Systems and methods for social graph data analytics to determine connectivity within a community

Abstract

Systems and methods for social graph data analytics to determine the connectivity between nodes within a community are provided. A user may assign user connectivity values to other members of the community, or connectivity values may be automatically assigned from third parties or based on the frequency of interactions between members. Connectivity values may represent such factors as alignment, reputation, status, and/or influence within a social graph of a network community, or the degree of trust. The paths connecting a first node to a second node may be retrieved, and social graph data analytics may be performed on the retrieved paths. Network connectivity values and/or other social graph data may be outputted to third-party processes and services for use in initiating automatic transactions or making automated network-based or real-world decisions.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A method for determining the network connectivity between a first node and a second node connected to the first node by at least one path, the method comprising:
 identifying paths to the second node from the first node within a network community;   using processing circuitry to:
 determine a normalized path weight for each identified path; 
 determine a user connectivity value for each identified path; 
 for each identified path, sum the product of the user connectivity value and the normalized path weight to produce a network connectivity indication; and 
 output the network connectivity indication.