STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT

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THE NAMES OF THE PARTIES TO A JOINT RESEARCH AGREEMENT

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INCORPORATION-BY-REFERENCE OF MATERIAL SUBMITTED ON A COMPACT DISC OR AS A TEXT FILE VIA THE OFFICE ELECTRONIC FILING SYSTEM (EFS-WEB)

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FIELD OF THE DISCLOSURE

The present disclosure relates to methods and systems for connecting (e.g., matching, etc.) people. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to computer implemented methods and systems that require video chat between users prior to allowing further communication therebetween.

BACKGROUND

The complexity of how people interact has dramatically increased in relation to capabilities afforded by internet communication. Electronic communication systems, databases, protocols, and services have been developed for a diverse set of end users in order to navigate the increasing complicated social networks in which human beings are interacting.

For example, the dating market has changed. As more and more singles use online dating as the method of meeting potential mates, a single user's number of potential connections and mates becomes increasingly vast and more complex to navigate. People navigate profiles where an end user may quickly accept or reject candidate matches following a quick glance of a potential match's pictures and brief read of their profile, receive a similar reciprocal choosing paradigm and if both are interested in one another and willing to communicate further (e.g., via text messages), the two parties to a potential match are allowed to communicate. Accordingly, end users spend countless hours choosing candidate matches based on minimal information and once candidate matches are found, end-users often engage in protracted superficial text messaging before meaningful conversation takes place. Furthermore, an end user may initiate interest in a large number of candidate matches with little consideration to priority or urgency of follow-through, leaving many matches predominantly inconvenienced with little chance of eventual benefit.

Moreover, as the dating profiles typically rely on pictures and brief descriptions of people, these superficial text messages are often with a person different than who is shown or described. This form of identity deception in online dating is known as “catfishing.” In catfishing, a person may create a fake identity on a social networking account pretending to be someone they are not with an intent to lure potential connections into a false relationship.

The foregoing discussion is presented solely to provide a better understanding of the problems confronting the art and should not be construed in any way as an admission of prior art, nor should citation of any reference herein be construed as an admission that such reference constitutes prior art to the instant application.

SUMMARY

Requirements for electronic communications systems usable by users to identify other users to a potential relationship may include providing users with the ability to identify possible parties of interest and assess identified parties, thereby allowing users to make a determination of their desire to have a connection therewith. However, given a general ease and disinhibition that can be characteristics of communicating electronically, combined with abilities to identify and assess users of potential interest, a result is that many electronic communications systems suffer from detrimental electronic communications between users. Examples of such detrimental communications may be characterized by one or more of the following terms and phrases: superfluous, superficial, frivolous, briefly considered, given little thought, indiscreet, insincere, careless, and the like. Furthermore, given an ability to shield one's true self when using an electronic communications system, such systems can suffer from misrepresentations made by users. As a result, users of electronic communications systems attempting to identify other users to a potential relationship can find the use of such systems to be futile, by pursuing connections that may be based on misrepresentations. Users of electronic communications systems can further find the use of such systems to be ineffective and inefficient, due to the difficulties and wasted time of sorting through excess and detrimental communications from users who may have given little or no consideration to their level of interest, and/or may be disingenuous regarding their interest.

Various methods and systems for efficiently arranging connections between people, also referred to as users of the system (or simply users) are disclosed. According to some possible implementations, methods and systems may be used to facilitate dating between people, and may be partially premised on preventing typical routes of communication between two users of a connection service who have identified each other as a potential match until the two users have video chatted with one another. In some implementations, each pair of users in a match are required to video chat with each other for a certain amount of time before an enabling of any further communication between the users is possible. In some implementations, controlled communication related to video chat scheduling may be facilitated prior to a video chat that satisfies qualification requirements. The systems and methods described herein may be configured to allow users to engage in online dating more efficiently by reducing the time wasted with incompatible matches typically plaguing other social networking sites.

In some implementations, a connection method and system may comprise a plurality of user devices connected over a communications network via a plurality of communications links to a server based application services system, thereby providing access to a plurality of user accounts by a plurality of users. The application services system may comprise an application services interface module (e.g., a communications interface layer), application software modules and data services (including services such as one or more databases) through which users may create and interact with user accounts. The application software modules may include a user account management module, a user profiles management module, a candidate matching and selection module, a match and connection management module and a user services and policies module. Users may access a user account management module and a user profiles management module to create a user account and a user profile which may be stored within a database of data services and the user profiles may be used by other users to consider users associated with the user profiles, and in response to such consideration, to provide an interest indication in further communication with a user associated with a considered user profile, also referred to as a positive interest indication, or to provide an interest indication of no such further communication, also referred to as a negative interest indication. In some implementations, users may specify criteria, such as filtering, selecting and matching criteria, also referred to as match settings, such that they may access and consider user profiles of other users that match, at least in part, their specified criteria. In some implementations, user match settings may be associated with their user account or user profile and stored by data services for subsequent retrieval and use in accessing matching user profiles in response to a request for matching user profiles, which may be referred to as candidate matches. In some implementations, users may specify match settings as part of a request for matching user profiles (candidate matches).

Users may access user account management module and candidate matching and selection module to request candidate matches, whereupon candidate matching and selection module may access data services to determine a pool of (e.g., a set of) user profiles matching, at least in part, match settings specified by the requesting user. The user may then when provided one or more candidate matches, consider associated user profiles, or portions thereof, from the provided candidate matches and provide a positive match interest indication or a negative match interest indication regarding their interest in further communication with each of the candidate matches they consider. As such, two users may request, consider and provide match interest indications in candidate matches, such that they each receive the other user's user profile, and indicate a positive match interest in further communication with the other user, thereby resulting in mutual positive match interest indications, wherein the latter occurring of the two may be referred to as a reciprocal positive match interest indication. Upon a reciprocal positive match interest indication, a match may be created between the pair of users having indicated mutual positive match interest indications in each other.

In some implementations, after a match is created, a next interaction between the two users of the match is required to be through a qualifying video chat or in regards thereto, such as the initiation or the scheduling of the qualifying video chat. As such, in some implementations, a limited communication between the pair of matched users regarding the initiation or the scheduling of the qualifying video chat may be facilitated. A user account management module and match and connection management module may facilitate a controlled communication between the pair of matched users comprising a qualifying video chat, wherein the two users attempt to successfully complete a qualifying video chat, wherein a successfully completed qualifying video chat may be referred to as a qualified video chat, and an unsuccessful qualifying video chat may be referred to as a failed video chat. In some implementations, there may be a requirement to video chat within a time window, which can also be referred to as a chat time window, wherein a time window may commence at a time in relation to the creation of a match, such as the time a match is created. In some implementations, if a chat time window requirement is not met, then the match may expire or may be otherwise inactivated upon the expiration of the chat time window. In some implementations, there may be a requirement for a qualifying video chat time duration to exceed a minimum qualification time, thereby satisfying a qualification requirement, to be determined as successful and become a qualified video chat, and those not meeting the minimum qualification time may thus be determined to be failed video chats. In some implementations, a facilitation of controlled communication may include a plurality of facilitating functions, such as notifications and review capabilities by users of their matches, management of match expirations with respect to their respective chat time windows, scheduling and review capabilities by users of their scheduled video chats, hosting of, or controlling a host of, the video chats and determinations of success or failure of meeting qualification requirements of qualifying video chats. In some implementations, upon completion of a successful qualifying video chat, namely, a qualified video chat, each of the two users of the pair of matched users which engaged in the qualified video chat may provide a second interest indication regarding the other user, wherein the second interest indication may be a positive connection interest indication or a negative connection interest indication regarding their interest in further communication with the other user. If there is mutual positive interest thereby resulting in mutual positive connection interest indications, wherein the latter occurring of the two may be referred to as a reciprocal positive connection interest indication, a connection may be created between the two users and further communication may be enabled, wherein they may be able to communicate with each other in an ongoing fashion.

In some implementations a user account management module may manage user interaction with a user services and policies module and allow users of the connection system to request or access user assistance and other support services, such as to address questions regarding system functionality and services, and to access and report policy rules and concerns. In some implementations data services may provide data storage and access thereto for data, such as data including, user account data, user profile data, user interest indication data, match data, video chat data, connection data, user policy data and user services data.

A detailed disclosure of various example implementations which may relate to one or more aspects of the foregoing summary disclosure is provided following a brief description of the drawings.

