Patent ID: 8326827

Claim:
A computer implemented method for providing a list of peers that satisfy a query for an item, the computer comprising a processor device, a user interface and a data repository storing peer profiles, the method comprising: receiving, from a query-originating peer having a profile stored in the data repository, a query with a search criterion for an item; performing, via the processor device, a search for the search criterion in the data repository storing peer profiles; obtaining, from the peer profiles stored in the data repository, a plurality of peer profiles having a degree of association with the query originating peer; determining, via the processor, a first group of the plurality of obtained peer profiles having a first degree of association with the query originating peer and a second group of the plurality of obtained peer profiles having a second degree of association with the query originating peer; determining, via the processor, a third group of the plurality of obtained peer profiles that satisfy the search criterion for the item; assigning a score to each of the peer profiles of the first and second groups based on a degree of association between the query originating peer and peers corresponding to the peer profiles of the first and second group; selecting, from the third group, a fourth group of peer profiles that, each of the peer profiles of the fourth group having an assigned score of the first or second groups; and displaying the fourth group to the query originating peer via the user interface.