Models of Web Page Reputation in Social Search

To date web search has been a solitary experience for the end-user, despite the fact that recent studies highlight the potential for collaboration that is inherent in many search tasks and scenarios. As a result, researchers have begun to explore the potential for a more collaborative approach to web search, one in which the search actions of other users can influence the results returned. In this context, the expertise of other users plays an important role when it comes to ensuring the quality of recommendations that arise from their actions. The reputation of these users is important in collaborative and social search tasks, much as relevance is vital in conventional web search. In this paper we examine this concept of reputation in collaborative and social search contexts. We describe a number of different reputation models and evaluate them in the context of a particular social search service. Our results highlight the potential for reputation to improve the quality of recommendations that arise from the activities of other searchers.