Segmentation of professional network update data

Abstract

Users belonging to a particular category at a networking site are monitored by a system and according to a method for their selection of articles from a networking update stream. The characteristics of the users, including the categories they belong to, are received as metadata corresponding to the each respective article. Periodically an article database is queried according to the category and a selected time period to determine the number of users that have chosen to follow the industry and that have initiated selection actions towards articles in the database. Articles from the query are ranked according to their popularity among users having interest in the same industry category and are presented to a viewing user at the networking site.

1 . A method comprising:
 responsive to a query of a database, receiving a selection of articles and respective selection action data at a networking site, the articles being selected by users belonging to a category and submitted to a networking update stream;   according to a number of the users initiating each respective selection action, scoring each article to produce a corresponding popularity score;   arranging the selection of articles according to the respective popularity scores to produce a ranked listing of the articles; and   responsive to receiving an indication of a user accessing the networking site, transmitting the ranked listing of the articles to a client device of a viewing user, the viewing user having chosen to follow the category.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 monitoring selection by the users of the articles from the networking update stream;   acquiring article metadata corresponding to each selected article and a respective selecting user, the article metadata including the respective selection action data; and   storing the selection of articles and corresponding article metadata into the database.   
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 2 , further comprising, in response to the storing of the selection of articles and article metadata into the database, indexing the articles by categories according to the corresponding article metadata, the article metadata being at least one of article data, user data, and selection action data. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 2 , wherein the article metadata includes article data, user data, and selection action data,
 wherein the article data includes at least one of an article ID, an article title, a source identifier, and a universal resource locator of the article's source;   wherein the user data includes at least one of a user ID, an industry category, a name of a company that the user works for, a list of user skills, and a location; and   wherein the selection action data includes at least one of liking, sharing, saving, commenting, voting, and time period.   
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the category including an industry category the users participate in. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 initiating the query of the database according to a set of query terms, the query terms being a selection of categories and metadata values associated with the articles, the categories including an industry category and a time period category.   
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 responsive to the database query being conducted according to the category and a time period, receiving the selection of articles including a number of users per article initiating the respective selection action;   submitting the number of users per article following the category to a scoring function; and   receiving respective popularity scores corresponding to the selection of articles.   
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 transmitting a set of recommended articles and a set of trending articles to the client device of the user,   wherein the set of trending articles having been selected by at least a previously defined number of users at the networking site.   
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising transmitting a set of suggested industries configured to be designated by the users as further followed categories to be followed at the networking site. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein arranging the selection of articles produces the ranked listing of articles being a list of articles ranked in descending order and wherein the transmitting the ranked listing of the articles to a client device of the user includes providing links to the respective articles through one of a web page and an e-mail. 
     
     
         11 . A computer-readable storage medium embodying a set of instructions, that when executed by at least one processor, causes the at least one processor to perform operations comprising:
 responsive to a query of a database, receiving a selection of articles and respective selection action data at a networking site, the articles being selected by users belonging to a category and submitted to a networking update stream;   according to a number of the users initiating each respective selection action, scoring each article to produce a corresponding popularity score;   arranging the selection of articles according to the respective popularity scores to produce a ranked listing of the articles; and   responsive to receiving an indication of a user accessing the networking site, transmitting the ranked listing of the articles to a client device of a viewing user, the viewing user having chosen to follow the category.   
     
     
         12 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 monitoring selection by the users of the articles from the networking update stream;   acquiring article metadata corresponding to each selected article and a respective selecting user, the article metadata including the respective selection action data; and   storing the selection of articles and corresponding article metadata into the database.   
     
     
         13 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 12 , further comprising, in response to the storing of the selection of articles and article metadata into the database, indexing the articles by categories according to the corresponding article metadata, the article metadata being at least one of article data, user data, and selection action data. 
     
     
         14 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 12 , wherein the article metadata includes article data, user data, and selection action data,
 wherein the article data includes at least one of an article ID, an article title, a source identifier, and a universal resource locator of the article's source;   wherein the user data includes at least one of a user ID, an industry category, a name of a company that the user works for, a list of user skills, and a location; and   wherein the selection action data includes at least one of liking, sharing, saving, commenting, voting, and time period.   
     
     
         15 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 11 , wherein the category including an industry category the users participate in. 
     
     
         16 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 initiating the query of the database according to a set of query terms, the query terms being a selection of categories and metadata values associated with the articles, the categories including an industry category and a time period category.   
     
     
         17 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 responsive to the database query being conducted according to the category and a time period, receiving the selection of articles including a number of users per article initiating the respective selection action;   submitting the number of users per article following the category to a scoring function; and   receiving respective popularity scores corresponding to the selection of articles.   
     
     
         18 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 transmitting a set of recommended articles and a set of trending articles to the client device of the user,   wherein the set of trending articles having been selected by at least a previously defined number of users at the networking site.   
     
     
         19 . The computer-readable storage medium of  claim 11 , further comprising transmitting a set of suggested industries configured to be designated by the users as further followed categories to be followed at the networking site. 
     
     
         20 . A system comprising:
 a computer memory including an article database and a server including at least one processing device configured to implement:
 an indexing module configured to index articles in the article database by categories according to article metadata corresponding to each respective article; 
 a query module configured to query the article database according to a set of query terms corresponding to the categories and the article metadata and to produce a selection of articles; 
 a scoring function configured to calculate a popularity score corresponding to respective articles from the selection of articles, the popularity score determined according to a number of users following a category and having selected the respective article; and 
 a ranking module configured to arrange the selection of articles according to the respective popularity scores and to produce a ranked listing of the articles.