Characteristic tagging

• US 7,788,247 B2
• Filed: 01/12/2007
• Issued: 08/31/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/12/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Kishore, Ajitesh, Wang, Esther Hsiu-Meng
• Primary Examiner(s): Corrielus; Jean M
• Application Number:
  US11/652,830
• Publication Number:
  US 20080172363A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,327 Days
• Field of Search: 707/10, 707/5, 707/3, 707/713, 707/721, 707/758, 707/759, 707/765, 707/766, 707/767
• US Class Current: 707/705
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking

Abstract

Embodiments are provided to enable a user to easily and conveniently assign, share, and/or locate characteristic and other information associated with others. In an embodiment, a user can assign, share, and use one or more characterizing tags. A user can use the one or more characterizing tags to characterize a person of interest and/or a relationship or association between the user and the person of interest. A user can also perform searches using one or more characterizing tags to locate others who may be associated with the one or more characterizing tags. Users can also view user profiles including any characterizing tags and/or communicate with others based in part on a characterizing tag. The various embodiments provide a forum for social tagging, allowing a user to apply and use one or more characterizing tags that are associated with a person of interest.

Claims

1. A computer-readable medium including executable instructions which, when executed, enable tagging by:

identifying a contact as a person of interest to associate with a tag;

presenting a number of recommended tags including presenting the number of recommended tags based in part on information collected from electronic communications with the contact;

tagging the contact with a characterizing tag, wherein the characterizing tag identifies information associated with the contact and defines an association with the contact based in part on prior electronic communications with the contact, wherein a tagging user can add characterizing tags for other persons of interest by selecting another contact to tag with a same or different characterizing tag, including presenting one or more recommended tags for each person of interest;

identifying other users that share a common characterizing tag; and

,

storing the characterizing tag in a tag store, including storing identification information associated with a tagging user that tagged the contact as the person of interest with the characterization tag.

2. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by recommending the recommended tags based in part on a prior communication with the contact.

3. The computer-readable medium of claim 2, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by selecting one or more of the recommended tags when tagging the contact with one or more characterizing tags.

4. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by tagging the contact with the characterizing tag, wherein the characterizing tag comprises metadata which corresponds to the information associated with the contact.

5. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by locating one or more contacts based in part on a search of one or more characterizing tags.

6. The computer-readable medium of claim 5, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by presenting a profile of a located contact based on the characterizing tag search.

7. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by storing the characterizing tag to the tag store, including storing temporal information to the tag store, wherein the temporal information is associated with when the contact was tagged with the characterizing tag.

8. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by presenting a number of contacts based on a characterizing tag search.

9. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, enable tagging by collecting one or more words of a prior communication with the contact and recommending one or more collected words as one or more characterizing tags.

10. A system to enable tagging comprising:

a processor coupled to memory;

an interface used in part to identify a contact as a person of interest;

a recommendation component to use information collected from a number of electronic communications to provide a number of recommended tags;

a tag component to tag a contact with a characterizing tag associated with the contact, wherein the characterizing tag is based on at least one of a personal perception and an association with the contact that is based in part on prior electronic communications with the contact, wherein the tag component can operate to add characterizing tags for other persons of interest by selecting another contact to tag with a same or different characterizing tag;

a presentation component to present characterization tag information including presenting users who share a common characterizing tag including presenting one or more recommended tags for each person of interest;

a tag store to store the characterizing tag and identification information associated with a tagging user that tagged the contact as the person of interest with the characterization tag; and

,

a search component to search the tag store using a tag query, wherein the search component is configured to return a search result based on the tag query.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the characterizing tag comprises metadata and is associated with at least one of a communication and a characterization of the contact.

12. The system of claim 10, further comprising a collector component to collect applicable nouns and phrases associated with a communication with the contact.

13. The system of claim 12, the recommendation component to recommend one or more of the recommended tags based in part on the applicable nouns and phrases collected by the collector component.

14. The system of claim 10, further comprising a tag notification component to notify the contact of a tag event and an associated tagger of the tag event.

15. The system of claim 14, further comprising an administration component to administer tag-related settings.

16. A method of social tagging comprising:

selecting a person of interest to tag;

recommending a number of recommended tags associated with the person of interest based in part on information collected from electronic communications;

applying a characterizing tag to the person of interest, wherein the characterizing tag is based in part on at least one of a communication or an association with the person of interest;

identifying other users that share a common characterizing tag;

storing the characterizing tag and identification information associated with a tagging user that tagged the person of interest with the characterization tag in a tag store comprising a computer-readable storage medium; and

,

presenting characterization tag information including presenting other users that share common characterizing tags.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising applying the characterizing tag to the person of interest, wherein the characterizing tag comprises metadata and is based on a prior communication with the person of interest.

18. The method of claim 16, further comprising searching for one or more contacts based in part on a characterizing tag query.

19. The method of claim 16, further comprising storing the characterizing tag on a dedicated serving computing device.