OBTAINING TRUSTED RECOMMENDATIONS THROUGH DISCOVERY OF COMMON CONTACTS IN CONTACT LISTS

• US 20100125599A1
• Filed: 11/17/2008
• Published: 05/20/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/17/2008
• Status: Active Application

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: CHENG, TSZ S., FITZPATRICK, GREGORY P.
• Application Number:
  US12/272,225
• Publication Number:
  US 20100125599A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/771
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

The present invention discloses a solution for obtaining trusted recommendations through discovery of common contacts in contact lists. The solution can utilize private contact lists (e.g., address book, phone lists) to permit users to search for and obtain trusted recommendations for a product and/or service. The presence of a contact in a contact list is recognized as recommendation of that contact. Recommendations can be determined through searching private contact lists and obtaining implicit relationships based on common contacts of multiple contact lists. Searches can be customized allowing recommendations to reflect results with high probability of confidence. Recommendations can also be affected by the degrees of separation between contact lists, professional peer relationships, expertise of contact list owner, and the like. Recommendation results can provide trusted recommendations for products and/or services without relying on potentially erroneous input.

Claims

1. A method for providing trusted recommendations comprising:

receiving at least one of a plurality of user established search criteria for a desired good or service;

searching a plurality of contact lists for included entries of entities which provide the desired good or service and that satisfy the user established criteria, wherein each searched contact list is a contact list of another user linked through at least one common contact to a contact list of a user from whom the user established criteria is received; and

generating a result set of entities satisfying the user established criteria from the searching.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the search is modified to search for at least one alias of the user established search criteria, wherein the alias is a synonym term and a taxonomy.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the user established search criteria is the limiting of the number of degrees of separation for the search to span, wherein each degree of separation corresponds to a contact list linked through another contact list by a common contact.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the contact lists are private lists.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the contact lists are exposed via at least one of a subscribable interface and a publishable mechanism.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the contact list is a user established contact list.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the contact list is an automatically generated contact list.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating step includes a degree of separation calculation for at least one entity in the result set.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein each entry in the result set is associated with a confidence rating, wherein the confidence rating indicates the degree of reliability.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the result set is sanitized, wherein the sanitization is the removal of personally identifiable information.

11. A system for providing trusted recommendations comprising:

a search query associated with at least one user established search criteria;

a contact list manager capable of handling a plurality of contact lists, wherein each contact list is associated with another contact list through a common entity;

a recommendation engine configured to determine at least one result set from the user established search criteria; and

a search augmenter able to establish at least one alias for a user established criteria for which the recommendation engine can improve the result set.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein a user established criteria is matched against at least one attribute found in the contact lists.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the contact manager is able to build a unique contact list, wherein the contact list is comprised of contact information gathered from at least one of a plurality of contact lists associated with the owner of the contact list.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein the recommendation engine is a Web service.

15. A computer program product for trusted recommendations comprising a computer usable medium having computer usable program code embodied therewith, the computer usable program code comprising:

computer usable program code configured to receive at least one of a plurality of user established search criteria for a desired good or service;

computer usable program code configured to search a plurality of contact lists for included entries of entities which provide the desired good or service and that satisfy the user established criteria, wherein each searched contact list is a contact list of another user linked through at least one common contact to a contact list of a user from whom the user established criteria is received; and

computer usable program code configured to generate a result set of entities satisfying the user established criteria from the searching.

16. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the search is modified to search for at least one alias of the user established search criteria, wherein the alias is a synonym term and a taxonomy.

17. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the user established search criteria is the limiting of the number of degrees of separation for the search to span, wherein each degree of separation corresponds to a contact list linked through another contact list by a common contact.

18. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the contact lists are private lists.

19. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the contact lists are exposed via at least one of a subscribable interface and a publishable mechanism.

20. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the contact list is an automatically generated contact list.