Personalizing an online service based on data collected for a user of a computing device

• US 9,594,832 B2
• Filed: 11/25/2013
• Issued: 03/14/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 06/02/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Verizon Patent and Licensing Incorporated (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Rubin, Mark, Hein, Brian
• Primary Examiner(s): MORRISON, JAY A
• Application Number:
  US14/089,506
• Publication Number:
  US 20140089411A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,205 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24578 using ranking
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/335 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles filtering in web context G06F16/9535, G06F16/9536
• 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
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles

Abstract

An Internet or other online service is personalized or customized based on data collected for a user of a computing device. In one embodiment, a method includes: storing a plurality of person profiles for persons associated with communications received by a user of a computing device; receiving data associated with an online service; and filtering, using at least one processor, the data based on the plurality of person profiles, wherein the filtered data is for display to the user on the computing device.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

at least one processor; and

memory storing instructions configured to instruct the at least one processor to;

store a plurality of person profiles for persons associated with communications received by a user of a computing device, wherein each of the persons associated with the communications received by the user is a sender to the user of one of the communications;

store activity data associated with prior activities of the user on the computing device regarding respective functions of the computing device that are activated by the user when communicating with each of the persons;

determine a set of persons of the person profiles that are active on an online service;

filter the set of persons to provide a plurality of highly-ranked persons, the filtering based on the plurality of person profiles, wherein the filtering uses a relevancy ranking for each of the plurality of person profiles, and the relevancy ranking is based in part on the stored activity data;

select first messages from the plurality of highly-ranked persons, wherein the first messages are for presentation to the user on the computing device;

replace a respective user identifier, used by the online service, for each of the plurality of highly-ranked persons with a replacement name obtained from the corresponding profile of the plurality of person profiles for presenting a message from the respective highly-ranked person to the user; and

cause presentation of the first messages to the user, wherein each of the first messages uses the respective replacement name.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the instructions are further configured to instruct the at least one processor to collect communications data associated with the computing device.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the respective user identifier is a user name, and the replacement name is a proper name.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the respective functions of the computing device are activated by the user by activating at least one button of the computing device.

5. A method, comprising:

storing a plurality of person profiles for senders of communications to a user of a computing device;

storing activity data associated with activities of the user on the computing device regarding respective functions of the computing device that are activated by the user when communicating with each of the senders;

ranking, by at least one processor, the plurality of person profiles, wherein the ranking uses a relevancy ranking for each of the plurality of person profiles, and the relevancy ranking is based in part on the stored activity data;

updating the ranking on an ongoing basis;

receiving a feed from an online service, the feed including a respective message from each of a portion of the senders, and each respective message including a respective user identifier for the sender that is used for identification of the sender by the online service;

filtering the feed, for display to the user, based on the updated ranking to provide first messages;

replacing each respective user identifier in the first messages with a replacement name obtained from one of the plurality of person profiles; and

causing presentation of the first messages to the user, wherein each of the first messages uses the respective replacement name.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising receiving a user selection of a maximum number of messages that the user is to receive in the filtered feed for any given predetermined time period.

7. The method of claim 5, further comprising adding information about each respective sender to its respective message, wherein the added information is not shown for messages of the respective sender in a home stream of the user on the online service.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the added information is obtained from prior messages that the user has received.

9. The method of claim 5, further comprising receiving a user selection from the computing device associated with a message from a first sender, and in response to the user selection, presenting a contact card to the user that includes information about the first sender, wherein the included information is obtained from at least one of the plurality of person profiles.

10. The method of claim 5, further comprising displaying an indication to the user for each respective message to indicate whether the user is explicitly following the respective sender on the online service.

11. The method of claim 5, wherein the updating of the ranking is performed as new communications to the user are received.

12. The method of claim 5, wherein the updating of the ranking is periodically performed for a predetermined time period.

13. The method of claim 5, wherein the computing device is a mobile device, and the method further comprising storing at least a portion of the plurality of person profiles in a memory of the mobile device.

14. The method of claim 5, wherein the online service is a first online service, the feed is a first feed, and the ranking is a first ranking, the method further comprising:

receiving a second feed from a second online service;

ranking the plurality of person profiles using an algorithm tuned to the second online service to provide a second ranking; and

filtering the second feed, for display to the user, based on the second ranking.

15. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing computer-readable instructions, which when executed, cause a system to:

store a plurality of person profiles for senders of communications to a user of a computing device;

store activity data associated with activities of the user on the computing device regarding respective functions of the computing device that are activated by the user when communicating with each of the senders;

rank, by at least one processor, the plurality of person profiles to select a portion of the senders, wherein the filtering uses a relevancy ranking for each of the plurality of person profiles, and the relevancy ranking is based in part on the stored activity data;

provide a feed to the user including first messages of the selected senders, the feed including a respective message from each of the senders, and each respective message including a respective user identifier for the sender that is used for identification of the sender by an online service;

replace each respective user identifier in the first messages with a replacement name obtained from one of the plurality of person profiles; and

cause presentation of the first messages to the user, each of the first messages using the respective replacement name.

16. The storage medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions further cause the system to further customize the feed for the user using information other than a name from the plurality of person profiles.

17. The storage medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions further cause the system to send the feed from a server to the computing device for display, and the server includes the at least one processor.