Full-text relevancy ranking

• US 6,842,761 B2
• Filed: 06/08/2001
• Issued: 01/11/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 11/21/2000
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Verizon Patent and Licensing Incorporated (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Original Assignee: America Online Inc. (Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc.)
• Inventors: Riesland, Melissa Anne, Hendrick, Daniel Allen, Diamond, Theodore George, Rehm, Eric Carl
• Primary Examiner(s): Mizrahi, Diane D.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Wu, Yicun
• Application Number:
  US09/876,925
• Publication Number:
  US 20020099694A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,313 Days
• Field of Search: 707/1, 707/2, 707/3, 707/4, 707/5, 707/6, 707/7, 707/8, 707/9, 707/10, 707/100, 707/101, 707/102, 707/103, 707/104, 340/7.41, 340/7.22, 709/203, 709/226, 709/223, 709/231, 370/400, 705/10
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/27 Replication, distribution or synchronisation of data between databases or within a distributed database system; Distributed database system architectures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/41 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/4387 by the use of playlists
• 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 16/907 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/908 using metadata automatically derived from the content
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/955 using information identifiers, e.g. uniform resource locators [URL]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/205 Parsing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/913 Multimedia
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/923 Intellectual property
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/959 Network
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

A method and system for ranking relevancy of metadata associated with media on a computer network, such as multimedia and streaming media, include categorizing the metadata into sets of metadata. The categories are broad categories relating to areas such as who, what, when, and where, such as artist, media type, and creation date, creation location. Weights are assigned to each set of metadata. Weights are related to technical information such as bit rate, duration, sampling rate, frequency of occurrence of a specific term, etc. A score is calculated for ranking the relevancy of each set of metadata. The score is calculated in accordance with the assigned weight and category. This score is available for search systems (e.g., search engines) and/or users to determine the relative ranking of search results.

Claims

1. A method for ranking relevancy of search results of a search for media on a communications network, said method comprising the steps of:

categorizing metadata associated with said media, each category of metadata comprising at least one set of metadata;

assigning at least one weight to each set of metadata, wherein a value of each weight is determined in accordance with a content of each set of metadata; and

calculating a score for ranking said relevancy of each search result, wherein a score is calculated for each search result in accordance with said at least one assigned weight and category of each set of metadata.

2. A method in accordance with claim 1, wherein said category comprises at least one of artist of said media, type of media, date said media was created, and creation location of said media.

3. A method in accordance with claim 1, wherein said value of each weight is determined in accordance with at least one of bit rate of said media, duration of said media, sampling rate of said media, a number of occurrences of a term in a set of metadata, a number of links to a referenced web site in a set of metadata, a file type of said media, and a number of terms occurring between specified query terms in a web page.

4. A method in accordance with claim 1, wherein said at least one set of metadata is categorized in accordance with predetermined associations between said categories and said sets of metadata.

5. A method in accordance with claim 1, wherein said metadata comprise elements related to at least one of content of the media, intellectual property rights associated with the media, and instantiation of the media.

6. A method in accordance with claim 1, wherein said media comprises at least one of multimedia and streaming media.

7. A method in accordance with claim 1, wherein said communications network is a computer network.

8. A program readable medium having embodied thereon a program for causing a processor to rank relevancy of search results of a search for media on a communications network, said program readable medium comprising:

means for causing said processor to categorize metadata associated with said media, each category of metadata comprising at least one set of metadata;

means for causing said processor to assign at least one weight to each set of metadata, wherein a value of each weight is determined in accordance with a content of each set of metadata; and

means for causing said processor to calculate a score for ranking said relevancy of each search result, wherein a score is calculated for each search result in accordance with said at least one assigned weight and category of each set of metadata.

9. A program readable medium in accordance with claim 8, wherein said category comprises at least one of artist of said media, type of media, date said media was created, and creation location of said media.

10. A program readable medium in accordance with claim 8, wherein said value of each weight is determined in accordance with at least one of bit rate of said media, duration of said media, sampling rate of said media, a number of occurrences of a term in a set of metadata, a number of links to a referenced web site in a set of metadata, a file type of said media, and a number of terms occurring between specified query terms in a web page.

11. A program readable medium in accordance with claim 8, wherein said at least one set of metadata is categorized in accordance with predetermined associations between said categories and said sets of metadata.

12. A program readable medium in accordance with claim 8, wherein said metadata comprise elements related to at least one of content of the media, intellectual property rights associated with the media, and instantiation of the media.

13. A data signal embodied in a carrier wave comprising:

a categorize metadata code segment for categorizing metadata associated with media on a communications network, each category of metadata comprising at least one set of metadata;

an assign weight code segment for assigning at least one weight to each set of metadata, wherein a value of each weight is determined in accordance with a content of each set of metadata; and

a calculate score code segment for calculating a score for ranking relevancy of search results of a search for said media on a communications network, wherein a score is calculated for each search result in accordance with said at least one assigned weight and category of each set of metadata.

14. A data signal in accordance with claim 13, wherein said categories comprise at least one of artist of said media, type of media, date said media was created, and creation location of said media.

15. A data signal in accordance with claim 13, wherein said value of each weight is determined in accordance with at least one of bit rate of said media, duration of said media, sampling rate of said media, a number of occurrences of a term in a set of metadata, a number of links to a referenced web site in a set of metadata, a file type of said media, and a number of terms occurring between specified query terms in a web page.

16. A data signal in accordance with claim 13, wherein said at least one set of metadata is categorized in accordance with predetermined associations between said categories and said sets of metadata.

17. A data signal in accordance with claim 13, wherein said metadata comprise elements related to at least one of content of the media, intellectual property rights associated with the media, and instantiation of the media.

18. A method for ranking relevancy of search results of a search for at least one of streaming media and multimedia (m/s media) on a communications network, said method comprising the steps of:

categorizing metadata associated with said at least one of m/s media, each category of metadata comprising at least one set of metadata, wherein said category comprises at least one of artist of said m/s media, type of m/s media, date said m/s media was created, and creation location of said m/s media;

assigning at least one weight to each set of metadata, wherein;

a value of each weight is determined in accordance with a content of each set of metadata; and

said value of each weight is determined in accordance with at least one of bit rate of said m/s media, duration of said m/s media, sampling rate of said m/s media, a number of occurrences of a term in a set of metadata, a number of links to a referenced web site in a set of metadata, a file type of said m/s media, and a number of terms occurring between specified query terms in a web page; and

calculating a score for ranking said relevancy of each search result, wherein a score is calculated for each search result in accordance with said at least one assigned weight and category of each set of metadata.