Social Network Augmented Search Results Filtering
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing communication regulations have been ineffective in reducing unwanted communications, as they do not cover international telemarketers and overseas email spammers, and new forms of communication such as IM, SMS, and data feeds are becoming increasingly burdensome.
Innovation Solution
Implementing trust-metric networks that prioritize and filter communications based on social network relationships, allowing users to restrict and target messages within specified social distances and affinity groups, using social distance and affinity group metrics to determine the relevance and trustworthiness of communications.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If regulations are passed to reduce unwanted communications, then the amount of unwanted communication should decrease, but work-arounds emerge that bypass these regulations
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback mechanisms where users provide ratings and feedback about communications they receive. This feedback is used to adjust trust metrics dynamically, allowing the system to adapt to new spam patterns and work-arounds. The feedback loop enables continuous improvement of filtering accuracy without requiring new regulations.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces trust metrics and social network relationships as intermediary layers between senders and receivers. These intermediaries evaluate and filter communications before they reach the user, blocking unwanted communications from overseas spammers and international telemarketers without requiring direct regulation of them.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If trust-metric networks are implemented to filter communications, then unwanted communications are reduced, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent makes existing social network infrastructure serve multiple functions: it provides social connectivity, generates trust metrics, enables communication filtering, and delivers targeted advertising. By making the social network universal and multi-functional, the system reduces complexity compared to building separate specialized systems for each function.
Solution Approach 2:
The system enables users to automatically generate their own trust metrics based on their social network relationships and communication patterns. Users self-manage their filtering preferences and the system automatically adjusts trust scores based on user behavior, reducing the need for complex centralized management.
3Measurement precision
If social network relationships are used to prioritize search results, then result relevance is improved, but processing time increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent pre-calculates and stores trust metrics, social network relationships, and affinity group memberships before searches are performed. This preliminary preparation allows the search system to quickly retrieve and apply pre-computed relevance data without performing complex calculations in real-time, thus maintaining high relevance while reducing processing time.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies different weighting and processing to different portions of search results based on local characteristics. Search results from high-trust sources within the user's social network receive different treatment than results from low-trust sources, allowing efficient prioritization without uniformly processing all results with the same complexity.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for a computer server includes receiving search criteria from a first user at a remote client, receiving a first identifier associated with the first user, performing a search to determine a plurality of search results including a first and a second search result, determining a first rating from a second user associated with the first search result, determining a first social network indicia from the second user to the first user within a social network, determining a second rating from a third user associated with the second search result, determining a second social network indicia from the third user to the first user within the social network, providing the first search result to the remote client including the first rating and the first social network indicia, and providing the second search result to the remote client including the second rating and the second social network indicia.