Abstract: To display a news feed in a social network environment, a social networking system generates news items regarding activities associated with a user of a social network environment. The social networking system may also attach an informational link associated with at least one of the activities to at least one of the news items, limit access to the news items to a predetermined set of viewers, and assign an order to the news items. The news items may be displayed in the assigned order to at least one viewing user of the predetermined set of viewers, and the number of news items displayed may be dynamically limited.

Abstract: The invention provides a display interface in a social networking system that enables the presentation of information related to a user in a timeline or map view. The system accesses information about a user of a social networking system, including both data about the user and social network activities related to the user. The system then selects one or more of these pieces of data and/or activities from a certain time period and gathers them into timeline units based on their relatedness and their relevance to users. These timeline units are ranked by relevance to the user, and are used to generate a timeline or map view for the user containing visual representations of the timeline units organized by location or time. The timeline or map view is then provided to other users of the social networking system that wish to view information about the user.

Abstract: Exemplary systems and methods for calendaring are provided. Exemplary systems include a natural language receiving component configured to receive a natural language entry corresponding to a future status, a calendar generation engine configured to create a calendar entry based on the natural language entry, a social network database configured for accessing and querying by the calendar generation engine, a privacy component configured to receive a privacy setting indicating a person who is approved to view the calendar entry, and a display module configured to display the calendar entry on a calendar. Exemplary methods include receiving a natural language entry corresponding to a future status, creating a calendar entry, and displaying the calendar entry.

Abstract: To display a news feed in a social network environment, a social networking system generates news items regarding activities associated with a user of a social network environment. The social networking system may also attach an informational link associated with at least one of the activities to at least one of the news items, limit access to the news items to a predetermined set of viewers, and assign an order to the news items. The news items may be displayed in the assigned order to at least one viewing user of the predetermined set of viewers, and the number of news items displayed may be dynamically limited.

Abstract: A social networking system provides a short, unbiased biographical summary for a user of the social networking system. The short biography includes a few relevant biographical information items selected from the user's profile and is displayed on the profile page. The short biography may be displayed with a set of photographs also selected from the profile for their relevance. Relevance may be based on various information including temporal relevance and relevance to the viewing user. Display of the short biography allows a viewer to easily find current biographical information about the user in an abbreviated format.

Abstract: A social networking system provides a short, unbiased biographical summary for a user of the social networking system. The short biography includes a few relevant biographical information items selected from the user's profile and is displayed on the profile page. The short biography may be displayed with a set of photographs also selected from the profile for their relevance. Relevance may be based on various information including temporal relevance and relevance to the viewing user. Display of the short biography allows a viewer to easily find current biographical information about the user in an abbreviated format.

Abstract: A system and method provides dynamically selected media content to someone using an electronic device in a social network environment. Items of media content are selected for the user based on his or her relationships with one or more other users. The user's relationships with other users are reflected in the selected media content and its format. An order is assigned to the items of media content, for example, based on their anticipated importance to the user, and the items of media content are displayed to the user in the assigned order. The user may change the order of the items of media content. The user's interactions with media content available in the social network environment are monitored, and those interactions are used to select additional items of media content for the user.

Abstract: A system and method provides dynamically selected media content to someone using an electronic device in a social network environment. Items of media content are selected for the user based on his or her relationships with one or more other users. The user's relationships with other users are reflected in the selected media content and its format. An order is assigned to the items of media content, for example, based on their anticipated importance to the user, and the items of media content are displayed to the user in the assigned order. The user may change the order of the items of media content. The user's interactions with media content available in the social network environment are monitored, and those interactions are used to select additional items of media content for the user.

Abstract: A system environment supporting one or more advertisers and one or more ad publishers provides a means of sharing user-targeted advertisement. One or more hashing modules in the system environment provide the advertisers and ad publishers a means of sharing this information without revealing a user's personally identifiable information (PII). If a lossy hash is chosen, then an advertiser can communicate targeted advertisements to an ad publisher without revealing any PII to the ad publisher that the ad publisher did not already know.

Abstract: The invention provides a display interface in a social networking system that enables the presentation of information related to a user in a timeline or map view. The system accesses information about a user of a social networking system, including both data about the user and social network activities related to the user. The system then selects one or more of these pieces of data and/or activities from a certain time period and gathers them into timeline units based on their relatedness and their relevance to users. These timeline units are ranked by relevance to the user, and are used to generate a timeline or map view for the user containing visual representations of the timeline units organized by location or time. The timeline or map view is then provided to other users of the social networking system that wish to view information about the user.

Abstract: A system, method, and computer program for social mapping is provided. Data about a plurality of social network members is received. A first member of the plurality of social network members is allowed to identify a second member of the plurality of social network members with whom the first member wishes to establish a relationship. The data is then sent to the second member about the first member based on the identification. Input from the second member is received in response to the data. The relationship between the first member and the second member is confirmed based on the input in order to map the first member to the second member.

Abstract: The invention provides a display interface in a social networking system that enables the presentation of information related to a user in a timeline or map view. The system accesses information about a user of a social networking system, including both data about the user and social network activities related to the user. The system then selects one or more of these pieces of data and/or activities from a certain time period and gathers them into timeline units based on their relatedness and their relevance to users. These timeline units are ranked by relevance to the user, and are used to generate a timeline or map view for the user containing visual representations of the timeline units organized by location or time. The timeline or map view is then provided to other users of the social networking system that wish to view information about the user.

Abstract: A social networking system generates socially-relevant stories for a user based on actions taken by other users to whom the user is connected. The social networking system may receive a request for a sponsored story for a viewing user and may select information about one or more actions performed by one or more users to whom the viewing user is connected to identify one of a plurality of candidate information for a sponsored story based on one or more criteria (e.g., affinity of the viewing user for the candidates, expected value for the candidates, etc.). The social networking system may also generate the sponsored story and generate a feed comprising the sponsored story and news stories (e.g., non-sponsored stories) about one or more users of the social networking system with whom the viewing user is connected. This feed may be provided for display to the viewing user.

Abstract: A social networking system generates socially-relevant stories for a user based on actions taken by other users to whom the user is connected. The social networking system may receive a request for a sponsored story for a viewing user and may select information about one or more actions performed by one or more users to whom the viewing user is connected to identify one of a plurality of candidate information for a sponsored story based on one or more criteria (e.g., affinity of the viewing user for the candidates, expected value for the candidates, etc.). The social networking system may also generate the sponsored story and generate a feed comprising the sponsored story and news stories (e.g., non-sponsored stories) about one or more users of the social networking system with whom the viewing user is connected. This feed may be provided for display to the viewing user.

Abstract: A social networking website logs information about actions taken by members of the website. For a particular member of the website, the website generates socially relevant ads for the member based on the actions logged for other members on the website to whom the member is connected (i.e., the member's online friends). The advertiser associated with the social ad may compensate the social networking website for publishing the ad on the website. When presenting a member with a social ad, the website may optimize advertising revenue by selecting an ad from the received ads that will maximize the expected value of the social ad. The expected value may be computed according to a function that includes the member's affinity for the ad content and the bid amount. The technique is also applied for providing socially relevant information off the social networking website.

Abstract: A social networking website logs information about actions taken by members of the website. For a particular member of the website, the website generates socially relevant ads for the member based on the actions logged for other members on the website to whom the member is connected (i.e., the member's online friends). The advertiser associated with the social ad may compensate the social networking website for publishing the ad on the website. When presenting a member with a social ad, the website may optimize advertising revenue by selecting an ad from the received ads that will maximize the expected value of the social ad. The expected value may be computed according to a function that includes the member's affinity for the ad content and the bid amount. The technique is also applied for providing socially relevant information off the social networking website.

Abstract: A system, method, and computer program for generating a social timeline is provided. A plurality of data items associated with at least one relationship between users associated with a social network is received, each data item having an associated time. The data items are ordered according to the at least one relationship. A social timeline is generated according to the ordered data items.