Personal trends module

An information processing system for generating personalized trending topics comprises:

• a processor device;
• and
• a memory operably coupled with the processor device, said memory comprising computer-executable instructions causing a computer to perform steps of:
• for a given user, producing a social timeline by logging content posted on the given user's accounts on social media sites;
• analyzing the social timeline for recently posted content to derive an interim summary of first trending topics for the user;
• receiving an in-stream feed of second trending topics based on the user's recent on-line activity such as page views, queries, and clicks;
• augmenting the social timeline with the second trending topics from the in-stream feed to produce an interim list of third trending topics;
• ranking the third trending topics by source category using a frequency index;
• selecting a subset of highest ranked third trending topics from each source category;
• and
• presenting a personalized trends module comprising positions allocated to the subset of the highest ranked third trending topics.

A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium with computer-executable instructions stored thereon, said computer-executable instructions, when executed, causing a computer to perform steps of:

• for a given user, producing a social timeline by logging content posted on the given user's accounts on social media sites;
• analyzing the social timeline for recently posted content to derive an interim summary of first trending topics for the user;
• receiving an in-stream feed of second trending topics based on the user's recent on-line activity such as page views, queries, and clicks;
• augmenting the social timeline with the second trending topics from the in-stream feed to produce an interim list of third trending topics;
• ranking the third trending topics by source category using a frequency index;
• selecting a subset of highest ranked third trending topics from each source category;
• and
• presenting a personalized trends module comprising positions allocated to the subset of the highest ranked third trending topics.