Resolution of advertising rules

• US 10,657,538 B2
• Filed: 10/25/2006
• Issued: 05/19/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 10/25/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Yruski, Andrey, Navar, Murgesh
• Primary Examiner(s): Brown, Luis A
• Application Number:
  US11/586,959
• Publication Number:
  US 20070094081A1
• Time in Patent Office: 4,955 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0258 Registration
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0269 based on user profile or attribute
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0275 Auctions

Abstract

A podcast system and method are provided to select and deliver media ads over a network to a user device and to insert the media ads in media content subscribed to and delivered over the network to the user device.

Claims

1. A method for resolving an advertisement rule to determine advertisement matching to content, the method comprising:

receiving information regarding an advertisement campaign provided by an advertisement provider server over a network, the advertisement campaign including a plurality of advertisements and associated with an advertisement rule for matching the advertisement campaign with content provided by a content provider server;

receiving information regarding a content attribute of the content provided by the content provider server over the network; and

executing instructions stored in memory, wherein execution of the instructions by a processor;

matches the advertisement campaign to the content attribute based on the advertisement rule,

periodically retrieves user usage information, wherein the user usage information is automatically transmitted by a software application at a user device, and wherein the user usage information includes play event and play duration data associated with each content feed to which a user of the user device is subscribed;

estimates a probability that the user device will play the content based on the retrieved user usage information, wherein the content is a content feed to which the user is subscribed,

selects an advertisement of the plurality of advertisements of the matching advertisement campaign for insertion into the content, the selected advertisement associated with metadata indicating a location where the selected advertisement is inserted relative to the content, wherein the location is measured from the start of the content when the location is within the content and the duration of the selected advertisement is within a length restriction when the selected advertisement is inserted into the content, wherein the advertisement is selected for insertion based on the user usage information, the estimated probability that the user device will play the content, and the length restriction, and wherein the content is associated with the selected advertisement when the content and the selected advertisement are delivered to the user device over the network,

delivers, in response to a request from the user device concerning the content, the content and the selected advertisement to the user device over the network, wherein the selected advertisement is delivered to the user device for storage, and

receives a usage log regarding the user device playing a file comprising the content and the selected advertisement inserted into the content at the insertion location, the selected advertisement inserted by processing the metadata to identify the insertion location and by processing the content to find the insertion location, wherein the usage log indicates;

an ad play duration of the inserted advertisement, the ad play duration determined relative to an ad play starting point of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location, and

a content play duration of the content, wherein the content play duration is calculated to exclude ad play of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location within the content; and

generates a payment amount for the advertisement provider based on the usage log.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected advertisement is inserted at the beginning of the content.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

alerting the content provider server of the matched advertisement campaign with the content prior to inserting the matched advertisement campaign into the content; and

receiving content provider approval for associating the advertisement campaign with the content.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising billing the advertisement provider for associating the advertisement campaign with the content.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein billing the advertisement provider is based on pricing terms submitted by the advertisement provider during a bidding process with the content provider.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a content rule provided by the content provider for matching the content with an advertisement campaign;

executing instructions stored in memory, wherein execution of the instructions by the processor;

matches the content to the advertisement campaign based on the content rule, and

determines a mutual match among matches that are based on the advertisement rule and matches that are based on the content rule.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the execution of instructions by the processor further selects an advertisement of the plurality of advertisements of the mutually matching advertisement campaign for insertion into the content based on the mutual match, wherein the selected advertisement is associated with metadata indicating a location where the selected advertisement is inserted relative to the content.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising estimating the probability that a user associated with the user device will respond to the transmitted selected advertisement.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving from the user device feedback concerning the selected advertisement.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising sharing the received feedback with another client device in the network.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the software application is a plug-in module.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising generating a report indicating a payment amount owed by the advertisement provider, wherein the payment amount owed is based on ad consumption of the inserted advertisement as determined based on the usage log indicating the ad play duration of the inserted advertisement relative to the ad play starting point.

13. A system for resolving an advertisement rule to determine advertisement matching to content, the system comprising:

an ad campaign server that receives an advertisement campaign provided by an advertisement provider server, the advertisement campaign including a plurality of advertisements and associated with an advertisement rule for matching the advertisement campaign with content provided by a content provider server, and stores the advertising campaign and the advertisement rule in memory coupled to the ad campaign server;

a provider registration server that receives the content attribute of the content provided by the content provider server;

a match system server that;

matches the advertisement campaign to the content attribute based on the advertisement rule,

periodically retrieves user usage information, wherein the user usage information includes play event and play duration data associated with each content feed to which a user of a user device is subscribed;

estimates a probability that the user device will play the content based on the retrieved user usage information, wherein the content is a content feed to which the user is subscribed,

selects an advertisement of the plurality of advertisements of the matching advertisement campaign for insertion into the content, the selected advertisement associated with metadata indicating a location where the selected advertisement is inserted relative to the content, wherein the location is measured from the start of the content when the location is within the content and the duration of the selected advertisement is within a length restriction when the selected advertisement is inserted into the content, and wherein the advertisement is selected for insertion based on the user usage information the estimated probability that the user device will play the content, and the length restriction, and wherein the content is associated with the selected advertisement when the content and the selected advertisement are delivered, in response to a request from the user device concerning the content, to the user device over the network, and the selected advertisement is delivered to the user device for storage; and

a plug-in module stored in memory and executable by a processor of the user device to;

automatically send the user usage information to the match system server, and

send a usage log to the match system server, the usage log regarding the user device playing a file comprising the content and the selected advertisement inserted into the content at the insertion location, the selected advertisement inserted by processing the metadata to identify the insertion location and by processing the content to find the insertion location, wherein the usage log indicates;

an ad play duration of the inserted advertisement, the ad play duration determined relative to an ad play starting point of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location, and

a content play duration of the content, wherein the content play duration is calculated to exclude ad play of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location within the content,

wherein the match system server generates a payment amount for the advertisement provider based on the usage log.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the provider registration server further receives a content rule provided by the content provider for matching the content with an advertisement campaign;

and wherein the match system server further;

matches the content to the advertisement campaign based on the content rule, and determines a mutual match among matches that are based on the advertisement rule and matches that are based on the content rule.

15. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having embodied thereon a program, the program being executable by a processor to perform a method for resolving an advertisement rule to determine advertisement matching to content, the method comprising:

receiving information regarding an advertisement campaign provided by an advertisement provider server, the advertisement campaign including a plurality of advertisements and associated with an advertisement rule for matching the advertisement campaign with content provided by a content provider server;

receiving information regarding a content attribute of the content provided by the content provider server;

matching the advertisement campaign to the content attribute based on the advertisement rule;

periodically retrieving user usage information, wherein the user usage information is automatically transmitted by a software application at a user device, and wherein the user usage information includes play event and play duration data associated with each content feed to which a user of the user device is subscribed;

estimating a probability that the user device will play the content based on the retrieved user usage information, wherein the content is a content feed to which the user is subscribed,

selecting an advertisement of the plurality of advertisements of the matching advertisement campaign for insertion into the content, the selected advertisement associated with metadata indicating a location where the selected advertisement is inserted relative to the content, wherein the location is measured from the start of the content when the location is within the content and the duration of the selected advertisement is within a length restriction when the selected advertisement is inserted into the content, wherein the advertisement is selected for insertion based on the user usage information, the estimated probability that the user device will play the content, and the length restriction, and wherein the content is associated with the selected advertisement when the content and the selected advertisement are delivered to the user device over a network;

delivering, in response to a request from the user device concerning the content, the content and the selected advertisement to the user device over the network, wherein the selected advertisement is delivered to the user device for storage;

receiving a usage log regarding the user device playing a file comprising the content and the selected advertisement inserted into the content at the insertion location, the selected advertisement inserted by processing the metadata to identify the insertion location and by processing the content to find the insertion location, wherein the usage log indicates;

an ad play duration of the inserted advertisement, the ad play duration determined relative to an ad play starting point of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location, and

a content play duration of the content, wherein the content play duration is calculated to exclude ad play of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location within the content; and

generating a payment amount for the advertisement provider based on the usage log.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 15, further comprising executable instructions for:

receiving a content rule provided by the content provider server for matching the content with an advertisement campaign;

matching the content to the advertisement campaign based on the content rule; and

determining a mutual match among matches that are based on the advertisement rule and matches that are based on the content rule.

17. A method for tracking play of spliced content files, the method comprising:

receiving information regarding an advertisement campaign provided by an advertisement server over a network, the advertisement campaign including a plurality of insertable advertisement files;

receiving information regarding a content file provided by a content provider server over the network, the information indicating at least one insertion location within the content file; and

executing instructions stored in memory, wherein execution of the instructions by a processor;

estimates a probability that the user device will play the content file based on user usage information including one or more attributes, and

selects at least one of the insertable advertisement files from the advertisement campaign for splicing into the content file based on the estimated probability, wherein selecting the at least one advertisement file includes associating the at least one selected advertisement with metadata indicative of the at least one insertion location;

delivering the content file and the selected advertisement file to the user device over the network, wherein the user device splices the selected advertisement file and the content file into a spliced file by splicing the selected advertisement file into the content file at the insertion location indicated by the associated metadata;

receiving a usage log from the user device over the network, the usage log indicating play of the spliced file by the user device;

identifying an ad play duration of the inserted advertisement file based on the usage log, wherein the ad play duration is identified relative to an ad play starting point of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location; and

identifying a content play duration of the content file based on the usage log and the identified ad play duration, wherein the identified content play duration excludes the ad play duration of the inserted advertisement at the insertion location within the content file.