Patent Document ID: 9600499
Application ID: 14129005
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. An interest graph collection system that is a search system using image information containing at least one of various objects and subjects as input, the system comprising: one or more central processing units operable to execute one or more programs; memory that stores the one or more programs to be executed by the one or more central processing units; the one or more programs comprising instructions for: selecting from among a large number of images existing on the Internet or on a dedicated network or images uploaded on the Internet by a number of users via a number of network terminals, an entire image or a specific region of an image in which the users have an interest; extracting and recognizing in real time various objects, the objects comprising at least one of a generic object, a specific object, a person, a face, a scene, characters, a sign, an illustration, a logo, and a favicon contained in the selected entire image or the specific image region by an image recognition engine on a server side, when queried by the users about the selected image via the network; and determining other related elements directly or indirectly related to one or more individual image components to a certain degree or more by a relevance search engine on the server side, when notified of image components contained in a recognized input image via the image recognition engine, extracting the related elements based on multidimensional feature vectors describing direct relationships between elements held on a relevance knowledge database in the relevance search engine in a learnable manner, and visually representing the image components recognized by the image recognition engine and the related elements extracted by the relevance search engine as nodes in a relevance graph together with one or more depths of relationships between the nodes on the respective network terminal of the users as a two-dimensional image, or a three-dimensional image with depth, or a four-dimensional spatiotemporal image to which a time axis variable as observation time of the relevance graph is added, wherein, in a respective relevance search operation, by respective ones of the users tapping or touching on a touch screen an arbitrary node on the relevance graph displayed on the network terminal for selection, or moving a cursor of a pointer onto an arbitrary node for selection, or by the respective user flicking on the touch screen toward an arbitrary region on the relevance graph, or moving a cursor of a pointer to an arbitrary region on the relevance graph and dragging and scrolling an entire image, or using a cursor key or the like for a similar operation, or using an input operation having a similar effect using a gesture, a line of sight, voice, or a brain wave, the relevance search engine additionally transmits a new relevance graph centered on the selected node or the region after the move, including a course thereto, so that the respective user can visually recognize broad relationships between a plurality of nodes on the relevance graph, seamlessly tracing a node or a region of interest to the respective user, wherein, in the relevance search operation, a more detailed relevance graph centered on a specific image component selected by the respective user from among a plurality of image components presented by the image recognition engine, or a specific node on the relevance graph displayed on the network terminal selected by the respective user double tapping or pinching out the node on the touchscreen, or operating a pointer or the like, enlarging a region centered on the node, or by the respective user using an input operation having a similar effect using a gesture, a line of sight, voice, or a brainwave, can be visually represented on the network terminal of the user; the series of operations being considered to show a certain degree of interest of the respective user to the node, a feature vector value representing the depth of interest of the respective user in the node is adaptively increased on a multidimensional feature vector describing direct relationships between elements with the respective user as the center node to allow an interest graph corresponding to an individual user of the one of the one or more users, with the individual user as the center node to be acquired; and the interest graph can be expanded to a wide range of the one or more users for acquisition to be collected as a statistical broad interest graph over a specific user cluster or all of the users, wherein, in the relevance search operation, allowing reflection of a subjective evaluation of the individual user is enabled with respect to a multidimensional feature vector that describes direct relationships between elements held as the relevance knowledge database in the relevance search engine; and wherein, based on the modified multidimensional feature vector, causes the respective network terminal of each of at least two of the users to represent the same one or two nodes and visually represents the mutual relationships between the nodes and the depths of the relationships as a relevance graph reflecting a factor of a difference in perception wherein each of said at least two of the users has the difference in the perception.