System and method for creation and management of advertising inventory using metadata

• US 20090113468A1
• Filed: 10/31/2007
• Published: 04/30/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 10/31/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Veritone Media
• Original Assignee: Veritone Media
• Inventors: Steelberg, Ryan, Steelberg, Chad
• Granted Patent: US 9,294,727 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 725/32
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0276 Advertisement creation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23424 involving splicing one content stream with another content stream, e.g. for inserting or substituting an advertisement
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2387 Stream processing in response to a playback request from an end-user, e.g. for trick-play
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/266 Channel or content management, e.g. generation and management of keys and entitlement messages in a conditional access system, merging a VOD unicast channel into a multicast channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47217 for controlling playback functions for recorded or on-demand content, e.g. using progress bars, mode or play-point indicators or bookmarks specific graphical features in visual interfaces H04N21/4312
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6106 specially adapted to the downstream path of the transmission network
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/84 Generation or processing of descriptive data, e.g. content descriptors systems specially adapted for using meta-information in broadcast systems H04H60/73
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/16 Analogue secrecy systems; Analogue subscription systems

Abstract

The invention is directed to a system and method for the creation and management of advertising inventory utilizing associated metadata. The system generally includes a media streaming system that is used with a video player in connection with the playback of at least one audio/video work. The media streaming system includes a media distribution system that supplies metadata associated with the audio/video work to the video player. The metadata has a hierarchical taxonomy that defines a plurality of attributes associated with one or more objects present in the audio/video work. The system also includes an ad inventory engine that determines available ad inventory based on the metadata and matches the available inventory with advertisement data based on the hierarchical taxonomy.

Claims

1. A media streaming system for use with a video player in connection with the playback of at least one audio/video work, the system comprising:

a media distribution system that supplies metadata associated with the audio/video work to the video player, wherein the metadata has a hierarchical taxonomy that defines a plurality of attributes associated with one or more objects present in the audio/video work, and

an ad inventory engine that determines available ad inventory based on the metadata and matches the available inventory with advertisement data based on the hierarchical taxonomy.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein at least one of the media distribution system and the ad inventory engine is at least partially remote from the video player.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the metadata includes at least one temporal attribute associated with the object present in the audio/video work.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the metadata includes at least one spatial attribute associated with the object present in the audio/video work.

5. The system of claim 1 comprising a communication channel coupled between the media distribution system and the video player, wherein the communication channel is selected from the group consisting of satellite communication, radio communication, wired communication, infrared communication, coaxial cable communication, WIFI communication, WiMAX communication, LAN communication, WAN communication, telephonic communication, DSL communication, and Ethernet communication.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the hierarchical taxonomy comprises at least three categories of breadth and at least three levels of depth thereby defining attributes of objects contained in the audio/visual work.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein at least a portion of the metadata is automatically associated with objects contained in the audio/visual work.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the automatic association occurs remotely from the video player.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein the automatic association occurs locally to the video player.

10. The system of claim 7, wherein the automatic association occurs via object recognition software.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the object recognition software is employed as part of a crawler that reviews the audio/visual works.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein at least a portion of the metadata is manually associated with objects contained in the audio/visual work.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the manual association occurs remotely from the video player.

14. The system of claim 12, wherein the manual association occurs locally to the video player.

15. The system of claim 1 wherein at least one of the media distribution system and the ad inventory engine are disposed on a computer readable media.

25. The method of claim 1, wherein at least a portion of the metadata is manually associated with objects contained in the audio/visual work.

16. A method of streaming media to a video player in connection with the playback of at least one audio/video work, the method comprising:

distributing metadata associated with the audio/video work to the video player, wherein the metadata has a hierarchical taxonomy that defines a plurality of attributes associated with one or more objects present in the audio/video work, and

Determining available ad inventory based on the metadata and matching the available inventory with advertisement data based on the hierarchical taxonomy.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein at least one of the media distribution system and the ad inventory engine is at least partially remote from the video player.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein the metadata includes at least one temporal attribute associated with the object present in the audio/video work.

19. The method of claim 16, wherein the metadata includes at least one spatial attribute associated with the object present in the audio/video work.

20. The method of claim 16, wherein the hierarchical taxonomy comprises at least three categories of breadth and at least three levels of depth thereby defining attributes of objects contained in the audio/visual work.

21. The method of claim 16, wherein at least a portion of the metadata is automatically associated with objects contained in the audio/visual work.

22. The method of claim 16, wherein the automatic association occurs remotely from the video player.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein the automatic association occurs locally to the video player.

24. The method of claim 22, wherein the automatic association occurs via object recognition software.