Patent ID: 8620919

Claim:
A computer implemented method for clustering similar media items in a program participant's media library comprising: selecting, by a processor, a collection of media items from a server library of content items available to the processor, the collection of media items selected based on the contents of at least one program participant's media library of a population of program participants; dividing, by the processor, the collection of media items into canopies comprising respective groups of potentially similar media items; recursively sub-dividing, by the processor, the media items in each canopy, each recursion producing non-overlapping, increasingly refined, server clusters of media items determined to be similar to other media items in a respective server cluster based on a cluster analysis of similarity data derived from the population of program participants; terminating, by the processor, the recursive sub-dividing responsive to determining that the server clusters produced from the latest recursion each comprise no more than a determined number of media items, resulting in a plurality of lowest-level server clusters; and creating, by the processor, one or more participant media item clusters for a particular program participant from media items present in that program participant's media library, comprising: grouping, by the processor, media items found in that program participant's media library into participant media item clusters, the media items found in that program participant's library grouped according to the grouping of media items in the lowest-level server clusters; and recursively agglomerating, by the processor, the participant media item clusters based on the server clusters, wherein participant media item clusters grouped according to lowest-level server clusters that share a common parent server cluster, and which have fewer than a participant cluster minimum number of media items, are agglomerated into respective larger participant media item clusters until each of those larger participant media item clusters comprises at least the participant cluster minimum number of media items.