Displaying Aggregated Social Networking System User Information Via A Map Interface

• US 20140082505A1
• Filed: 09/20/2012
• Published: 03/20/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 09/20/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Inventors: Watson, Thomas Andrew, McCord, Jonathan, Shaffer, Justin Alexander, Bayer, Ross David
• Granted Patent: US 9,766,783 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/738
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0484 for the control of specific functions or operations, e.g. selecting or manipulating an object, an image or a displayed text element, setting a parameter value or selecting a range
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking

Abstract

A map interface presents a geographic map with markers identifying geographic locations associated with content items. When the geographic distance between two or more content items is less than a threshold distance, multiple content items are grouped to create an aggregated content item. Based on the geographic locations associated with the grouped content items, a geographic location is associated with the aggregated content item. A single marker identifies the geographic location for the aggregated content item on the geographic map. When a user viewing the map interface accesses the single marker, content selected from the content items combined to generated the aggregated content item is presented as well as the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

presenting a map interface to a viewing user, the map interface presenting a marker identifying a geographic location associated with an aggregated content item on a geographic map, the aggregated content item including a plurality of content items each associated with a geographic location and a user of a social networking system;

receiving an interaction with the marker identifying the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item;

retrieving one or more content items included in the aggregated content item;

ranking the retrieved one or more content items based on one or more criteria;

selecting one or more content items from the retrieved one or more content items based at least in part on the ranking;

generating an information display associated with the aggregated content item, the information display including the selected one or more content items and the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item; and

presenting the information display to the viewing user.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein ranking the retrieved one or more content items based on one or more criteria comprises:

determining affinity of the viewing user for each of the retrieved one or more content items; and

selecting the one or more content items based at least in part on the determined affinities.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein selecting the one or more content items based at least in part on the determined affinities comprises:

selecting one or more content items for which the viewing user has the highest affinities.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein ranking the retrieved one or more content items based on one or more criteria comprises:

determining a time associated with each of the retrieved one or more content items; and

selecting the one or more content items based at least in part on the determined times.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein selecting one or more content items from the retrieved one or more content items based at least in part on the ranking comprises:

determining a content type associated with each of the retrieved one or more content items; and

selecting the one or more content items to include a specified amount of content items having a particular content type.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item is based at least in part on a zoom level used to present the map interface to the viewing user.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item includes a level of information proportional to the zoom level.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the interaction with the marker identifying the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item comprises positioning a cursor over the marker.

9. A method comprising:

presenting a map interface to a viewing user, the map interface presenting a marker identifying a geographic location associating with an aggregated content item, the aggregated content item including a plurality of content items each associated with a geographic location and a user of a social networking system;

receiving an interaction with the marker identifying the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item;

retrieving one or more content items included in the aggregated content item;

selecting one or more content items from the retrieved one or more content items based on one or more criteria;

generating a ranking of the selected one or more content items based on one or more attributes of the one or more content items;

ordering the selected one or more content items based at least in part on the ranking;

generating an information display associated with the aggregated content item, the information display including the selected one or more content items presented in the order and the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item; and

presenting the information display to the viewing user.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein generating the ranking of the selected one or more content items based on one or more attributes of the one or more content items comprises:

determining an affinity of the viewing user for each of the selected one or more content items; and

ordering the selected one or more content items based at least in part on the determined affinities.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein ordering the selected one or more content items based at least in part on the determined affinities comprises:

ordering the selected one or more content items in descending order based on the determined affinities.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein generating the ranking of the selected one or more content items based on one or more attributes of the one or more content items comprises:

determining a time associated with each of the selected one or more content items; and

ordering the selected one or more content items based at least in part on the determined times.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item is based at least in part on a zoom level used to present the map interface to the viewing user.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the geographic location associated with the aggregated content item includes a level of information proportional to the zoom level.

15. The method of claim 9, wherein the presenting the information display to the viewing user comprises:

displaying the information display in conjunction with the map interface.