Profiles for information acquisition by devices in a wireless network

• US 6,968,178 B2
• Filed: 04/27/2001
• Issued: 11/22/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 04/27/2001
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Inventors: McDonnell, James Thomas Edward, Waters, John Deryk, Macer, Peter J., Pradhan, Salil
• Primary Examiner(s): Hoosain, Allan
• Application Number:
  US09/843,647
• Publication Number:
  US 20020160759A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,670 Days
• Field of Search: 455/414, 455/412, 455/413, 455/421, 455/422, 455/456, 379/72, 379/76, 379/88.22, 379/93.12, 379/93.13, 379/114.1, 379/114.11, 379/114.13
• US Class Current: 455/414.1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0256 User search
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0267 Wireless devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0269 based on user profile or attribute
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0276 Advertisement creation

Abstract

A mobile telephone (10), an advertiser, broadcasts an advertisement over a wireless short range piconet link to another mobile telephone (12), a consumer. The advertisement is broadcast with a predetermined set of classification tags and the consumer phone (12) has a filter set to accept only certain adverts. When an advertisement of interest is received by the consumer phone (12) it requests further details automatically via the piconet link and the advertiser phone (10) provides then automatically via the piconet link. When the consumer wishes to reply to the advertisement they contact the advertiser phone (10), or an advertiser device, via a long range cellular link (16).

Claims

1. A method of advertising comprising:

communicating a first part of an advertisement from an advertiser telecommunications device to a consumer telecommunications device via wireless short range telecommunications, the consumer device requesting a fuller advertisement or further details from an advertisement follow-up device and having an advertisement filter that filters incoming advertisements and requests fuller details, or further details, of only advertisements that pass a screening selection; and

communicating the request for further details from the consumer device to the advertisement follow up device by using short range wireless telecommunications,

wherein the request for the fuller details or further details is made automatically without user intervention.

2. A method according to claim 1 in which the consumer device is a mobile telephone, personal digital assistant, or other hand-portable electronic device.

3. A method according to claim 1 further including supplying the fuller details or the further details to the consumer device via short or long range wireless telecommunications.

4. A method according to claim 1 in which the advertisement follow-up device is the same device as the advertiser device.

5. A method according to claim 4 in which the advertiser device is a mobile telephone, personal digital assistant, or other hand portable electronic device.

6. A method according to claim 1 in which the first part of the advertisement includes the telecommunications address of the advertisement follow up device.

7. A method according to claim 1 including the step of contacting an advertisement concluder device to accept what is being offered in the advertisement.

8. A method according to claim 7 in which the concluder device is contacted over a long range telecommunications network.

9. A method according to claim 1 in which the wireless communication between the consumer device and the advertisement follow-up device takes place within a second of the consumer device receiving the first part of the advertisement.

10. A method of advertising by using an advertiser telecommunications device and a consumer telecommunications device having an advertisement filter with an allowable advertisement characteristics profile, comprising:

emitting from the advertiser telecommunications device an advertisement over a short range via a short range wireless transmitter, the advertisement having a characterisation profile associated with it conveying information about the type of advertisements, of goods or services being offered or both;

receiving the short range wireless advertisement at the consumer telecommunications device;

comparing the received advertisement characteristic profile with its filter profile and accepting advertisements which match its advertisement characteristics profile to an acceptable degree and rejecting advertisements whose characteristics profile does not match to an acceptable degree, the comparing, accepting and rejecting steps being performed by the consumer device;

offering to present to a user the accepted advertisements received by the consumer device;

broadcasting a short range short-form advertisement;

making an assessment as to whether a reply to the advertisement is required, and if so replying to the advertisement via long range telecommunications; and

trying to request further or fuller details of the advertisement, and responding to a failure to make contact with an advertising device via short range telecommunications by trying to make contact with the advertising device via the long range telecommunications.

11. A method according to claim 10 comprising trying to request further or fuller details of the advertisement via short range telecommunications, or via long range telecommunications.

12. A method according to claim 10 in which receipt of the short form advertisement prompts the consumer device to request more information via the short range telecommunications automatically if the short form advertisement triggers a trigger to do so.

13. A mobile telephone or other portable telecommunications device comprising a short range piconet receiver and an advertisement filter, the receiver being capable of receiving piconet advertisements and the filter being, in use, capable of (a) comparing a characterisation profile associated with a received advertisement with an allowable advertisement characteristics profile of the filter, (b) determining whether there is a match to an acceptable level, (C) accepting those advertisements which match the filter or which are not screened out by the filter, and (d) a piconet emitter, said device being configured so as to emit automatically via its piconet emitter a request for more information about an advertisement upon an advertisement being accepted by the filter.

14. A device according to claim 13 in which the filter is adapted to screen an advertisement positively into being accepted, or to screen an advertisement out so that it is definitely rejected, or both.

15. A device according to claim 13 in which the filter can be configured by a user by connecting the device, via telecommunications, to a filter protocol setting device.

16. A device according to claim 13 comprising a long range telecommunications antenna or link.

17. A device according to claim 13 comprising a display screen adapted to display the advertisement.

18. A mobile telephone or other portable telecommunications device comprising a short range piconet receiver and an advertisement filter, the receiver being capable of receiving piconet advertisements and the filter being, in use, capable of (a) comparing a characterisation profile associated with a received advertisement with an allowable advertisement characteristics profile of the filter, (b) determining whether there is a match to an acceptable level, (C) accepting those advertisements which match the filter or which are not screened out by the filter, and Cd) a memory and a control processor, the memory being arranged to store telecommunications addresses for advertisements that have been accepted by the filter, the device being arranged to attempt to contact an advertiser device automatically via its piconet telecommunications facility upon determining that a received advertisement is accepted by the filter, the device having an advertisement store and being adapted to store in the advertisement store further information or a fuller advertisement that it receives associated with the successful receipt and acceptance by its filter of an initial advert.

19. A device according to claim 18 in which the advertisement store includes an advertisement reply address store adapted to receive a telecommunications address for replying to the advertisements.

20. A mobile telecommunications device having a memory, a short range wireless telecommunications receiver, an emitter, and a controller, the controller being arranged for controlling the device in use to assess messages received by the receiver for a reply telecommunications address and storing any such reply address in the memory, and the device also having a reply trigger adapted in use to cause the controller to use an address from the memory to send a reply to a received message to the address associated with the relevant incoming message via the emitter in response to the reply trigger being activated, a comparator for deriving the reply trigger, the comparator being adapted to compare characteristics of the message with a predetermined set of screening characteristics and to cause a reply to be transmitted if predetermined conditions are met, the device having both piconet and long range telecommunications emitters and receivers and the controller being adapted, in use, to assess the telecommunications address to determine whether the reply address is a short range piconet address or a long range telecommunications address and to cause the reply to be emitted by the appropriate long or short range emitter of the device.