METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PROVIDING ANNOTATIONS OF A DIGITAL WORK

• US 20110184828A1
• Filed: 04/08/2011
• Published: 07/28/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 01/19/2005
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Inventors: Siegel, Hilliard B., Manber, Udi, Leblang, Jonathan
• Application Number:
  US13/083,445
• Publication Number:
  US 20110184828A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/26.1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/48 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9562 Bookmark management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/382 insuring higher security of transaction
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0601 Electronic shopping [e-shopping]

Abstract

Methods and systems for receiving and distributing annotations of a digital work include receiving an annotation of the digital work, storing the annotation, and providing the annotation to a user. The user may be required to submit a valid authorization credential for the annotation. Annotations may be textual or graphical, and may be associated with particular content in a digital work. Indicators may be displayed to identify content in the digital work for which annotations are available. A user may exchange compensation or perform a specified action for access to an annotation. Some or all of the compensation received for an annotation may be distributed to the author of the annotation. Multiple annotations may be listed in an order based a criterion, such as ranking, price, or date of receipt. Users that purchase a digital work may automatically receive an authorization credential to receive annotations of the digital work.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for providing an annotation of a digital work, comprising:

under control of instructions that are executed by one or more computing devices;

receiving multiple annotations from different authors for particular content in a digital work;

storing the annotations in association with the digital work;

providing a list of abbreviated versions of the annotations to a user desiring to access one or more of the annotations;

receiving an authorization credential from a user desiring to access one or more of the annotations; and

if the authorization credential is valid, providing a full version of one or more of the annotations of the digital work to the user in context with regard to the digital work.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein an annotation of the digital work is received in at least one of a graphical format, a handwriting format and a highlighting of text in the digital work.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the particular content in the digital work is identified by an indicator displayed near text in the digital work.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the digital work is an audio or audiovisual work and the particular content in the digital work is identified by an indicator displayed with a playback control provided for playback of the digital work.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the user has obtained the authorization credential in exchange for compensation paid by the user, the method further comprising distributing compensation to the author of an annotation.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the authorization credential is specific to an annotation desired by the user.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein an annotation, when combined with the digital work to which it pertains, becomes accessible upon accessing the digital work.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the user has obtained the authorization credential in exchange for purchase of the digital work to which an annotation pertains.

9. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, in response to execution by a computing system, cause the computing system to:

receive from a client system an annotation of a digital work by a first user;

store the annotation in a memory in association with the digital work;

require a second user desiring to access the annotation of the first user to perform a specified action before providing an authorization credential to the second user, wherein the specified action is electronically previewing a digital work; and

upon receipt of the authorization credential from the second user desiring to access the annotation, provide the annotation to a client system for output to the second user, wherein the annotation is provided in context with regard to the digital work.

10. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, further having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that cause the computing system to store the annotation in association with particular content in the digital work.

11. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, further having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that cause the computing system to provide the annotation to the client system only after the user has purchased the digital work to which the annotation pertains.

12. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the specified action further includes contributing an annotation of a digital work.

13. A computing system programmed to provide a marketplace for annotations of digital works, comprising:

a computing component configured to receive digital works from a plurality of sources;

a computing component configured to receive annotations of digital works from a plurality of authors;

a computing component configured to receive requests for annotations from a plurality of users and deliver annotations to requesting users; and

a computing component configured to facilitate receiving compensation from users for delivery of annotations and distributing compensation to authors of the delivered annotations,

wherein the compensation received from a user is represented by a valid authorization credential received from the user.

14. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the compensation distributed to an author is a portion of the compensation received from a user.

15. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the compensation received from a user is performance by the user of a specified action.

16. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the compensation received from a user is included in compensation paid by the user to access a digital work.

17. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, in response to execution by a computing system, cause the computing system to:

receive multiple annotations from different authors for particular content in a digital work;

store the annotations in association with the digital work;

provide a list of abbreviated versions of the annotations to a user desiring to access one or more of the annotations;

receive an authorization credential from the user desiring to access one or more of the annotations; and

if the authorization credential is valid, provide a full version of the one or more annotations of the digital work to the user in context with regard to the digital work.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the authorization credential is specific to an annotation desired by the user.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the user has obtained the authorization credential in exchange for electronically previewing a digital work.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the user has obtained the authorization credential in exchange for contributing an annotation of a digital work.