Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to identifying one or more messages sent by a user, identifying two or more contacts that are associated with one or more of the messages, determining a strength of relationship score between identified contacts, and utilizing the strength of relationship scores to provide additional information related to the contacts. A strength of relationship score between a contact and one or more other contacts may be determined based on one or more properties of one or more of the messages. In some implementations, contacts groups may be determined based on the strength of relationship scores. In some implementations, contacts groups may be utilized to disambiguate references to contacts in messages. In some implementations, contacts group may be utilized to provide suggestions to the user of additional contacts of a contacts group that includes the indicated recipient contact of a message.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to providing additional information related to a vague term in a message. For example, in some implementations, one or more messages sent by a sender and received by one or more recipients may be identified, a vague term in the message may be identified, a user-restricted database may be identified that is associated with the sender or a recipient, and additional information related to the vague term may be determined from the user-restricted database. A vague term is a term which may have multiple meanings and that can be clarified with additional information. In some implementations, user-restricted databases may include additional information that is associated with the user that may be utilized to replace the vague term with a clarified term. In some implementations, a user-restricted database may be utilized to identify additional information in another database that may be utilized to clarify the vague term.

Abstract: A method and apparatus are provided for detecting and explaining bursty stream events in targeted groups. In one example, the method includes receiving validated bursty events, finding explanatory data sources having relevant bursty events that are relevant to the validated bursty events, wherein the explanatory sources explain the presence of the validated bursty events, correlating the validated bursty events to the relevant bursty events of the explanatory data sources to obtain burst results, and sending the burst results to a burst database that is accessible to an end user.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to associating a task completion step with one or more tasks. A task group is determined based on similarity between the tasks of the task group, a task completion step of one of the tasks of the task group is identified, and one or more of the other tasks of the task group are associated with the task completion step. In some implementations, the task group is determined based on similarity between entities that are associated with the tasks of the task group. In some implementations, the task group is determined based on textual representations that are associated with the tasks of the task group.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to providing an indication to a user that a task may be completed based on the values of one or more dynamic attributes of an entity related to the task. An entity is determined based on information that is associated with the task. An indication related to completion of the task is provided to the user when the value of one or more dynamic attributes of the entity is one or more states.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to associating a task completion step with a task template based on one or more task completion steps of tasks that conform to the task template. A task template may include one or more terms, entities, and/or category of entities. A Task conforms to the task template when the task includes the one or more terms, entities, and/or an identifier of an entity that is a member of the entity category. In some implementations, a task that is associated with a task completion step is identified as conforming to the task template and the task completion step of the conforming task is associated with the task template. In some implementations, the task template may be utilized to associate a task completion step with a task that conforms to the task template.

Abstract: A computer-implemented method for customizing a user display is disclosed. A user is identified based on user-provided information or user activity. The user's sharing activity is determined. A user type is identified based at least in part on the user's sharing activity and associated with the user. The user type is one of two or more user types related to a measure of the user's sharing activity. One or more of a content item and an annotation displayed to the user is customized based at least in part on the user's user type.

Abstract: A system and method for generating a stream of content for a channel. The channel application includes a content categorizer, a scoring engine and a channel engine. The content categorizer categorizes new content items received from heterogeneous data sources. The channel engine identifies a channel category for a user based at least in part on at least one of a historical trend and a user activity. The scoring engine queries the new content items based on the channel category and at least one other channel attribute. The scoring engine retrieves candidate content items that include the channel category and the other channel attribute. The scoring engine then generates a stream of content from the candidate content items for the channel.

Abstract: A system and method for generating a channel includes a channel engine that retrieves candidate content items based on a topic from heterogeneous data sources. The channel engine generates a stream of content with selected content items and populates the stream of content for the channel and providing the stream of content to users associated with the channel. In response to receiving feedback, the channel engine modifies the at least one topic based at least in part on the feedback. The scoring engine generates a second stream of content from the first stream of content that is personalized for the first user based at least in part on a model. Other users can subscribe to the second stream.

Abstract: A system and method for generating a stream of content with candidate content items associated with a likelihood of being interesting to a user. A model generation engine generates a model for a user. A scoring engine obtains candidate content items and compares candidate content items to a model to determine the most interesting content items. A user interface engine organizing first and second content items in a first direction and a third content item in a second direction. The user interface engine receives feedback that includes a request for additional content items or a request to remove an interest associated with a selected content item from the model. The model generation engine updates the model in response to feedback.

Abstract: Disclosed are methods and apparatus for matching sets of text to objects are disclosed. In accordance with one embodiment, a set of text is obtained. For instance, the set of text may include a review. A numerical value is determined for each of a plurality of objects, where the numerical value indicates a likelihood that the corresponding one of the plurality of objects is a subject of the set of text. Each of the plurality of objects has an object type defined by a set of one or more attributes, each of the set of one or more attributes having associated therewith a corresponding set of one or more parameters, wherein the numerical value is determined using the set of text and a value of each of the set of one or more parameters for each of the set of one or more attributes. One of the plurality of objects that is most likely to be the subject of the set of text is identified based upon the numerical value that has been determined for each of the plurality of objects.

Abstract: An improved system and method for evolutionary clustering of sequential data sets is provided. A snapshot cost may be determined for representing the data set for a particular clustering method used and may determine the cost of clustering the data set independently of a series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence. A history cost may also be determined for measuring the distance between corresponding clusters of the data set and the previous data set in the sequence of data sets to determine a cost of clustering the data set as part of a series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence. An overall cost may be determined for clustering the data set by minimizing the combination of the snapshot cost and the history cost. Any clustering method may be used, including flat clustering and hierarchical clustering.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to providing one or more completion step suggestions for a task that is associated with a user. In some implementations, the completion step suggestions may be provided to the user based on the satisfaction of a trigger condition. In some implementations, a trigger condition may be based on a user geographic location. In some implementations, a trigger condition may be based on an action of the user. In some implementations, a trigger condition may be based on a time when the associated task may be completed.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to identifying a plurality of user locations, determining an activity of the user based on the identified user locations, and providing information to the user based on the determined activity of the user. In some implementations, the information may be a user activity suggestion for a user to perform. In some implementations, the information may be provided to the user in response to input from the user. In some implementations, the input may be a search query and the information may be search results. In some implementations, the input may be a partial query and the information may be query suggestions.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to associating a task with a user based on the user selecting a task suggestion that is provided to the user in response to a user query. In some implementations, the task may be identified based on similarities between the words and/or phrases of the user query and a task suggestion that is associated with a task. In some implementations, the task may be identified based on user data associated with the user. In some implementations, the task may be associated with additional information related to completing the task.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus related to receiving user task information indicative of an intended action of a user, determining additional information related to completion of the intended action, determining a completion step for the intended action based on the additional information, and providing the completion step to the user. The user task information may be received from a first source and the additional information may be determined from one or more additional sources that are distinct from the first source. Additional sources may include, for example, user data associated with the user and/or one or more non-user specific databases such as an entity database. Whether a completion step is provided to a user may be dependent on one or more factors such as, for example, the source of the user task information, the source of the additional information, and/or a trigger associated with the completion step.

Abstract: Methods and systems are described for navigating a corpus of content items stored in one or more information repositories within a distributed communications system. The content items may include video feeds, audio feeds, television broadcasts, website, a web log or the like. Using any browser application, the user views content items presented in an interactive scroll display. Modules are included for filtering, sorting and sampling content to ensure delivery of relevant high-quality content to the user. A feedback mechanism is also included for refining relevance filtering, sorting and sampling processes.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for identifying a set of items that are displayed to a user of a social networking service, the items comprising digital content distributed using the social networking service and being associated with item features, the item features comprising item-dependent features and user-dependent features; receiving feature values that are associated with one of an item-dependent feature and a user-dependent feature; receiving probabilities that are associated with a group and reflecting a likelihood that the user is a type of user associated with the group, the groups including a set of weights; determining an item score based on the feature values and a set of weights to provide item scores, the set of weights being identified based on the probabilities; and determining a subset of items to be displayed to the user based on the item scores.

Abstract: The subject matter disclosed herein relates to a process for receiving, evaluating and selecting of content modules such as content summary boxes and landing pages for display on network-accessible search engine results page. In one particular example, potential content providers may be provided with incentives and guidelines for the preparation of content summary boxes and landing pages over an electronic communications network, and the resulting submissions can be ranked and published in conjunction with the display of a search engine results page over the network.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for identifying entities using search results. One of the methods includes determining that a first search query includes a respective text reference to each of one or more predetermined attributes, wherein each attribute is associated with a first entity type; obtaining search results for the first search query from a search engine, the search results identifying a plurality of resources; identifying entities of the first entity type that are related to any of the plurality of resources identified by the search results; and selecting names of one or more of the identified entities of the first entity type to include in a response to the first search query.