Systems and Methods to Present Members of a Social Network for Real Time Communications
Methods and systems to facilitate real time communications and/or commerce via a social network. In one embodiment, a method includes maintaining data representing a social network of a plurality of members, including a first member and a second member; and providing the first member with information to present the second member, the information including a communication reference of a connection provider, the communication reference to be used to request the connection provider to establish a connection for real time communications between the first and second members without revealing a communication reference of the second member to the first member. In one embodiment, communication references are provided to facilitate the requests for real time communications with a member of the social network via a connection provider, which performs scheduling, filtering, payment processing, etc. for the member of the social network.
1 . A method, comprising:
maintaining data representing a social network of a plurality of members, including a first member and a second member; and
providing the first member with information to present the second member, the information including a communication reference of a connection provider, the communication reference to be used to request the connection provider to establish a connection for real time communications between the first and second members without revealing a communication reference of the second member to the first member.
2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the first and second members are not directly connected in the social network.
3 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
the connection provider establishing a first Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) connection to connect to the first member using the communication reference;
the connection provider determining a telephonic reference of the second member based on the communication reference used to establish the first VoIP connection;
the connection provider establishing a second Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) connection to connect to the second member using the telephonic reference of the second member; and
bridging the first and second VoIP connections to connect the first and second members.
4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the bridging of the first and second VoIP connections comprises establishing a media connection that does not go through the connection provider to connect the first and second members for telephone communications.
5 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the connection provider establishing the first VoIP connection comprises the connection provider receiving a call for the first VoIP connection in response to the first member placing a call using the communication reference on a public switched telephone network.
6 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the connection provider establishing the first VoIP connection comprises:
the connection provider receiving a request including the communication reference over a data connection; and
the connection provider placing a call for the first VoIP connection in response to the request.
7 . The method of claim 6 , wherein the communication reference is embedded in a user interface element which when selected causes the request to be sent to the connection provider via a data communication network.
8 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the bridging the first connection and the second connection comprises translating a message from a first language to a second language to bridge the first connection and the second connection.
9 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the bridging the first connection and the second connection comprises converting a message between text and voice to bridge the first connection and the second connection.
10 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the communication reference includes a telephone number without an extension, a telephone number with an extension, a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) user identifier, or a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) uniform resource identifier (URI).
11 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
the connection provider charging the first member on behalf of the second member according to a price specified by the second member.
12 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:
the connection provider charging the second member a portion of an amount the connection provider charges the first member on behalf of the second member.
13 . The method of claim 11 , wherein the price specified by the second member is dependent on a social distance between the first and second member in the social network.
14 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the connection for real time communications between the first and second members comprises a telephone connection, an instant messaging connection for text, voice or video chat, or a two way voice connection.
15 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request for the connection between the first and second connection provider via the communication reference;
determining whether a time of the request is within a scheduled callable period of the second member;
wherein the request is blocked when the time of the request is outside the scheduled callable period of the second member.
16 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the scheduled callable period is dependent on a social distance between the first and second members in the social network.
17 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the information to present the second member further includes an indication of real time availability of the second member to conduct real time communications with the first member at a time the information is presented and a price the first member is to be charged for real time communications with the second member.
18 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
determining whether the first member is allowed to call for a connection for real time communications between the first and second members, based at least in part on a characteristic of a social connection between the first member and the second member in the social network;
wherein the information includes the communication reference of the connection provider in response to a determination that the first member is allowed to call for a connection for real time communications between the first and second members.
19 . A machine readable media embodying instructions, the instructions causing a machine to perform a method, the method comprising:
maintaining data representing a social network of a plurality of members, including a first member and a second member; and
providing the first member with information to present the second member, the information including a communication reference of a connection provider, the communication reference to be used to request the connection provider to establish a connection for real time communications between the first and second members without revealing a communication reference of the second member to the first member.
20 . A system, comprising:
means for maintaining data representing a social network of a plurality of members, including a first member and a second member; and
means for providing the first member with information to present the second member, the information including a communication reference of a connection provider, the communication reference to be used to request the connection provider to establish a connection for real time communications between the first and second members without revealing a communication reference of the second member to the first member.