Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Alexey Volkov

Houdong Hu

Paul A Elliott

Kjetil Krogvig Bergstrand

Fernando Garcia Valenzuela

Mark Robert Bolin

Ning Ma

Aleksandr Livshits

Pawel Michal Pietrusinksi

A computer-implemented method for determining a crowdsourced association between a first user identifier, and a second user identifier for a user of a service accessible over a network. Service data are searched to identify users of the service having a potential association with the first user identifier. Users of the service are invited in turn to select one of the identified users in relation to the first user identifier. A tier of linkage is determined, from at least two defined tiers, between a user making the selection and the selected user. A vote is recorded, of the determined tier, for the selection. A threshold is assigned to votes according to the tier of linkage so that if the votes of at least one of the defined tiers achieves its assigned threshold, it may be determined whether the first user identifier is associated with the respective second user identifier.

Crowdsourcing content associations in a profile-hosting system

Systems and methods for identifying search results in response to a search query are presented. More particularly, images are selected as search results, at least in part, according to an attractiveness value associated with the images. Upon receiving a search query, a set of content is identified according to the query intent of the search query and includes at least one image. The identified set of content is ordered according an overall score determined according to relevance and, in the case of the at least one image, according to an attractiveness value. A search results generator selects items from the set of content according to their overall scores, including the at least one image, generates a search results page, and returns the search results page to the requesting party.

Search results through image attractiveness

Growing community of inventors

Oslo, Norway

Alexey Volkov