Abstract: Techniques are described that provide a platform and methods through which a user's motivation for an action taken by the user can be attributed to influence from information provided by an initial user. The techniques provide an easy way for the user to explicitly provide direct evidence of the user's motivation. Also, the techniques demonstrate a highly reliable way as to how motivation may be inferred from certain context in which the user operates and the user can be prompted to confirm the motivation inference. Indications of the user's motivations may also be linked to a creation (post, text, message, etc.) by the initial user to assist in search operations to provide more thorough and accurate search results.

Abstract: The technology described herein relates to a new and improved search engine platform that provides rankings and search results based on scores determined at least in part on user interactions with user created content referrals. Searches are thus performed on a user-defined data set, which provides more relevant information in fewer search results than is the case with other search engines. Ranked lists of content referrals having common topics are maintained according to scores associated with the content referrals or elements thereof. Search results may include individual content referrals or lists of content referrals.