Patent ID: 8549061

Claim:
A method for a social network service on a server, wherein the server is configured to accept a request for a user to join the social network based on an email address, the method comprising: storing a profile for a first user in a memory accessible to the server, wherein the profile contains a list of profile fields and responses thereto, the responses being descriptive of characteristics requested by the profile fields; storing a permission setting associated with a specific profile field in the memory; creating a first profile for the first user viewable by a first set of users; creating a second profile for the first user viewable by a second set of users; and matching the first user to a second user of the social network service based at least in part on the characteristics described in the responses to the profile fields; wherein the social network comprises plural groups together with plural different sub-groups, each sub-group being grouped hierarchically under a corresponding one of the plural different groups, with each group and each sub-group comprising one or more users; wherein a user is authenticated to one or more groups on the social network based on the email address provided to the server; and wherein the server is configured to create a new sub-group based on a prefix and a postfix of the email address.