INTERNET BASED SYSTEM AND APPARATUS FOR PAYING USERS TO VIEW CONTENT AND RECEIVING MICROPAYMENTS

• US 20140032540A1
• Filed: 08/30/2013
• Published: 01/30/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 07/20/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Lim, Stanley T., Giddings, John Galen
• Granted Patent: US 9,372,939 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/723
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/903 Querying for retrieval from the web G06F16/953
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 17/0032 Apparatus for automatic testing and analysing marked record carriers, used for examinations of the multiple choice answer type teaching apparatus working with questions and answers G09B7/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0639 Performance analysis of employees; Performance analysis of enterprise or organisation operations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0235 constrained by time limit or expiration date

Abstract

An Internet service is configured to provide information to a user of the service in ranked order according to demographic profile information about the user provided by the user. Such information might include advertising information and/or search results (e.g., rendered as hyperlinks) to search queries posed by the user. The information may be returned in a ranked order according to reward credits offered by advertisers and/or content providers associated with the advertising information and/or web sites represented by the search results. A process for verifying whether or not an Internet operation (e.g., sending an e-mail message or accessing a web site) is being attempted by a human being or an automated process may be incorporated with the service by using a quiz process that requires user interaction.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

transmitting, by a first computer system, a prompt to a second different computer system including one or more graphical images and a corresponding question related to the one or more graphical images, and a means for a human operator of a computer system to provide a respective answer thereto;

receiving, at the first computer system, a response related to the prompt;

determining, by the first computer system, whether the received response includes a correct answer;

when so, inferring that the respective response was provided by the human operator of the second computer system and granting the human operator access to a computer-based resource;

otherwise, not granting the human operator access to the computer-based resource;

determining an amount of time or amount of resources that will be accessible by the human operator before a next prompt is transmitted including adjusting an interval for a next prompt including increasing an amount of time or resources associated with the interval from a baseline amount to an increased amount when the respective response is inferred to have been provided by the human operator and based on correctness or incorrectness of the human operator'"'"'s responses to prior prompts; and

providing a second prompt after expiration of the interval.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the computer-based resource comprises a resource adapted for sending an e-mail message.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the computer-based resource comprises a Web site.

4. The method of claim 1 further including providing data from the computer-based resource in ranked order according to a demographic profile of a respondent.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the data comprises one or more of:

advertising information or search results to search queries posed by a respondent.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the data is returned in a ranked order according to reward credit portions offered by advertisers associated with the advertising information.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein the reward credit portions are posted to a user account maintained by the respondent upon selection by the respondent of selectable objects associated with the advertising information.

8. The method of claim 5 wherein the data is returned in the ranked order and wherein the ranked order is influenced by reward credit portions offered by content providers associated with the advertising information.

9. The method of claim 5 wherein the data is returned in the ranked order and wherein the ranked order is influenced by reward credit portions offered by advertisers associated with web sites represented by the search results.

10. The method of claim 5 wherein the information is returned in the ranked that is influenced by reward credit portions offered by content providers associated with web sites represented by the search results.

12. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

determining a time to provide a second prompt wherein determining a time includes determining a time based on a correctness of the response and correctness or incorrectness of one or more prior responses to other prompts;

sending the second prompt at the second time.

13. The method of claim 12 further comprising:

determining an amount of time or amount of resources that will be accessible by the human operator before second prompt is transmitted including adjusting an interval for a next prompt including increasing an amount of time or resources associated with the interval from a baseline amount to an increased amount when the respective response is inferred to have been provided by the human operator.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein the interval is bases at least in part on correctness or incorrectness of the human operator'"'"'s responses to prior prompts.

11. A method, comprising:

transmitting a prompt to a device including one or more graphical images and a corresponding question related to the one or more graphical images;

receiving a response related to the prompt;

determining, by one or more processors, whether the received response includes a correct answer;

when so, inferring that the respective response was provided by the human operator of the second computer system and granting the human operator access to a computer-based resource;

otherwise, not granting the human operator access to the computer-based resource.