Patent ID: 7330845

Claim:
A method for providing navigational information for facilitating navigation and user socialization at web sites, the method being utilized in a computer networking system having one or more central processing units, one or more memories, and one or more network connections, the method comprising steps of: creating at least one instance of a mapping data structure for a web site, the created mapping data structure representing two or more categories, each of the two or more categories divided into subcategories of ordered levels of specificity, each of the ordered levels of specificity being a grouping of subcategories of the same levels of specificity; generating a graphical representation of said at least one instance of said mapping data structure, said generated graphical representation graphically depicting each of the two or more categories and its subcategories mapped to a corresponding pie segment, wherein the subcategories of each of the two or more categories are separated by subrings; mapping information about people, activities, and social interactions at the web site onto a plurality of icons in said graphical representation; selecting one of the plurality of icons by a user; and returning additional information of people, activities or social interactions corresponding to the selected one of the plurality of icons, wherein the returned additional information comprises information facilitating socialization between the user with people, activities or social interactions corresponding to the selected one of the plurality of icons.