Aol Inc.

Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Verizon Patent and Licensing Inc.

Oath Inc.

Bright Sun Technologies

Michael Sommers

Rakesh Agrawal

Steven Miles Greenberg

Alan Keister

Jennifer Granito

Lark Dunham

Carol A Glover

Christopher Armstrong

Harmannus Vandermolen

Anthony Wiegering

Karen Nelson Howe

Alexander Franco

Scott J Levine

Collecting and distributing information related to recent content publication activity of an instant messaging (IM) user provides other users in a network with timely, relevant information about people known to the user or within the same social network. A user participating in a social network can quickly and efficiently perceive new information related to other users (referred to as co-users) in a social network by reviewing the co-users' recent content publication activity. A user may be made able to do so without requiring the co-user to send a communication directly to the user regarding the new facts or new content, and also without requiring the user to actively browse or request information about the co-user.

Systems and methods for distributing published content among users of a social network

Indicating recent content publication activity by a user

Search results may be provided to a user. A search query may be received from the user. A query feature vector may be formed for the search query. The query feature vector may be compared with news feature vectors associated with documents related to current events. An augmented query feature vector may be formed based on results of the comparison of the query feature vector with the news feature vectors. The augmented query feature vector may be compared with feature vectors related to target documents. Search results that include target documents may be identified based on results of the comparison of the augmented query feature vector with the feature vectors related to the target documents. The user may be made able to perceive at least some of the identified search results.

Systems and methods for providing culturally-relevant search results to users

A presentation of search results may be improved. An indication that identifies a user may be received. A search authority model may be formed to represent information related to the user. A search query may be received from a searching user. Search results may be determined based on the terms included within the search query and the search results may be ranked or grouped based on the search authority model. Additionally, or alternatively, the search query may be adjusted based on the search authority model and search results may be determined based on the adjusted search query. In either case, the search results may be made perceivable to the searching user.

Authority management for electronic searches

Instant messages sent by a viewer of a video while the video is perceivable to the viewer may be monitored. An event of interest occurring in the video may be identified based on the monitored instant messages. Metadata that describes the event of interest may be generated and assigned to the video. A request for video content associated with the video may be received from a user. An indexed collection of videos that includes the video may be searched for the requested video content. Based on the search, it may be determined that the video satisfies the user's request. The event of interest occurring in the video may be identified based on the metadata assigned to the video. User perception of a scene from the video that includes the event of interest may be enabled.

Identifying events of interest within video content

Searching recent content publication activity

Culturally relevant search results

Growing community of inventors

Leesburg, VA, United States of America

Michael Sommers