Estimating social interest in time-based media

A computer-executed method for determining social interest in an event in a time-based media, the method comprising:

• accessing from a social networking system a plurality of candidate social media content items authored by users of the social networking system;
• for each of the candidate social media content items, determining a confidence score indicative of a probability that the candidate social media content item is relevant to the event;
• aligning with the event, based on their respective confidence scores, a subset of the plurality of the social media content items;
• aggregating the confidence scores of the aligned subset of candidate social media content items to produce an aggregate score;
• and
• determining a level of social interest in the event based upon the aggregate score.

A computer-executed method for determining social interest in time-based media events, the method comprising:

• selecting a plurality of events in a time-based medium;
• accessing from a social networking system a plurality of candidate social media content items authored by users of the social networking system that are potentially relevant to the events in the time based medium;
• for each social media content item, determining a confidence score for the social media content item with respect to at least one of the plurality of events, the confidence score indicating a probability that the social media content item is relevant to the at least one event;
• and
• for each of the plurality of events:
• aligning with the event, based on their respective confidence scores, a subset of the plurality of the social media content items;
• aggregating the confidence scores of the social media content items having a confidence score for the event;
• and
• determining a level of social interest for in the event based on the aggregate score.

A computer-executed method for mapping social content items to time-based media events, comprising:

• accessing from a social networking system a plurality of social media content items authored by users of the social networking system;
• aligning a plurality of metadata instances to segments of time-based media corresponding to events in the time-based media to form annotated events;
• and
• mapping to the annotated events the social media content items relevant to the annotated events.

A system for associating social media content items with a time-based media event, the system comprising:

• means for accessing from a social networking system a plurality of candidate social media content items authored by users of the social networking system;
• means for determining a confidence score for each of the candidate social media content items indicative of a probability that the candidate social media content item is relevant to the event;
• means for aligning with the event, based on their respective confidence scores, a subset of the plurality of the social media content items;
• and
• a data store for collecting the alignments between the event and the subset of the plurality of the social media content items.

A system for mapping social content items to time-based media events, comprising:

• means for accessing from a social networking system a plurality of social media content items authored by users of the social networking system;
• means for aligning a plurality of metadata instances to segments of time-based media corresponding to events in the time-based media to form annotated events;
• and
• means for mapping to the annotated events the social media content items relevant to the annotated events.

A system for associating social media content items with a time-based media event, the system comprising:

• a computer processor;
• and
• a computer-readable storage medium storing computer program modules configured to execute on the computer processor, the computer program modules comprising:
• a data ingestion engine configured to access from a social networking system a plurality of candidate social media content items authored by users of the social networking system;
• a media/event alignment engine configured to determine a confidence score for each of the candidate social media content items indicative of a probability that the candidate social media content item is relevant to the event and to align with the event, based on their respective confidence scores, a subset of the plurality of the social media content items;
• and
• a data store for collecting the alignments between the event and the subset of the plurality of the social media content items.

A computer system for mapping social content items to time-based media events, the computer system comprising a processor and a memory and further comprising:

• a data ingestion engine, executed by the computer system, configured to access from a social networking system a plurality of candidate social media content items authored by users of the social networking system;
• a metadata alignment engine, executed by the computer system, configured to align a plurality of metadata instances to segments of time-based media corresponding to events in the time-based media to form annotated events;
• and
• a media/event alignment engine, executed by the computer system, configured to map to the annotated events a plurality of social media content items relevant to the annotated events.