Systems and methods for monitoring and applying statistical data related to shareable links associated with content items stored in an online content management service

• US 9,692,840 B2
• Filed: 11/11/2013
• Issued: 06/27/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 11/11/2013
• Status: Expired

• Current Assignee: Dropbox, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Dropbox, Inc.
• Inventors: Welinder, Nils Peter, Fushman, Ilya
• Primary Examiner(s): Lazaro, David
• Assistant Examiner(s): Ye, Zi
• Application Number:
  US14/077,166
• Publication Number:
  US 20150134808A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,324 Days
• Field of Search: 709224, 705 40, 707741
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/954 Navigation, e.g. using categorised browsing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34

Abstract

Shareable links can be created to share content items and information pertaining to activity on those shareable links can be monitored and stored in an online content management service. Based on this activity information, predetermined actions can be executed. These actions can include sending notifications regarding link activity, disabling shareable links, and/or updating sharing limitations related to the shareable links. Using the activity information, popular shared content items can be identified and recommendations for sharing unshared content items can be provided to the user. Additionally, advertisements can be tailored to the relative popularity of the shared content items.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

monitoring a plurality of requests for a plurality of shared content items, each shared content item, of the plurality of shared content items, corresponding to a different shareable link, of a plurality of shareable links;

wherein each request, of the plurality of requests, is for one shared content item, of the plurality of shared content items, and specifies the shareable link, of the plurality of shareable links, corresponding to the shared content item;

wherein monitoring the plurality of requests for the plurality of shared content items comprises, for each request, of the plurality of requests, incrementing a counter associated with the shareable link specified in the each request;

based on the counters associated with the plurality of shareable links, identifying a subset of one or more shared content items, of the plurality of shared content items, with a number of received requests via shareable links exceeding a threshold;

identifying, from a share history of a user, a group of target identifiers with which the subset of one or more shared content items have been shared by the user;

determining, via a processor, one or more common characteristics common among the subset of one or more shared content items;

identifying an unshared content item having the one or more common characteristics;

sending a recommendation to the user, the recommendation recommending that the user create a shareable link for the unshared content item and recommending that the user share the shareable link for the unshared content item with the group of target identifiers; and

wherein the method is performed by one or more computer systems comprising one or more processing units.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more common characteristics include content item name and content item metadata.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining whether the unshared content item is analyzable; and

upon determining that the unshared content item is analyzable, analyzing contents of the unshared content item,

generating the recommendation based on the analyzed contents of the unshared content item, and

sending a sharing recommendation for the unshared content item.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

upon determining that the unshared content item is analyzable, analyzing metadata of the unshared content item to determine one or more of authorship and publication information of the unshared content item.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

creating the shareable link for the content item; and

storing the shareable link and the recommendation in a user share history data structure.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the threshold includes one or more of:

a view count corresponding to a number of times a content item is requested using requested using the shareable links;

a content item-specific network bandwidth limit;

or

a network communication protocol limitation.

7. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving, from a first client device, a request to create a shareable link to a first content item, wherein the request comprises a particular target identifier of a user or a group of users to which the shareable link is to be provided;

responsive to receiving the request, accessing a first data structure representing a share group of users, wherein the first data structure includes a plurality of target identifiers;

responsive to receiving the request, determining whether the plurality of target identifiers in the first data structure comprises the particular target identifier of the request;

adding the particular target identifier of the request to the first data structure upon determining that the plurality of target identifiers in the first data structure does not include the particular target identifier of the request;

identifying a second content item that has at least one characteristic in common with the first content item;

identifying a subset of the plurality of target identifiers in the first data structure with which content items that include the at least one common characteristic have previously been shared, the subset of the plurality of target identifiers comprising the particular target identifier;

sending a recommendation to the first client device to create and share a shareable link to the second content item with the subset of the plurality of target identifiers in the first data structure; and

wherein the method is performed by one or more computer systems comprising one or more processing units.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the second content item is an unshared content item that has not been shared with any user in the share group of users.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

upon determining that the particular target identifier is not included in the first data structure, sending a notification to the first client device to confirm adding the particular target identifier to the share group of users.

10. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

retrieving additional data structures, wherein each additional data structure represents a share group of users associated with a target identifier of the plurality of target identifiers in the first data structure;

determining whether any of the additional data structures include the particular target identifier; and

upon determining that the particular target identifier is not included in either of the first data structure or the additional data structures, sending a notification to the first client device to confirm adding the particular target identifier to the share group of users.

11. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

receiving, from a second client device, a request from a recipient user associated with particular target identifier to bookmark the shareable link; and

adding an entry to a bookmark data structure associated with an account of the recipient user, the account corresponding to the shareable link, wherein the entry includes the shareable link and at least one sortable metric.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

sending a representation of the bookmark data structure to the second client device for display; and

sorting the representation according to the sortable metric, wherein the sortable metric includes one or more of a view count associated with the shareable link and a user configurable metric indicating an importance of the shareable link.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the representation is a sharing graph.

14. A system comprising:

an online content management service executing on at least one server including;

a computer readable medium, and

a processor;

wherein the online content management service is configured to;

store a plurality of content items in a plurality of user accounts;

maintain a data structure representing share group of users, the shared group of users including one or more users with whom content is shareable, wherein the share group of users is associated with each of the plurality of user accounts, and wherein the data structure includes one or more target identifiers, each of the one or more target identifiers associated with a different user of the one or more users in the share group of users;

receive, from a client device, a request to create a shareable link for a user to access a first content item stored in a user account of the plurality of user accounts, wherein the request includes at least one target identifier associated with the user;

access the data structure representing the share group of users associated with the user account;

upon determining that the one or more target identifiers in the data structure does not include the at least one target identifier, update the data structure to add the at least one target identifier;

identify a second content item that includes at least one common characteristic with the first content item;

identifying a subset of the one or more target identifiers in the data structure with which content items that include the at least one common characteristic have previously been shared, the subset of the one or more target identifiers comprising the at least one target identifier; and

send a recommendation to the client device to create and share a shareable link to the second content item with a subset of the one or more target identifiers in the data structure.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the second content item is an unshared content item stored in the user account.

16. The system of claim 14, wherein the online content management service is further configured to:

upon determining that the one or more target identifiers in the data structure does not include the at least one target identifier, send a notification to the client device to confirm the at least one target identifier.