Circle model powered suggestions and activities

• US 9,292,880 B1
• Filed: 04/20/2012
• Issued: 03/22/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 04/22/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Groupon Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Groupon Incorporated
• Inventors: Heycke, Sebastian, Koorakula, Naveen, Arsiwala, Sakina, Huckestein, Jonas Werner
• Primary Examiner(s): Ouellette, Jonathan
• Application Number:
  US13/452,469
• Time in Patent Office: 1,432 Days
• Field of Search: 705 11-912
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24578 using ranking
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 20/00 Machine learning
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 5/02 Knowledge representation; Symbolic representation
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 7/01 Probabilistic graphical models, e.g. probabilistic networks
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34

Abstract

The circle model powered suggestions and activities system provides a way to efficiently and effectively manage relationships. The circle model powered suggestions and activities system provides a way to model relationships for a user and assist the user with creating groupings of relevant constituents into context circles, provide suggested activities to members of the modeled relationships as well as facilitate the user with managing the user'"'"'s relationships. The system analyzes public and private data, and tracks the user'"'"'s interactions and the interactions of the constituents'"'"' of the user in order to generate suggested activities (including conversation starters) for the users and the constituents of the users. The system refines the semantic analysis and learning algorithms used to perform the analysis by analyzing the activities engaged in by the users and the constituents of the users related to suggested activities.

Claims

1. A method to model social circles of constituents with whom a user desires to interact, the method comprising:

causing, by an activity engine of a circle model system, a mobile device associated with a user to embed one or more client software components in one or more applications executable by the mobile device associated with the user;

tracking, by the activity engine and based on data received via the one or more embedded client software components, activities performed by the user on (a) the mobile device associated with the user, the activities provided by one or more merchants and including electronic communications;

modeling, by the activity engine and using the tracked activities, one or more social circles of constituents of the user, wherein each of the social circles represents a circle-context that identifies a group of constituents;

organizing, by the activity engine, the tracked activities performed by the user according to one or more modeled social circles of the user;

weighting each of the one or more modeled social circles for the user relative to another of the one or more modeled social circles;

suggesting, by the circle model system and without user interaction, a modeled social circle for at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles or the user to join; and

without user interaction, contextualizing results from a web search to the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles based on an importance of a relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents and further based on a relationship health index.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the constituents include people and organizations with whom the user interacts, or desires to interact, or whom the user is determined to have a probability of interest to interact, or any combination thereof.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

creating one or more quick-lists from the tracked activities of the user, where the modeled social circles comprise;

the user identified as the creator;

the one or more quick-lists; and

a circle-context.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

communicating, using the one or more modeled social circles, with the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles;

collaborating, using the one or more modeled social circles, with the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles;

visualizing the relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein the visualization of the relationship identifies a health of the relationship based on a relationship health value, wherein the relationship health value is from a group consisting of;

strong relationship; and

weak relationship; and

managing the relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, by determining a relationship importance value for the relationship, wherein the relationship importance value is from a group consisting of;

an unimportant relationship; and

an important relationship.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

generating an extended circle comprising the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles identified by the relationship importance value equal to an important relationship; and

annotating the one or more modeled social circles with meta data by analyzing public data and private data about the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein annotating the one or more modeled social circles with meta data includes performing semantic analysis on the public data and private data and using machine learning algorithms on the public data and private data.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

performing, using the one or more modeled social circles and without user interaction, one or more tasks of;

discovering shared context for interaction within the one or more modeled social circles;

suggesting content to the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles or the user; and

interacting with the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, based on the importance of the relationship and the relationship health index.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the content includes:

offers by the one or more merchants within a configurable geographical distance of the user or the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles; and

activity suggestions for the user or the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein the activity suggestions include one or more deals by the one or more merchants.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein at least one of the activity suggestions require the user to get a configurable number of contacts of the user to commit to the at least one of the activity suggestions, and wherein at least one of the activity suggestions has an expiration time period within which the at least one of the activity suggestions must be completed.

9. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

identifying one or more union sets of users and constituents of the users for the users and the constituents of the one or more quick-lists;

displaying a subset of the one or more union sets to the users, wherein the displayed subset of the one or more union sets form one or more circle-suggestions for the users; and

defining one or more new social circles or one or more new quick-lists using the one or more circle-suggestions.

10. A system to model social circles of constituents with whom a user desires to interact, the system comprising:

a memory coupled to a processor, the memory storing interaction data from public and private sources for a user and constituents of the user; and

processor executable instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to;

cause a mobile device associated with a user to embed one or more client software components in one or more applications executable by the mobile device associated with the user;

based on data received via the one or more embedded client software components, track activities performed by the user on the mobile device associated with the user, the tracked activities including electronic communications;

model, using the tracked activities, one or more social circles of constituents of the user, wherein each of the social circles represents a circle-context that identifies a group of constituents;

organize the tracked activities performed by the user according to one or more modeled social circles of the user, wherein the tracked activities performed by the user are provided by the one or more merchants;

weight each of the one or more modeled social circles for the user relative to another of the one or more modeled social circles;

suggest another modeled social circle for the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles or the user to join; and

without user interaction, contextualize results from a web search to the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles

based on an importance of a relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents and further based on a relationship health index.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the constituents include people and organizations with whom the user interacts, or desires to interact, or whom the user is determined to have a probability of interest to interact, or any combination thereof.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

create one or more quick-lists from the tracked activities of the user, where the modeled social circles comprise;

the user identified as the creator;

the one or more quick-lists; and

a circle-context.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

communicate, using the one or more modeled social circles, with at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles;

collaborate, using the one or more modeled social circles, with at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles;

visualize a relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein the visualization of the relationship identifies a health of the relationship based on a relationship health value, wherein the relationship health value is from a group consisting of;

strong relationship; and

weak relationship; and

manage the relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, by determining a relationship importance value for the relationship, wherein the relationship importance value is from a group consisting of;

an unimportant relationship; and

an important relationship.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

generate an extended circle comprising the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles identified by the relationship importance value equal to an important relationship; and

annotate the one or more modeled social circles with meta data by analyzing public data and private data about the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein annotating the one or more modeled social circles with meta data includes performing semantic analysis on the public data and private data and using machine learning algorithms on the public data and private data.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

perform, using the one or more modeled social circles and without user interaction, one or more of;

discovering shared context for interaction within the one or more modeled social circles;

suggesting content to the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles or the user;

and interacting with the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, based on the importance of the relationship and the relationship health index.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the content includes:

offers by the one or more merchants within a configurable geographical distance of the user or the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles; and

activity suggestions for the user or the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein the activity suggestions include one or more deals by the one or more merchants.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein at least one of the activity suggestions require the user to get a configurable number of contacts of the user to commit to the at least one of the activity suggestions, and wherein at least one of the activity suggestions has an expiration time period within which the at least one of the activity suggestions must be completed.

18. The system of claim 12, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

identifying one or more union sets of users and constituents of the users for the users and the constituents of the one or more quick-lists;

displaying a subset of the one or more union sets to the users, wherein the displayed subset of the one or more union sets form one or more circle-suggestions for the users; and

defining one or more new social circles or one or more new quick-lists using the one or more circle-suggestions.

19. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon processor executable instructions to model social circles of constituents with whom a user desires to interact, wherein the processor executable instructions, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:

cause a mobile device associated with a user to embed one or more client software components in one or more applications executable by the mobile device associated with the user;

based on data received via the one or more embedded client software components, track activities performed by the user on the mobile device associated with the user, the tracked activities including electronic communications;

model, using the tracked activities, one or more social circles of constituents of the user, wherein each of the social circles represents a circle-context that identifies a group of constituents;

organize the tracked activities performed by the user according to one or more modeled social circles of the user, wherein the tracked activities performed by the user are provided by the one or more merchants;

weight each of the one or more modeled social circles for the user relative to another of the one or more modeled social circles;

suggest another modeled social circle for the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles or the user to join; and

without user interaction, contextualize results from a web search to the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles based on an importance of a relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents and further based on a relationship health index.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 19, wherein the constituents include people and organizations with whom the user interacts, or desires to interact, or whom the user is determined to have a probability of interest to interact, or any combination thereof.

21. The computer-readable medium of claim 19, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

create one or more quick-lists from the tracked activities of the user, where the modeled social circles comprising;

the user identified as the creator;

the one or more quick-lists; and

a circle-context.

22. The computer-readable medium of claim 19, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

communicate, using the one or more modeled social circles, with at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles;

collaborate, using the one or more modeled social circles, with at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles;

visualize a relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein the visualization of the relationship identifies a health of the relationship based on a relationship health value, wherein the relationship health value is from a group consisting of;

strong relationship; and

weak relationship; and

manage the relationship between the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, by determining a relationship importance value for the relationship, wherein the relationship importance value is from a group consisting of;

an unimportant relationship; and

an important relationship.

23. The computer-readable medium of claim 22, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

generate an extended circle comprising the user and the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles identified by the relationship importance value equal to an important relationship; and

annotate the one or more modeled social circles with meta data by analyzing public data and private data about the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein annotating the one or more modeled social circles with meta data includes performing semantic analysis on the public data and private data and using machine learning algorithms on the public data and private data.

24. The computer-readable medium of claim 19, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

perform, using the one or more modeled social circles and without user interaction, one or more of;

discovering shared context for interaction within the one or more modeled social circles;

suggesting content to the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles or the user;

and interacting with the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, based on the importance of the relationship and the relationship health index.

25. The computer-readable medium of claim 24, wherein the content includes:

offers by the one or more merchants within a configurable geographical distance of the user or the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles; and

activity suggestions for the user or the at least one of the constituents of the one or more modeled social circles, wherein the activity suggestions include one or more deals by the one or more merchants.

26. The computer-readable medium of claim 25, wherein at least one of the activity suggestions require the user to get a configurable number of contacts of the user to commit to the at least one of the activity suggestions, and wherein at least one of the activity suggestions has an expiration time period within which the at least one of the activity suggestions must be completed.

27. The computer-readable medium of claim 21, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to:

identify one or more union sets of users and constituents of the users for the users and the constituents of the one or more quick-lists;

display a subset of the one or more union sets to the users, wherein the displayed subset of the one or more union sets form one or more circle-suggestions for the users; and

define one or more new social circles or one or more new quick-lists using the one or more circle-suggestions.