METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR RECOMMENDING SELECTIONS BASED ON PREFERENCES IN A MULTI-USER SYSTEM

• US 20060265369A1
• Filed: 05/16/2006
• Published: 11/23/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 09/09/1993
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Original Assignee: RealNetworks, Inc.
• Inventors: Miller, James R. III, Atcheson, John
• Granted Patent: US 7,461,055 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/40 of multimedia data, e.g. slideshows comprising image and additional audio data retrieval of still image data G06F16/50; retrieval of audio data G06F16/60; retrieval of video data G06F16/70
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/635 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/64 Browsing; Visualisation therefor generation of a list or set of audio data G06F16/638
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/68 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/735 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0633 Lists, e.g. purchase orders, compilation or processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/922 Communications
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/959 Network
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99938 Concurrency, e.g. lock management in shared database

Abstract

A system for determining selections that a user is likely to be interested in. The determination is made based on the user'"'"'s prior indicated preferences. The user designates his or her preferred selections as entries in a user'"'"'s preference list. Entries in the user'"'"'s list are compared with entries in the other users'"'"' lists. When a significant number of matches have been found between two lists, the unmatched entries of the other user'"'"'s preference list are extracted. The unmatched entries are further processed. Those unmatched entries with a high correlation to the user'"'"'s preference list are presented to the user as selections in which the user is likely to be interested.

Claims

1. A method for outputting recommended preferences based on predetermined preferences, the method executing on a computer system, the computer system including a processor, database, an input device and an output device, wherein the database includes a plurality of datafiles each containing a plurality of preferences, the method comprising the following steps:

accepting signals from the input device to indicate a plurality of user preferences;

using the processor to search the database and to determine the number of user preferences that match preferences in a given datafile;

using the processor to identify datafiles with a number of matching preferences above a first threshold number;

selecting preferences from the identified datafiles, wherein the selected preferences do not match the user preferences; and

outputting, by means of the output device, the selected preferences.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the preference is an artist'"'"'s name.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the preference is the title of a movie.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the computer system further includes a data communications network, wherein the processor, database, first user input device, second user input device and output device are coupled to the network, wherein the first and second user input devices are remotely located from each other.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the “

selecting preferences”

step further comprises the substeps of (a) for each unmatching preference in the identified datafiles, determining the number of other preferences in the identified datafiles that match it and assigning the determined number to the preference; and

(b) using the processor to select one or more unmatching preferences with the highest assigned numbers.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the number of preferences in a datafile is limited to 10, and wherein the first threshold number is 5.

7. The method of claim 5, wherein the number of preferences in a datafile is limited to 10, and wherein only those unmatching preferences that also appear in 50% or more of the identified datafiles are selected in substep (b).

8. An apparatus for identifying preferences, the apparatus comprising a processor;

a database coupled to the processor;

means, coupled to the processor, for accepting signals to indicate first and second preferences;

means, coupled to the processor, for creating an association between the first and second preferences and for storing the first and second preferences in the database as a first datafile;

means, coupled to the processor, for accepting signals to indicate a user preference, wherein the user preference is the same as the first preference;

means, coupled to the processor, for determining that the user preference matches the first preference;

means, coupled to the processor, for retrieving the correlated second preference from the database; and

an output device, coupled to the processor, for outputting the second preference.

9. A method for outputting an ordered list of recommended objects based on an input object, the computer system including a processor, database, input device and an output device, the method comprising the following steps:

using the processor to store pairs of ranked objects in the database;

using the processor to assign a ranking number to each of the pairs of ranked objects and storing the ranking number as associated with the pair;

accepting signals from the input device to indicate an object;

using the processor to find occurrences of the selected object in the pairs of ranked objects;

for each pair in which the selected object occurs, determining the object in the pair that does not match the selected object;

using the processor to order non-matching objects into a list according to the ranking number for the pair that the non-matching object belongs to; and

outputting the list as an ordered list of recommended objects.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein each object is an artist'"'"'s name.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein each object is the title of a movie.