FOLLOWING ONLINE SOCIAL BEHAVIOR TO ENHANCE SEARCH EXPERIENCE

• US 20120095976A1
• Filed: 10/13/2010
• Published: 04/19/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 10/13/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Hebenthal, Douglas C., Saretto, Cesare J., Mulcahy, Kathleen P., Allard, James E.
• Granted Patent: US 9,679,060 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/706
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9536 Search customisation based on social or collaborative filtering

Abstract

Systems and methods are disclosed for customizing a user'"'"'s experience with an application such as a search engine application. The user'"'"'s experience is customized based on inferring a mood and/or interests of the user at least in part from an analysis of the user'"'"'s posts on one or more social media sites. The search engine application is configured to include a user-following engine which follows a user'"'"'s activities on social media websites. By tracking a user'"'"'s posts and other activity on social media websites, and possibly those of his or her friends, the user-following engine is able to draw inferences about a user, including for example the user'"'"'s emotional state, current trending interests, future plans, likes/dislikes and aspirations. The user-following engine may then customize the user'"'"'s search experience based on these drawn inferences.

Claims

1. A method of enhancing a user interaction with a privileged application, comprising:

(a) following the online activity of a user on one or more social media sites;

(b) analyzing the user activity on the social media sites followed in said step (a) to correlate the user'"'"'s activity with a user'"'"'s interests and/or mood; and

(c) customizing the user experience with the privileged application based on the interests and/or mood of the user correlated in said step (b).

2. The method of claim 1, said step (b) of analyzing the user activity on the social media sites comprising the step of analyzing the user posts on the one or more social media sites to detect indicators of the users interests and/or mood.

3. The method of claim 2, said step of analyzing the user posts on the one or more social media sites to detect indicators of the user'"'"'s interests and/or mood comprising the step of performing at least one of a key word search of text, object recognition of graphics and video and speech recognition of audio on content or metadata associated with that content to determine the presence and frequency of key words, objects and speech.

4. The method of claim 1, said step (b) further comprising the step of following the online activity of one or more friends to aid in determining the user'"'"'s interest and/or mood.

5. The method of claim 2, said step of analyzing the user posts on the one or more social media sites to detect indicators of the user'"'"'s interests and/or mood comprising the step of analyzing user posts on the one or more social media sites to detect indicators of emotion, trending interests, geographical interests, temporal event interests, affinities, aversions and aspirations.

6. The method of claim 1, said step (a) of following the online activity of a user on one or more social media sites comprising the step of obtaining an ID of a user on the one or more social media sites and copying the user posts into an index containing all user posts.

7. The method of claim 1, said step (c) of customizing the user experience comprising the step of customizing the appearance of a graphical user interface for the privileged application based on the interests and/or mood of the user correlated in said step (b).

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the privileged application is a search processing environment, said step (c) of customizing the user experience comprising the step of customizing the search results returned by a search engine of the search processing environment based on the interests and/or mood of the user correlated in said step (b).

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the privileged application is a search processing environment, said step (c) of customizing the user experience comprising the step of disambiguating the search results returned by a search engine of the search processing environment based on the interests and/or mood of the user correlated in said step (b).

10. A system for inferring a mood and/or interests of a user at least in part based on the user'"'"'s interaction with one or more social media sites, the system comprising:

a user-following engine including;

a gathering engine for following the user to the one or more social media sites, and

one or more processing modules for analyzing the posts identified by the gathering engine and inferring the mood and/or interests of the user from the posts; and

a data store for storing indications of the mood and/or interests inferred by the one or more processing modules.

11. The system of claim 10, the user-following engine and data store used in association with a search processing environment including a search engine.

12. The system of claim 11, the user-following engine further including a customization engine for customizing a user experience with the search processing environment based on the indications of mood and/or interests stored in the data store.

13. The system of claim 10, the user-following engine further including a setup module for obtaining a user ID on the one or more social media sites, and for generating a request to friend the user, sent via at least one social media site on which the user has a private profile.

14. The system of claim 10, the user-following engine further including a setup module allowing a user to delegate authority to the user-following engine to act as the user on the one or more social media sites.

15. The system of claim 10, the one or more processing modules further analyzing the posts gathered by the gathering engine for a group of users and inferring the mood and/or interests of the group or users.

16. The system of claim 15, further comprising a public opinion application for receiving data related to the mood and/or interests of the group of users and generating a public opinion on one or more topics related to the mood and/or interests of the group of users.

17. The system of claim 15, further comprising a prolific fan application for receiving data related to users of the system and identifying the users that have the most posts on the one or more social media sites relating to a given topic, and whose posts are read, shared, liked and/or mentioned by the most other users on the given topic.

18. In a computer system having a user interface including a display and a user interface selection device, a method of enhancing a user experience with a search processing environment including a search engine, the method comprising:

(a) inferring at least one of a mood of a user and an interest of the user from analysis of the user'"'"'s posts on one or more social media sites; and

(b) customizing the user'"'"'s interactive experience with the search processing environment via the user interface based at least in part on the mood and/or interest inferred for the user in said step (a).

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising the steps of:

(c) time stamping a mood and/or interest of the user at the time mood and/or interest is inferred, and

(d) lessening the degree to which the user'"'"'s interactive experience with the search processing environment is customized based on the mood and/or interest with a passage of time after the mood and/or interest is time stamped in said step (c).

20. The method of claim 18, further comprising the step of presenting the user with an option over the user interface to modify the mood and/or interest inferred for the user from analysis of the user'"'"'s posts on one or more social media sites.