PROGRAM PROMOTION FEEDBACK

• US 20090193460A1
• Filed: 01/30/2008
• Published: 07/30/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/30/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Barnett, Sharon F.
• Granted Patent: US 8,341,660 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 725/38
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25891 being end-user preferences retrieval of video data in a video database based on user preferences G06F16/739; arrangements for recognizing users' preferences H04H60/46; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306; processing of user preferences or user profiles in wireless networks H04W8/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4325 by playing back content from the storage medium reproduction of recorded television signals H04N5/76; reproduction of recorded television signals H04N9/79
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4334 Recording operations recording of a television signal H04N5/76; arrangements for recording or accumulating broadcast information or broadcast-related information H04H60/27
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44204 Monitoring of content usage, e.g. the number of times a movie has been viewed, copied or the amount which has been watched monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; protecting generic digital content where the protection is independent of the precise nature of the content G06F21/10; arrangements for monitoring the use made of the broadcast services in broadcast systems H04H60/31
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44224 Monitoring of user activity on external systems, e.g. Internet browsing
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6582 Data stored in the client, e.g. viewing habits, hardware capabilities, credit card number arrangements where receivers interact with the broadcast H04H20/38
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/76 Television signal recording
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/765 Interface circuits between an apparatus for recording and another apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/17318 Direct or substantially direct transmission and handling of requests
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 9/8205 involving the multiplexing of an additional signal and the colour video signal

Abstract

A user request to watch a program is received in response to a promotion for the program. One or both of recording the program and playback of the program is performed. Information regarding one or both of the recording and the playback is output, this information including an identifier of the promotion. Additionally, a report can be generated from this information output by multiple devices, the report describing the recording of the program and the playback of the program on the multiple device in response to the promotion.

Claims

1. One or more computer storage media having stored thereon multiple instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a device, cause the one or more processors to:

receive a user request to watch a program, the user request being received in response to a promotion for the program;

perform one or both of recording the program and playback of the program; and

output information regarding one or both of the recording and the playback, the information including an identifier of the promotion.

2. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, wherein the user request is a request to record a subsequently broadcast program, wherein to perform is to record the subsequently broadcast program, and wherein to output is to output information regarding the recording of the subsequently broadcast program.

3. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 2, wherein to perform is further to playback a recorded program obtained by recording the subsequently broadcast program, and wherein to output is to output information regarding playback of the recorded program.

4. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, the user request being a request to immediately begin playback of the program.

5. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, the information comprising information identifying whether the program was recorded and played back, or recorded and deleted without being played back.

6. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, the information comprising information identifying an elapsed time between recording of the program and playback of the program.

7. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, wherein to receive the user request is to receive the user request from a second device on which the promotion is played back.

8. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, the instructions further causing the one or more processors to:

receive a user request to purchase an additional service in response to a promotion for the additional service; and

output information regarding a selection by the user to purchase the additional service, the information regarding the selection including an identifier of the promotion for the additional service.

9. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, wherein to output is to output the information to a data warehouse that collects information regarding recording and playback of the program in response to multiple promotions played back at multiple devices.

10. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, wherein to receive is to receive the user request while the promotion is being played back, and wherein to output is to output the identifier of the promotion in response to the user request being received.

11. A method comprising:

receiving, from each of multiple devices, data regarding one or both of recording of a program by the device and playback of the program by the device;

selecting a first promotion of multiple promotions for the program;

identifying the received data regarding one or both of recording of the program and playback of the program in response to the first promotion; and

generating, using the identified data, a report describing the recording of the program and the playback of the program in response to the first promotion.

12. A method as recited in claim 11, the received data including an identifier of a promotion for the program played to a user of the device in response to which the program was one or both of recorded and played back.

13. A method as recited in claim 11, the receiving comprising:

receiving, in response to a user request to watch the program, both the promotion identifier and an indication that the user request to watch the program was received;

receiving, in response to recording of the program, both the promotion identifier and the data regarding recording of the program; and

receiving, in response to playback of the program, both the promotion identifier and the data regarding playback of the program.

14. A method as recited in claim 11, further comprising repeating the receiving, selecting, identifying, and generating for multiple programs.

15. A method as recited in claim 11, the generating comprising generating the report describing the recording of the program and the playback of the program including information regarding how well the first promotion enticed users of the multiple devices to both record the program and playback the program.

16. A method comprising:

distributing, to different users, multiple different promotions for a program, each of the multiple different promotions including a promotion identifier; and

receiving feedback from different consumer devices used by the different users, the feedback including information regarding, for each promotion identifier, recording of the program and playback of the program at the different consumer devices.

17. A method as recited in claim 16, the feedback comprising information regarding both how well the multiple different promotions enticed the different users to record the program and how well the multiple different promotions enticed the different users to playback the program.

18. A method as recited in claim 16, the feedback including interval information regarding one or both of the recording of the program and the playback of the program.

19. A method as recited in claim 16, the feedback including event occurrence information regarding one or both of the recording of the program and the playback of the program.

20. A method as recited in claim 16, the feedback including duration information regarding one or both of the recording of the program and playback of the program.