but the difficulty of detecting and measuring their connections increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveinformation valueVSAvoidconnection detection difficulty
Core Design Contradiction:
Loss of informationVSDifficulty of detecting and measuring

Solution Approach 1:

The system uses intermediary entities (such as shared connections, common organizations, or mutual acquaintances) as mediators to detect and establish connections between influential people who maintain low profiles. By tracking these intermediary nodes in the social graph, the system can indirectly discover and measure relationships between target individuals without requiring direct interaction or self-promotion from the influential people themselves.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

Solution Approach 2:

The system performs preliminary actions by proactively crawling and indexing information from multiple sources (websites, social media, public records) to build comprehensive profiles of influential people and their connections before users need to query them. This advance preparation reduces the difficulty of detecting connections when tracking requests are made, as the foundational data structure is already in place.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

3Reliability

If the system continuously updates information by crawling multiple sources, then the reliability and currentness of data improves, but the use of energy and computational resources increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvedata currentnessVSAvoidcomputational energy consumption
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSUse of energy by moving object

Solution Approach 1:

The system implements periodic action by scheduling crawling and updates at specific intervals rather than continuously. Information sources are crawled periodically, and the social graph is updated at discrete time points, reducing computational energy consumption while maintaining data reliability. The system balances update frequency with resource constraints, ensuring information remains current without requiring constant processing.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #19Periodic action

Solution Approach 2:

The system applies partial action by selectively crawling and updating only those portions of the social graph that have changed or are relevant to user interests. Rather than processing the entire database continuously, the system focuses computational resources on specific nodes, edges, or information sources that require updates, reducing overall energy consumption while maintaining data reliability for tracked entities.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #16Partial or excessive action

Data Source

PatentUS9443274B1System watches for new paths to a target in a social graph
Publication Date: 2016.09.13 ALTRATA INC
  • US9443274B1 patent drawing
  • US9443274B1 patent drawing
  • US9443274B1 patent drawing

AI summary

A system gathers information on important and influential people and builds a social graph. The information is organized based on this social graph and provided to users as a service. The system continually updates information in the social graph by crawling websites and other sources of information. When a user wants to keep updated with a person of the system, the user can establish a watch. The system processes the requirements of the user from the watch and alerts the user when the requirements are met.