INFORMATION COLLECTION DURING GAME PLAY

• US 20090054123A1
• Filed: 08/22/2007
• Published: 02/26/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/22/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Mityagin, Anton, Paek, Timothy S., Chickering, David M., Meek, Christopher A., Bennett, Paul N., Gunawardana, Asela J., Lakshmiratan, Aparna
• Granted Patent: US 9,283,476 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 463/9
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/12 involving interaction between a plurality of game devices, e.g. transmisison or distribution systems protocols for networked virtual reality, networked games H04L29/06034
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/23 for interfacing with the game device, e.g. specific interfaces between game controller and console
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/30 Interconnection arrangements between game servers and game devices; Interconnection arrangements between game devices; Interconnection arrangements between game servers
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/33 using wide area network [WAN] connections
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/46 Computing the game score
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/75 Enforcing rules, e.g. detecting foul play or generating lists of cheating players
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/798 for assessing skills or for ranking players, e.g. for generating a hall of fame computing the game score A63F13/46
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/85 Providing additional services to players
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 2300/558 by assessing the players' skills or ranking
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 2300/5586 for enforcing rights or rules, e.g. to prevent foul play
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 17/3225 Data transfer within a gaming system, e.g. data sent between gaming machines and users
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 17/3244 Payment aspects of a gaming system, e.g. payment schemes, setting payout ratio, bonus or consolation prizes

Abstract

Systems and methods allow an on-line game to extract information relevant to a specific need of a game platform or service platform. The specific need relates to management and use of digital content, and is addressed by designing and playing an on-line collaborative game. The rules of the game intend to solve a specific task dictated by the specific need. Players'"'"' responses to the game generate a wealth of information related to a specific task objective, such as ranking, sorting, and evaluating a set of digital content items. To compel participation in a game, players can be rewarded with monetary value rewards. As a game illustration, an image selection game (ISG) that exploits human contextual inference is described in detail. The information extracted from ISG is a list of key-image associations, relevant for the task of image sorting and ranking.

Claims

1. A computer implemented system to facilitate information collection through a game played by a plurality of agents, comprising:

a task component that defines specific information to be collected during game play of a game;

a game facilitation component that facilitates game play, the game facilitation component is coupled to a scoring component that retains score point records generated during game play, wherein said score points are awarded upon the completion of a task, and wherein specific information is collected upon the completion of said task; and

a reward component that converts score points into currency points with a monetary value.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising a storage component to store the information collected during game play.

3. The system of claim 1, further comprising a fraud component that mitigates fraud aimed at indiscriminately increasing score points, and manipulating the information collected during a game in anticipation of its use.

4. The system of claim 1, the game is played over a communication network, the communication network is a wide area network, a local area network, or a wireless network.

5. The system of claim 1, the task component further defines an intended objective to be accomplished during game play, the objective includes associating an image with a query, ranking a plurality of images, or sorting a plurality of images.

6. The system of claim 5, the objective includes ranking a universal resource locator (URL) for an on-line based search, assessing relevance of an on-line search result, or assessing relevance of a snippet content to summarize an on-line search result.

7. The system of claim 5, the objective includes translation of natural language documents from a first language to a second language, or transcription of handwritten content, telephone conversations, or music or song lyrics.

8. The system of claim 5, the objective includes identifying webpage spam or email message spam.

9. The system of claim 5, the objective includes assessing a blog reputation, relevance, and tone.

10. The system of claim 5, further comprising a content store that stores content relevant to the accomplishment of the objective, the content is an image;

an email message;

a blog fragment, a query log, a universal resource locator (URL) listing;

a title list and a fragment of movies, songs, and books, both in English and foreign languages;

a question listing;

a published scientific article;

a “

fact book” and

a profile of a university, college, or high school;

a set of occupational data;

an entertainment information;

a health information; and

a document in a foreign language.

11. The system of claim 5, further comprising a game store that includes a plurality of games that facilitate accomplishment of objective defined by the task component.

12. A computer implemented method that comprises the following computer executable acts:

displaying a query and a plurality of images to each player of a plurality of players;

collecting image selection input from each player of the plurality of players;

and

processing the collected input from each player and establishing an association extant between the query and an image from the plurality of images when the image is selected by more than one player.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising augmenting the plurality of images displayed to each player of a plurality of players when more than one player select the same image.

14. The method of claim 12, the act of displaying a set of images to each player of a plurality of players further comprising displaying the same set of images to each player in permutated order.

15. The method of claim 12, further comprising awarding score points to players who selected the same image within the displayed plurality of images.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising displaying control images to a selected player to determine at least one of whether the selected player is scoring points fraudulently, a profile of the selected player, or a level of expertise of the selected player.

17. A computer implemented system comprising,

computer-implemented means for selecting a task to gather specific information and a first game that facilitates solving the task;

computer-implemented means for displaying content related to the selected task according to the selected first game;

computer-implemented means for collecting responses to the task that result from playing the selected first game, and processing the responses according to the rules of the selected first game; and

computer-implemented means for adopting a nested-game strategy, wherein a second game facilitates rating the collected responses of the first game as part of processing the responses.

18. The system of claim 17, further comprising computer-implemented means for awarding score points to a plurality of agents that legitimately play the first or second game according to the rules of the first or second game.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising computer-implemented means for rewarding one or more agents based at least in part on the score points of the one or more rewarded agents.

20. The system of claim 17, further comprising

computer-implemented means for adopting a task relevant to a third-party entity, and designing a game that facilitates solving the task of interested to the third party;

and

computer-implemented means for extracting information relevant to the task by playing the game, and selling the information to the third-party entity.