Patent ID: 7333997

Claim:
A method for performing knowledge discovery comprising the steps of: associating with each member of a data corpus one or more metatags through execution of a ranking function, wherein said ranking function is controllable through a parameter value; selecting a first subset of members from said data corpus whose associated metatags are a match to a first set of criteria; processing said first subset of members to produce a set of pairwise associations between elements of each of said first subset of members; selecting a subset of said set of pairwise associations that reach a certain predefined or preset value; identifying a second subset of members from said data corpus based on said subset of said pairwise associations; computing a utility function to measure a utility of said second subset of members; adjusting said parameter value to an adjusted parameter value based on said utility function; associating one or more members of said data corpus with one or more retrospective metatags through execution of said ranking function controlled by said adjusted parameter value; and selecting a third subset of members from said data corpus whose associated metatags are a match to a second set of criteria.