Adaptive Audiences For Claims In A Social Networking System

• US 20140215578A1
• Filed: 04/01/2014
• Published: 07/31/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 04/24/2012
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Inventors: Lessin, Samuel, Sittig, Aaron, Shaffer, Justin Alexander
• Application Number:
  US14/231,749
• Publication Number:
  US 20140215578A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 726/4
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/10 for controlling access to devices or network resources

Abstract

A social graph may be modeled as a collection of claims. Each claim is associated with an author, an audience, and an assertion about a fact. Probabilistic information may be collected from various sources for a claim, enabling a social networking system to evaluate a truthfulness of the assertion made in the claim. User-declared profile information may be evaluated as claims. A user, entity, or application may make claims about any assertions made in the social networking system. Reputation scores may be determined for users based on evaluations of their historical assertions. Claims may be evaluated for truthfulness using a probabilistic prediction model using heuristics analysis, regression analysis, and machine learning methods. A claims-based profile of users may be provided to viewers based on the contexts in which the claims were made. Viewers may view claims made about users, such as the users'"'"' biographical information, contact information, expertise, and interests.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

maintaining a plurality of claim objects based on a plurality of actions performed by one or more agents of a social networking system, where each claim object represents a claim comprising an assertion made to an audience;

receiving a request from a viewing agent for a plurality of claims about a subject agent of the social networking system;

retrieving a subset of the plurality of claim objects, where the subset of the plurality of claim objects are associated with the subject agent; and

for each claim object of the subset of the plurality of claim objects associated with the subject agent,

determining an accessibility of the claim object by the viewing agent based on the audience of the claim object;

responsive to the viewing agent having access to the claim object based on the determined accessibility of the claim object, providing the claim object to the viewing agent;

responsive to the viewing agent not having access the claim object based on the determined accessibility of the claim object, sending an access request for the claim object to the subject agent; and

responsive to receiving an approval of the access request for the claim object, providing the claim object to the viewing agent.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

for each claim object of the subset of the plurality of claim objects associated with the subject agent,

responsive to receiving an approval regarding the access request for the claim object,

redefining the audience for the claim object to further comprise the viewing agent, and

storing the redefined audience in the claim object in the social networking system.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving a request from a viewing agent for a plurality of claims about a subject agent of the social networking system further comprises:

receiving from a viewing agent a request to view a claims-based profile of the subject agent, where the claims-based profile includes the plurality of claims made about the subject agent.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving a request from a viewing agent for a plurality of claims about a subject agent of the social networking system further comprises:

receiving from a viewing agent a request to view one or more content items on the social networking system associated the subject agent, where the subject agent has been tagged in the one or more content items.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more content items further comprises one or more status updates on the social networking system.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more content items further comprises one or more photos uploaded on the social networking system.

7. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more content items further comprises one or more location check-in events on the social networking system.

8. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more content items further comprises one or more events on the social networking system.

9. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more content items further comprises one or more contact information items about the subject agent on the social networking system.

10. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more content items further comprises one or more biographic information items about the subject agent on the social networking system.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein, for each claim object of the subset of the plurality of claim objects associated with the subject agent and responsive to the viewing agent not having access the claim object based on the determined accessibility, the approval is received from the subject agent.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein, for each claim object of the subset of the plurality of claim objects associated with the subject agent and responsive to the viewing agent not having access the claim object based on the determined accessibility, the approval is received from another agent of the social networking system selected by the subject user provide the approval.

13. A method comprising:

maintaining a first plurality of claims about a plurality of agents of a social networking system, where each claim of the first plurality of claims comprises an assertion made to an audience by an author;

receiving a request from a viewing agent for a second plurality of claims about a subject agent, where the subject agent is an agent of the plurality of agents of the social networking system;

determining the second plurality of claims about the subject agent as a subset of the first plurality of claims about the plurality of agents of the social networking system, where the subset of the first plurality of claims include at least one assertion about the subject agent; and

for each claim of the second plurality of claims about the subject agent,

determining an accessibility of the claim by the viewing agent based on the audience of the claim, where the accessibility of the claim is based on the viewing agent being included in the audience of the claim;

responsive to the viewing agent having access to the claim based on the determined accessibility of the claim, providing the claim to the viewing agent;

responsive to the viewing agent not having access to the claim based on the determined accessibility of the claim, sending a notification to the author that the viewing agent has requested access to the claim about the subject agent; and

responsive to receiving an approval for providing the viewing agent access to the claim, providing the claim to the viewing agent.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

for each claim of the second plurality of claims about the subject agent,

responsive to receiving an approval for providing the viewing agent access to the claim,

redefining the audience for the claim to further comprise the viewing agent, and

storing the redefined audience associated with the claim in the social networking system.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the approval is received from the author of the claim responsive to the notification.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the approval is received from a selected agent of the social networking acting on behalf of the author of the claim responsive to the notification, where the author enables the selected agent to provide the viewing agent access to the claim.

17. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

for each claim of the second plurality of claims about the subject agent,

responsive to the viewing agent not having access to the claim based on the determined accessibility of the claim, sending a message to one or more other agents connected to the subject agent in the social networking system that the viewing agent has requested access to the claim about the subject agent; and

receiving a response to the message from the one or more other agents connected to the subject agent in the social networking system, where the response comprises a related claim to the claim being requested by the viewing agent; and

providing the related claim to the viewing agent responsive to the request from the viewing agent.

18. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

for each claim of the second plurality of claims about the subject agent,

responsive to the viewing agent not having access to the claim based on the determined accessibility of the claim, sending a message to one or more other agents that have authored claims similar to the claim about the subject agent being requested, where the message indicates that the viewing agent has requested access to the claim about the subject agent; and

receiving a response to the message from the one or more other agents that have authored claims similar to the claim about the subject agent being requested, where the response comprises a related claim to the claim being requested by the viewing agent; and

providing the related claim to the viewing agent responsive to the request from the viewing agent.

19. The method of claim 13, wherein the author of a claim is an entity in the social networking system.

20. The method of claim 13, wherein the author of a claim is an application operating on the social networking system.

21. The method of claim 13, wherein the author of a claim is a user of the social networking system.

22. The method of claim 13, wherein each assertion including in the first plurality of claims comprises a statement about one or more of the plurality of agents of the social networking system.

23. The method of claim 13, wherein each assertion including in the first plurality of claims comprises a statement about one or more entities in the social networking system.

24. The method of claim 13, wherein each assertion including in the first plurality of claims comprises a statement about one or more concepts in the social networking system.