LinkedIn Patents

LinkedIn Corporation is a professional network on the Internet that seeks to connect its members to people, knowledge and career opportunities.

LinkedIn Patents by Type
  • LinkedIn Patents Granted: LinkedIn patents that have been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
  • LinkedIn Patent Applications: LinkedIn patent applications that are pending before the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
  • Patent number: 9105069
    Abstract: A system may include a network interface, a user interface, and a recommendation engine. The user interface may be configured to receive a company characteristic of a company profile of a company posted to the social network and a company bid from an entity related to company to the social network. The recommendation engine may be configured to determine an aggregate company score for the user based on a relevance of the company characteristic to a user characteristic and the company bid. The network interface may be configured to transmit a message related to the company to the user based, at least in part, on the aggregate company score.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 16, 2012
    Date of Patent: August 11, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Christian Posse, Michael Grishaver
  • Patent number: 9104983
    Abstract: A method and system to present an optimum action in response to a flow of actions in a computer network from a user are provided. For each of a plurality of possible presented actions corresponding to a particular flow of actions in a computer network, and for each of one or more possible performed actions for each possible presented action, a likelihood that a user will perform the possible performed action is determined. Then each of the determined likelihoods is weighted by applying a weight assigned to a corresponding possible presented action. An optimum presented action is identified determining a presented action having a weighted maximum determined likelihood, based on the weighted determined likelihood.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 8, 2014
    Date of Patent: August 11, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Samir M. Shah, Lili Wu, Manas Khadilkar
  • Patent number: 9098133
    Abstract: Tools (systems, apparatuses, methodologies, computer program products, etc.) for pairing electronic devices including touchscreen-enabled electronic devices, and for facilitating communication between paired electronic devices.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 23, 2012
    Date of Patent: August 4, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Bowei Gai, Matthew David Shoup
  • Publication number: 20150213119
    Abstract: A system and method may include an electronic data storage configured to store content items and an established category with which a first subset of the content items are associated. The system may further include a processor, coupled to the electronic data storage, configured to generate a new category different than the established category and related to a second subset of the content items based, at least in part, on a relationship of the content items of the second subset with respect to one another, identify a statistic related to an inclusion of at least some of the content items of at least one of the first subset and the second subset into a social network by users of the social network, and cause information related to the statistic to be displayed on a user interface.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 30, 2014
    Publication date: July 30, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Deepak Agarwal, Bee-Chung Cheng
  • Publication number: 20150213063
    Abstract: Disclosed in some examples are methods, systems, and machine readable mediums which automatically convert an unstandardized attribute value of a member profile of a social networking service to one of a plurality of standardized values for that attribute. In some examples, the method utilizes various matching and similarity metrics in combination with social aspects available to a social networking service to determine the best standardized value that matches the unstandardized value entered by the user.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 12, 2014
    Publication date: July 30, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Navneet Kapur, Gloria Lau
  • Publication number: 20150213022
    Abstract: A system and method optionally includes an electronic data storage configured to store content items introduced to a social network by a first user and to store interactions with the content items by second user of the social network. The system further includes a processor, coupled to the electronic data storage, configured to determine an influence of the first user based, at least in part, on the interaction by the second user with at least one of the content items as introduced by the first user and a characteristic of the second user and cause an indication of the influence of the first user to be displayed on a user interface.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 30, 2014
    Publication date: July 30, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Deepak Agarwal, Bee-Chung Cheng
  • Patent number: 9092287
    Abstract: A product deployment system of an electronic document is described. An example product deployment system includes a deployment processor, a remote execution module, and a plan manager. The deployment processor may be configured to receive a request to deploy an application, generated a deployment plan, provide the deployment plan to the plan manager, and trigger a command to be sent from the remote execution module to the target hosts in the target host set. The plan manager provides the deployment plan to the target host set in response to receiving the identification of the deployment plan from the target host set. The plan manager may also monitor execution of the deployment plan by the target host set without saving a state of deployment process that is being performed at the target host set. The plan manager may also react to perceived failures that may occur at the target host set.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 5, 2014
    Date of Patent: July 28, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Manish Dubey, Daniel Sully, Zoran Simic, Scott Holmes, Daniel L. Grillo
  • Patent number: 9092521
    Abstract: A fact checking system verifies the correctness of information and/or characterizes the information by comparing the information with one or more sources. The fact checking system automatically monitors, processes, fact checks information and indicates a status of the information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 19, 2013
    Date of Patent: July 28, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Lucas J. Myslinski
  • Patent number: 9094289
    Abstract: Systems and methods for the forming of user device groups are presented. First, logical relationship information describing logical relationships among a plurality of users is accessed. Then potential membership of a first user of a first user device in a first group of users is determined based on the logical relationship information, by selecting the first group from a plurality of possible groups, the selecting being based on scores generated, for each of the plurality of possible groups, by a candidate scorer module, the scores based at least partially on information about the first user device, but the scores not being based on any personal information about the first user the first group of users containing a plurality of users, including one or more users who are not logically connected to the first user. Then the first user is added to the first group of users.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 24, 2013
    Date of Patent: July 28, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Vincent Mallet, Jessica Cheng, Noah Fiedel, Eric William Gillum, Ganesh Ramanarayanan, Nicholas James Woods
  • Publication number: 20150205776
    Abstract: An autofill system is described for auto-populating electronic forms with data stored by an on-line social networking system. When a member of an on-line social network system accesses, via a web browser, an autofill-enabled web page, the autofill system determines an identification of the member, scrapes the member's profile to obtain member's information, assembles the member's profile information as member data, and communicates the member data to the web browser together with a script for presenting an autofill button on the web page.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 21, 2014
    Publication date: July 23, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Meera Gill Bhatia, Guangyu Dong, Sanjay Kshetramade, Douglas James Myers, Sophia H. Nguyen, Aviad Pinkovezky, Vikram Rangnekar, Brian Rumao
  • Patent number: 9087048
    Abstract: A fact checking system is able to verify the correctness of information and/or characterize information by comparing the information with one or more sources. The fact checking system automatically monitors, processes, fact checks information and indicates a status of the information. Fact checking results are able to be validated by re-fact checking the fact check results.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 11, 2013
    Date of Patent: July 21, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Lucas J. Myslinski
  • Patent number: 9082084
    Abstract: Automatic machine-learning processes and systems for an online social network are described. During operation of the online social network, a system can automatically collect labeled training events, obtain snapshots of raw entity data associated with subjects from the collected training events, produce training examples by generating features for each training event using the snapshots of entity data and current entity data, and split the training examples into a training set and a test set. Next, the system can use a machine-learning technique to train a set of models and to select the best model based on one or more evaluation metrics using the training set. The system can then evaluate the performance of the best model on the test set. If the performance of the best model satisfies a performance criterion, the system can use the best model to predict responses for the online social network.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 28, 2013
    Date of Patent: July 14, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Paul T. Ogilvie, Xiangrui Meng, Anmol Bhasin, Trevor A. Walker
  • Patent number: 9081825
    Abstract: The disclosed embodiments provide a reputation system. The reputation system includes a ranking apparatus that obtains a set of reputation scores for one or more dimensions of a set of items in the reputation system and generates a ranking of the items based on the reputation scores and the one or more quantiles. The reputation system also includes a query-processing apparatus that obtains a query comprising the one or more dimensions and one or more quantiles associated with the one or more dimensions and provides the ranking in a response to the query.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 17, 2014
    Date of Patent: July 14, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Mario S. Rodriguez, Viet Thuc Ha, Jessica V. Zuniga, Mathieu Bastian, Michael Conover
  • Patent number: 9081421
    Abstract: A user interface and methods are provided for presenting electronic content on a mobile device with a content-serving application. Heterogeneous content includes ‘internal’ and ‘external’ content. Internal content includes items served by a system hosting the application and/or other items to which the host has full access rights, while external content includes items to which the application host does not have full access rights (e.g., because they are served by a remote site). Placeholders representing content items are browsed using one input, and an item is opened by different input when its placeholder is displayed. External items may not be retrieved until they are opened. Gestures while an external item is open are communicated to its remote site, and when either type of item is fully panned left or right, the item begins to scroll out of view sideways and the placeholder of the next item scrolls into view.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 30, 2014
    Date of Patent: July 14, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Albert J. Lai, Lindsay Norman, Ankit Gupta
  • Publication number: 20150189026
    Abstract: A method of presenting on a device of a user of a social-networking system information about other users of the social-networking system is disclosed. A location of the user of a social-networking system is determined. Locations of the additional users of the social-networking system are determined. A subset of the additional users of the social networking system is selected based on the location of the user and the locations of the additional users and based on information stored in a profile of the user in comparison to information stored in profiles of the additional users. Instructions are transmitted to a device of a user, the instructions instructing the device to display in a condensed visual form the subset of the information stored in the profiles of the additional users.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 31, 2013
    Publication date: July 2, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Tomer Cohen, Joff Redfern
  • Publication number: 20150188959
    Abstract: Techniques for populating a content stream of a mobile application are described. A content request for content to be presented in a personalized activity or content stream of a member of a social networking service is communicated from a mobile computing device to a content server. The content request includes a member identifier, location information indicating the current location of the member, and/or an activity status identifier indicating an inferred physical activity state of the member. Using the information received with the content request, a content selection and relevance module will process the request and provide contextually relevant content for presentation in the member's activity or content stream, at the mobile device.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 27, 2013
    Publication date: July 2, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Sameer Sayed
  • Patent number: 9071509
    Abstract: In an example embodiment, logical relationship information describing logical relationships between a first user and other users is recorded, the logical relationship information associated with a social networking service. Then affinity levels for each of the logical relationships between the first user and the other users are calculated. One or more of the logical relationships between the first user and one or more of the other users are displayed in a user interface, wherein the affinity level for each of the one or more logical relationships is represented graphically in the user interface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 6, 2013
    Date of Patent: June 30, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Vincent Mallet, Jessica Cheng, Noah Fiedel, Eric William Gillum, Ganesh Ramanarayanan, Nicholas James Woods
  • Publication number: 20150161186
    Abstract: A system, method, and apparatus are provided for supporting and/or executing count-distinct queries. A large set of data (e.g., tens or hundreds of millions of event records) is condensed daily to generate presence bitmaps to reflect the distinctiveness of a selected data dimension S (e.g., user ID) for one or more key dimensions g1, g2, . . . (e.g., advertisement ID, campaign ID, advertiser ID). The condensation process eliminates duplication and yields a single value (e.g., 1 or 0) for each tuple [S, g1, . . . ] to represent the distinctiveness of each value in the S dimension to each combination of values in the grouping dimensions. On a monthly basis, the daily values are condensed to yield a single value for the month, and a similar process is applied on any other desired time granularities (e.g., year). The condensed data may be generated for any combination of selected dimension(s) and grouping dimension(s).
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 21, 2014
    Publication date: June 11, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Srinivas S. Vemuri
  • Publication number: 20150161185
    Abstract: A system, method, and apparatus are provided for supporting and/or executing count-distinct queries. A large set of data (e.g., tens or hundreds of millions of event records) is condensed daily to generate presence bitmaps to reflect the distinctiveness of a selected data dimension S (e.g., user ID) for one or more key dimensions g1, g2, . . . (e.g., advertisement ID, campaign ID, advertiser ID). The condensation process eliminates duplication and yields a single value (e.g., 1 or 0) for each tuple [S, g1, . . . ] to represent the distinctiveness of each value in the S dimension to each combination of values in the grouping dimensions. On a monthly basis, the daily values are condensed to yield a single value for the month, and a similar process is applied on any other desired time granularities (e.g., year). The condensed data may be generated for any combination of selected dimension(s) and grouping dimension(s).
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 21, 2014
    Publication date: June 11, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Srinivas S. Vemuri
  • Patent number: 9049249
    Abstract: A method, system and article of manufacture for determining a global hierarchy of an entity by computing subjective coherence strength between nodes of first members of a social network service, computing objective entanglement strength between nodes of second members of the social network service, using subjective coherence strength and objective entanglement strength, compute the pairwise latent relationship probabilities between different ones of the nodes of the social network service, and using the pairwise relationship probabilities, compute the global hierarchy relationship.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 31, 2013
    Date of Patent: June 2, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Ximeng Zhang, Guan Wang, Yuchen Zhao, Shaobo Liu, Christian Sutherland-Wong, Mike Derezin
  • Patent number: 9043285
    Abstract: A method of classifying data is disclosed. Text data items are received. A set of classes into which the text data items are to be classified is received. A phrase-based classifier to classify the text data items into the set of classes is selected. The phrase-based classifier is applied to classify the text data items into the classes. Here, the applying includes creating a controlled vocabulary pertaining to classifying the text data items into the set of classes, building phrases based on the text data items and the controlled vocabulary, and classifying the text data items into the set of classes based on the phrases.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 9, 2012
    Date of Patent: May 26, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Ron Bekkerman
  • Patent number: 9043405
    Abstract: A computer-implemented method for leveraging social networking information with a messaging client are disclosed. In one aspect, a messaging client (e.g., email client), or an application designed to be closely integrated with an email client, analyzes a message to identify a sender, and then generates a query including information identifying the sender that is forwarded to a social networking application to be processed. The social networking application returns information about the sender (e.g., from a social networking profile), that can be viewed by a user of the messaging client, thereby providing additional information about the sender of a particular message.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 26, 2007
    Date of Patent: May 26, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Eric Ly, Edward Tau, James Duncan Work
  • Publication number: 20150143327
    Abstract: An example project management tool, which is a computer-implemented system configured to provide a real-time view of a product change with respect to its status within a testing process, is provided. In operation, the project management tool receives a request to create a new project for a particular product change, determines the requirement definition included in the request and, based on the requirement definition, identifies all components of the associated computing application that are affected by the product change. The project management tool then uses the monitored information to generate one or more views that may provide users with information regarding the estimated time of arrival (ETA) of the product that has a certain product change incorporated into it.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 15, 2013
    Publication date: May 21, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Scott Holmes, Manish Dubey, Sean Keenan
  • Publication number: 20150142584
    Abstract: A system, apparatus, method and computer-program product are provided for determining affinities between members of an on-line service and/or one member's likely propensity for content published by or on behalf of another member. Members of the service include individuals and organizations. A content item may be an announcement by or for a member, an advertisement, a job listing or something else. Content items available for service to an individual member are ranked based on the member's propensity for consuming them, as reflected in scores computed for each item. An item's propensity score may be calculated based on the relevance and/or proximity between the member and an organization featured in or associated with the item. Relevance may measure the similarity between profiles of the individual and the organization. Proximity may be affected by whether the individual and/or associates of the individual follow the organization, visit a page of the organization, etc.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 18, 2013
    Publication date: May 21, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Haishan Liu, Baoshi Yan, Anmol Bhasin, Christian Posse
  • Publication number: 20150134575
    Abstract: The disclosed embodiments relate to a system that uses data from an online social network to optimize subscription offers. During operation of the online social network, the system gathers data associated with subscription offers that were presented to members of the online social network, including information about which subscription offers were converted. Next, the system uses a machine-learning technique to train a model based on the gathered data. Finally, the system uses the trained model to select subscription offers to present to a member of the online social network.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 13, 2013
    Publication date: May 14, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Jonathan D. Traupman, Tarun Kumar, Venu Javarappa, Anmol Bhasin, Lizabeth Li, Yurong Shi
  • Publication number: 20150127469
    Abstract: The disclosed embodiments provide a system that manages online advertising. During operation, the system calculates an intrinsic value of an online advertisement slot from at least one of a user engagement value and a cannibalization value. Next, the system obtains a reserve price for the online advertisement slot from at least one of the intrinsic value and an advertiser value. Finally, the system uses the reserve price to manage serving of online advertisements from a set of advertising campaigns in the online advertisement slot.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 4, 2013
    Publication date: May 7, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Tingting Cui, Deepak Dileep Kumar, Ashvin Kannan, Deepak Agarwal, Souvik Ghosh, Sohil Maru, Gururaj Seetharama
  • Patent number: 9026913
    Abstract: A computer-implemented method that includes receiving a request to generate an interface within a software application that is configured to play back one or more media files; for a first media file, generating an image representing a frame of the first media file; and causing the image to be displayed within the interface on a display device, where the image is configured to detect an event that causes a media player to be loaded into the software application behind the image.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 11, 2010
    Date of Patent: May 5, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Stanley Peter Demarta, David Jack Ovadia, Peter W. Winer, Jeff Sturgis, Rajesh Navaneethakrishnan
  • Publication number: 20150120279
    Abstract: A method of presenting translated content items is disclosed. It is detected that a content item has been captured by a device of a user. It is identified that the content item is a candidate content item for translation. The candidate content item is translated; and the translated candidate content item is presented via a user interface of a wearable display of the device.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 28, 2013
    Publication date: April 30, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Tomer Cohen
  • Patent number: 9021040
    Abstract: A system, method, and apparatus are provided for distributing a content item toward target recipients solely via first degree connections (e.g., in a professional network, in a social network). For a selected content item and identified target recipients of the item, when a user initiates a message to forward or otherwise convey the content item, one or more schemes are applied to select and automatically populate the message with suitable addressees. In one scheme, values are computed for each neighbor of the sender, to indicate the value of delivering the item to that neighbor; the message is automatically addressed to the highest-value neighbors. In another scheme, user communities that encompass the target recipients are identified and the message is automatically addressed to neighbors that are best able to disseminate the item throughout a community. In another scheme a minimal set of neighbors having connections to all target recipients is identified.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 28, 2014
    Date of Patent: April 28, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: June H. Andrews, Jason R. Schissel
  • Patent number: 9015037
    Abstract: A fact checking system is able to verify the correctness of information and/or characterize information by comparing the information with one or more sources. The fact checking system automatically monitors, processes, fact checks information and indicates a status of the information. The fact checking system is able to be interactive with a user, so that a user is able to respond to a fact check result and receive additional information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 11, 2013
    Date of Patent: April 21, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Lucas J. Myslinski
  • Patent number: 9015639
    Abstract: Methods and systems for facilitating the navigation of a list of content items with gestures are described. Consistent with some embodiments, a computing device detects simple gestures, and in response, display a preview of content items preceding, or following a currently selected content item, from the list of content items. Upon detecting a selection gesture, the computing device updates the view of the currently selected content item to display the newly selected content item.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 11, 2011
    Date of Patent: April 21, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Frank Taehyun Yoo, Steven Thomas Flory, Sean Edward Beausoleil
  • Patent number: 9009608
    Abstract: Recording a user's preference for content is disclosed. An indication of a problem associated with the content is received, in response to only a single action taken by a user interacting with a web page. After receiving the indication, at least a portion of the web page is continued to be displayed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 24, 2013
    Date of Patent: April 14, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: R. Kevin Rose
  • Patent number: 9009607
    Abstract: Recording a user's preference for content is disclosed. An indication of a problem associated with the content is received, in response to only a single action taken by a user interacting with a web page. After receiving the indication, at least a portion of the web page is continued to be displayed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 22, 2008
    Date of Patent: April 14, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: R. Kevin Rose
  • Patent number: 9009249
    Abstract: Described herein are a system and method for delivering content to a mobile computing device, where the content is selected for presentation to a member of a social network service based on the current geo-location of the member (device) and one or more associations and/or relationships between entities represented in a social graph of the social network service. A particular embodiment includes providing, by use of a data processor, a user interface to notify a member of a social network service of his or her proximity to another entity that is represented in the social graph of the social network service. In some embodiments, in response to determining that a member is in geographical proximity of a company that has a presence in the social graph of the social network service, a job recommendation/matching engine may cause information to be presented relating to a job listing posted to a job listing service by an authorized representative of the company.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 29, 2012
    Date of Patent: April 14, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Joff Redfern, Jayant Sai
  • Publication number: 20150095619
    Abstract: An example request change tracker may be used to create, modify, monitor, and report events occurring within a development and testing pipeline with respect to one or more computing applications. A request change tracker may include a pipeline event detector, a testing stage detector, a control module, and a reporting module. The pipeline event detector detects a pipeline event indicative of a status of a code module with respect to a pipeline. The testing stage detector determines the associated testing stage in the pipeline, based on the pipeline event. The control module initiates actions with respect to the pipeline, based on the determined testing stage. The reporting module updates a reporting log with information related to the state, progress and results of a testing stage in the pipeline.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 30, 2013
    Publication date: April 2, 2015
    Applicant: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Manish Dubey, Daniel L. Grillo, Sean Keenan, Scott Holmes
  • Patent number: 8997117
    Abstract: The present invention is directed to methods and systems for providing personal connection alerts. The user desires to have a personal connection with a target person. An indicator for a target is provided by the user. The indicator is often the name of the target, but can also be a picture of the target, or other information. A record for the target is created based on the received indicator. The target record is stored. A variety of additional information regarding the target may be obtained from external or internal sources and also stored in the target record. Then the target record is periodically compared with the user's social sphere of influence, which comprises the user's primary and secondary connections. The comparison includes at least comparing the target with the user's secondary connections. When the target record matches at least one of the user's secondary connections, an alert is provided.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 2, 2012
    Date of Patent: March 31, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Nisheeth Ranjan, Michael Leeds
  • Patent number: 8996536
    Abstract: A network update interface is presented to a user on a network to display network updates from other users of a mutual social-networking site. The network updates shared by the other users are gathered in a stream and supplied to a facet-filtering system including a network update interface. The user controls the display of certain network update items according to facet-filter characteristics enabled in facet-filter selection panels in the network update interface. The facet-filter characteristics are used by a facet filter to select certain network updates for display to the user in the network update interface. Trending links to further articles with content corresponding to the facet-filter characteristics are displayed to the user according to greatest popularity among the other users. Links to the profiles of the users sharing the articles are also provided in the network update interface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 20, 2011
    Date of Patent: March 31, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Alejandro Crosa, Esteban Kozak, Yasuhiro Matsuda, Xiaoyang Gu, Hao Yan, John Wang, Chanh Nguyen
  • Patent number: 8990155
    Abstract: A system and methods are provided for synchronizing multiple lists of content channels that a user of a multi-channel content service subscribes to or follows, such as lists maintained at different places and/or on different devices. If a list on one of the user's devices has been modified, the device (e.g., a multi-channel content applet) informs a synchronization server by uploading the list. The server synchronizes it with a master list and downloads a copy to the device. A channels list includes an entry for each channel the user follows (and possibly channels he has deleted), which includes an index or ordinal position of the channel among all the member's channels, an identifier of the channel (e.g., a URN), identifiers of sub-lists the channel has been assigned to, and a timestamp identifying the last time the entry changed (e.g., when the channel was added, removed, assigned to a sub-list).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 27, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 24, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Gregory W. Bayer, Steven S. Chow, Kwei-you Tao, Ankit Gupta
  • Patent number: 8990191
    Abstract: A method and system to determine a category score of a social network member is described. An example system comprises a sample selector, a weight value module, a storing module, an access module, and a category score module. The sample selector selects a random sample of member profiles from the profiles maintained by an on-line social network system. The weight value module obtains respective weight values associated with various phrases present in the random sample of member profiles. The access module accesses a member profile and the weighted phrases associated with a certain category. The category score module determines a category score for the member profile based on a presence of one or more phrases from the plurality of weighted phrases in the member profile.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 25, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 24, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Yan Liu, Shaobo Liu
  • Patent number: 8990345
    Abstract: A method for migrating information, and a migrator for migrating information, are disclosed. The method may include extracting organizational information from at least two service providers, accessing a first at least one of the at least two service providers upon selection of a migration selection interface by the user, receiving of a first plurality of information related to the user from one of the service providers, accessing a second at least one of the at least two service providers, and writing the first plurality of information to the second at least one of the at least two service providers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 3, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 24, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Tomy K. Isaac, Mark Kasiraja
  • Patent number: 8984049
    Abstract: An online address book is configured to include a multi-user input bar to receive search items intended to match contacts existing in a user's contact list. If a search term does not match any entry in the current contact list the search is extended by the multi-user input bar to include further candidate contacts. Candidate contacts are acquired through social profiles available from a set of networking sites linked-to over the Internet. A candidate contact that does match the search term is added to the contact list with a public profile whose contents are populated with contact data acquired from social profiles available through the networking sites. This practice of profile bookmarking may be applied iteratively across candidate contacts from various networking sites to build an extensive public profile.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 1, 2012
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Sachin Rekhi
  • Patent number: 8984045
    Abstract: A technique for identifying a group of potential candidates to join an organization is described. During this analysis technique, an identifier is received from an individual. This identifier may be used to associate the individual with a pre-existing profile that includes information. For example, the identifier may include a link to the pre-existing profile. Alternatively, a profile with the information may be generated for the individual based on the identifier and an information source. Using the information, an affinity metric of the individual with the organization is calculated, such as a number of employees of the organization who know the individual or who attended a same educational institution as the individual. Moreover, the affinity metric is used to determine whether to include the individual in the group of potential candidates to join the organization. In this way, the analysis technique may facilitate more-efficient recruiting efforts.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 13, 2012
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Christina Allen, Farid Hosseini, Seth M. McLaughlin
  • Patent number: 8984005
    Abstract: An Internet-based system capable of automatically maintaining contact-related information in any computer software application or digital device which stores or manages contact-related information. More particularly, the system allows users to automatically enter and maintain contact-related information in a digital address book or similar application or device (such as a wireless phone or PDA) with minimal or no manual entry of the contact-related information by the user. The system also allows contacts of the user (i.e. people who's contact information or partial contact information is present in the user's address book application) to make corrections to their contact-related information contained in the user's address book, request reciprocal contact information from the user, deny the user access to additional or corrected contact-related information and take other actions relative to managing the contact-related information which others (users) have about them.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 13, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2015
    Assignee: Linkedin Corporation
    Inventor: Robert L. Gropper
  • Patent number: 8984415
    Abstract: Displaying a preference by a user of a content contribution is disclosed. A preference event by the user is detected. A plurality of detected events is stored. In response to a query from a client, at least a portion of the stored detected events is stored. At least a portion of the received events is displayed in an interface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 26, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: R. Kevin Rose, Michal Jan Migurski, Shawn Paul Allen, Eric W. Rodenbeck
  • Patent number: 8977607
    Abstract: A system and method includes a network interface device to receive and retransmit electronic messages between a first user and a second user, an electronic data storage configured to store database entries related to electronic messages as received and retransmitted by the network interface device, at least some of the database entries including a latest message in thread flag identifying a latest electronic message in a thread of multiple electronic messages, and a processor. The processor may create a database entry corresponding to a first electronic message, the database entry including the latest message in thread flag indicating that the first electronic message is a latest electronic message of a thread, and change a status of a latest message in thread flag of a database entry corresponding to a second electronic message of the thread to indicate that the second electronic message is not a latest message in the thread.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 27, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 10, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Xiaobin Lu, Elaine Chien
  • Patent number: 8977687
    Abstract: Disclosed in some examples is a method of providing a bookmarking service on a social networking service, the method including receiving, over a network, an indication that a member of the social networking service interacted with an item of content; associating the item of content with a skill using a computer processor; and storing an indication in a storage device that the member interacted with the item of content and the skill associated with the item of content.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 12, 2012
    Date of Patent: March 10, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventor: Vinoth Chandar
  • Publication number: 20150066654
    Abstract: Techniques for facilitating retargeting of content are described. According to various embodiments, a user specification of a first set of content items and a second set of content items may be received. Moreover, a user specification of flow logic information may be received. The flow logic information may specify a user trigger action, and an instruction that a second content item in the second set is only to be displayed to a particular user after it is determined that the particular user has performed the user trigger action on the first content item. Thereafter, it may be determined that the particular user has performed the user trigger action on the first content item, and the second content item may be displayed to the particular user, based on the flow logic information.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 20, 2013
    Publication date: March 5, 2015
    Applicant: Linkedin Corporation
    Inventors: Ashvin Kannan, Gyanda Sachdeva, Michael Grishaver, Huining Feng
  • Patent number: 8972414
    Abstract: Techniques for identifying and presenting member profiles similar to a source member profile are described. With some embodiments, a general recommendation engine is used to extract features from member profiles, and then store the extracted features, including any computed, derived or retrieved profile features, in an enhanced member profile. In real-time, the general recommendation engine processes client requests to identify member profiles similar to a source member profile by comparing select profile features stored in the enhanced member profile with corresponding profile features of the source member profile, where the comparison results in several similarity sub-scores that are then combined in accordance with directives set forth in a configuration file. Finally, the member profiles with the highest similarity scores corresponding with the user-selected member profile are selected, and in some instances, presented to a user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 29, 2011
    Date of Patent: March 3, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Christian Posse, Abhishek Gupta, Anmol Bhasin, Monica Rogati
  • Patent number: 8972501
    Abstract: Systems and methods for the transmission of content are provided. A user group is defined and a group data structure corresponding to the user group is stored. An item of content is received and stored as a child data structure of a parent data structure of the group data structure. In response to this storage, the item of content is automatically transmitted to all other users of the user group.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 23, 2013
    Date of Patent: March 3, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Vincent Mallet, Jessica Cheng, Noah Fiedel, Eric William Gillum, Ganesh Ramanarayanan, Nicholas James Woods
  • Patent number: 8972417
    Abstract: Disclosed in some examples are methods, systems and machine readable medium for recommending an out-of-network communication by determining a set of potential recommended members of a social networking service based upon one or more recommendation criteria. In some examples the recommendation criteria may include: a profile similarity to a previous target of an out-of-network communication, a degree of correspondence between an interest and intent of the sending member, and a likelihood of response.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 21, 2013
    Date of Patent: March 3, 2015
    Assignee: LinkedIn Corporation
    Inventors: Junghoon Ahn, Abhishek Gupta, Christian Posse, Anmol Bhasin, Yurong Shi, Jian Li, Jacob Kessler