Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for a collective address book system. One of the methods includes: receiving a request from a user to contact a person of interest; determining that contact information for the person of interest is not available in the user's contact information to which the system has access; determining that the collective address book system has access to contact information for the person of interest; generating proxy contact data for the person of interest; and providing the proxy contact data to the first user.

Abstract: Methods and systems for managing agents and threads that form part of a virtual personal assistant system. One of the methods includes receiving a user request; associating a first agent with a triage state and a second agent with a queue state; providing a first thread associated with the user request to the first agent; receiving from the first agent at least one task to be performed to respond to the user request, the task forming part of the first thread; providing the first thread to the second agent, and removing the first thread from the second agent if the second agent does not act on the first thread according to a specified criteria, wherein an agent can only be in one of the triage state or the queue state at one time and an agent can work on a second thread only after stopping work on the first thread.

Abstract: Embodiments improve the ability of users of a social networking system to search for information that is likely to be relevant to them by learning and/or applying a search context associated with selector components used to search for objects of the social networking system. The search context is specific to the use of an individual selector and thus need not be as general as the context of an entire page or set of pages in which selectors can be embedded. The social networking system may learn the context of a selector by monitoring user selections from prior search results performed using the selector.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for a collective address book system. One of the methods includes: receiving a request from a user to contact a person of interest; determining that contact information for the person of interest is not available in the user's contact information to which the system has access; determining that the collective address book system has access to contact information for the person of interest; generating proxy contact data for the person of interest; and providing the proxy contact data to the first user.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for a collective address book system. One of the methods includes: receiving a request from a user to contact a person of interest; determining that contact information for the person of interest is not available in the user's contact information to which the system has access; determining that the collective address book system has access to contact information for the person of interest; generating proxy contact data for the person of interest; and providing the proxy contact data to the first user.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for resolving inconsistencies in information graphs.

Abstract: A social networking system leverages user's social information to evaluate content submitted for inclusion in objects. If the evaluated submission is accepted, the submission is added to the content of an object. Accepted submissions are also used to predict associations between metadata and objects. Metadata is used to predict which objects will match user searches for information. The social networking system also provides a user interface configured to prompt users to submit information to objects. When a user completes a submission to an object, the user is provided with other options for groups of objects to contribute to. The objects offered are chosen to increase the likelihood that the user will choose to provide submissions to one of the provided objects.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for identifying user-specific values for entity attributes. One of the methods includes maintaining data representing a particular cluster of a plurality of claims about a particular entity, wherein each claim is an assertion by a respective claimant about an attribute value of the particular entity; receiving a request for a value of a particular attribute of the particular entity that has been submitted by a requesting user; determining, from attribute values for the particular attribute identified by the claims in the particular cluster, a user-specific attribute value for the particular attribute value; and providing the user-specific attribute value in response to the request.

Abstract: A social networking system allows its users to provide metadata for association with objects maintained by the social networking system. Some of the metadata may be presented to other users along with the object. To prevent association of inaccurate metadata with an object, the social networking system determines a confidence value associated with a user who provided metadata for association with an object. The confidence value indicates of the accuracy of metadata provided by the user relative to information associated with the object. If the user has previously provided less than a threshold amount of metadata to associate with objects, the confidence score is determined using characteristics associated with the user by the social networking system. The metadata provided by the user is stored but not associated with the object if the user's confidence value is less than a threshold value.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for a collective address book system. One of the methods includes: receiving a request from a user to contact a person of interest; determining that contact information for the person of interest is not available in the user's contact information to which the system has access; determining that the collective address book system has access to contact information for the person of interest; generating proxy contact data for the person of interest; and providing the proxy contact data to the first user.

Abstract: Users of a social networking system post questions for other users to answer. Questions are automatically tagged based on keywords extracted from text within the posted questions as well as user-selected tags. Answers may be voted on and sorted by social information related to the browsing user. Affinities for tags are recorded based on users' interactions with the question and answer service. Affinities for tags may also be used to target questions to other users and sort answers.

Abstract: A social networking system allows its users to provide metadata for association with objects maintained by the social networking system. Some of the metadata may be presented to other users along with the object. To prevent association of inaccurate metadata with an object, the social networking system determines a confidence value associated with a user who provided metadata for association with an object. The confidence value indicates of the accuracy of metadata provided by the user relative to information associated with the object. If the user has previously provided less than a threshold amount of metadata to associate with objects, the confidence score is determined using characteristics associated with the user by the social networking system. The metadata provided by the user is stored but not associated with the object if the user's confidence value is less than a threshold value.

Abstract: Embodiments improve the ability of users of a social networking system to search for information that is likely to be relevant to them by learning and/or applying a search context associated with selector components used to search for objects of the social networking system. The search context is specific to the use of an individual selector and thus need not be as general as the context of an entire page or set of pages in which selectors can be embedded. The social networking system may learn the context of a selector by monitoring user selections from prior search results performed using the selector.

Abstract: Embodiments improve the ability of users of a social networking system to search for information that is likely to be relevant to them by learning and/or applying a search context associated with selector components used to search for objects of the social networking system. The search context is specific to the use of an individual selector and thus need not be as general as the context of an entire page or set of pages in which selectors can be embedded. The social networking system may learn the context of a selector by monitoring user selections from prior search results performed using the selector.

Abstract: A social networking system leverages user's social information to evaluate content submitted for inclusion in objects. If the evaluated submission is accepted, the submission is added to the content of an object. Accepted submissions are also used to predict associations between metadata and objects. Metadata is used to predict which objects will match user searches for information. The social networking system also provides a user interface configured to prompt users to submit information to objects. When a user completes a submission to an object, the user is provided with other options for groups of objects to contribute to. The objects offered are chosen to increase the likelihood that the user will choose to provide submissions to one of the provided objects.

Abstract: A social networking system leverages user's social information to evaluate content submitted for inclusion in objects. If the evaluated submission is accepted, the submission is added to the content of an object. Accepted submissions are also used to predict associations between metadata and objects. Metadata is used to predict which objects will match user searches for information. The social networking system also provides a user interface configured to prompt users to submit information to objects. When a user completes a submission to an object, the user is provided with other options for groups of objects to contribute to. The objects offered are chosen to increase the likelihood that the user will choose to provide submissions to one of the provided objects.

Abstract: Users of a social networking system post questions for other users to answer. Questions are automatically tagged based on keywords extracted from text within the posted questions as well as user-selected tags. Users also browse questions asked by other users on the social networking system using an interface that displays questions by topics and sub-topics. Answers may be voted on and sorted by social information related to the browsing user. Affinities for tags are recorded based on users' interactions with the question and answer service. Affinities for tags may also be used to target questions to other users and sort answers.

Abstract: Embodiments of the invention improve the ability of a social networking system to determine which types of data—hereinafter referred to as “fields”—are relevant to which types of user pages. Specifically, a social networking system assigns page types to different user pages, and likewise stores information on different types of fields. By analyzing the relationships of different pages and fields, the social networking system determines which types of fields are particularly well-suited for inclusion on different types of pages. Using the learned information about page types and field types, the social networking system can better aid page administrators in specifying data to add to their pages. For example, the social networking system can recommend to administrators the addition of certain types of fields or automatically add the fields. Further, the social networking system can specialize a search for social networking system data to field types.

Abstract: Users of a social networking system post questions for other users to answer. Questions are automatically tagged based on keywords extracted from text within the posted questions as well as user-selected tags. Users also browse questions asked by other users on the social networking system using an interface that displays questions by topics and sub-topics. Answers may be voted on and sorted by social information related to the browsing user. Affinities for tags are recorded based on users' interactions with the question and answer service. Affinities for tags may also be used to target questions to other users and sort answers.

Abstract: Users of a social networking system post questions for other users to answer. Questions are automatically tagged based on keywords extracted from text within the posted questions as well as user-selected tags. Users also browse questions asked by other users on the social networking system using an interface that displays questions by topics and sub-topics. Answers may be voted on and sorted by social information related to the browsing user. Affinities for tags are recorded based on users' interactions with the question and answer service. Affinities for tags may also be used to target questions to other users and sort answers.