System, method, apparatus, and computer media for distributing targeted alerts

• US 7,814,145 B2
• Filed: 08/24/2007
• Issued: 10/12/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 08/24/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Earth Networks Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Shane Lundy, Yossi Firstenberg
• Inventors: Firstenberg, Yossi, Lundy, Shane
• Primary Examiner(s): Srivastava; Vivek
• Assistant Examiner(s): Liu; Lin
• Application Number:
  US11/844,486
• Publication Number:
  US 20080092162A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,145 Days
• Field of Search: 709/228, 709/201, 709/202, 709/203, 725 32- 36
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0264 based upon schedule
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4524 involving the geographical location of the client retrieval from the Internet by querying based on geographical locations G06F16/9537; systems specially adapted for using geographical information in broadcast systems H04H60/70; protocols in which the network application is adapted for the location of the user terminal in communication control or processing H04L67/52; services making use of the location of users or terminals in wireless networks H04W4/02; locating users or terminals in wireless networks H04W64/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4882 for displaying messages, e.g. warnings, reminders arrangements for providing short real-time information to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1895
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/814 comprising emergency warnings arrangements specially adapted for emergency or urgency in broadcast systems H04H20/59; arrangements for providing alarms, notifications, alerts to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1895
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8146 involving graphical data, e.g. 3D object, 2D graphics
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8586 by using a URL processing chained hypermedia data for information retrieval G06F16/94; information retrieval from the Internet by using URLs G06F16/955; URL in broadcast information H04H20/93; Web-based protocols H04L67/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/163 by receiver means only

Abstract

A method of presenting content, including steps of: determining a location associated with a user; receiving notice of a dynamic content alert (DCA); creating an advertisement that includes real-time information related to the dynamic content being within a predetermined range of the location associated with the user; and presenting the advertisement to the user.

Claims

1. A method of presenting content, comprising steps of:

receiving, at an advertisement server configured to provide advertisements included at designated locations within web pages, requests for advertisements to be inserted into the web pages based on ad tags provided to web browsers by content providers of the web pages;

in response to receiving a request for an advertisement at the advertisement server, contacting, by the advertisement server, an alert server;

determining, at the alert server, a geographic region of a web browsers sending the request for the advertisement to the advertisement server;

determining, at the alert server, whether an automatic insertion order stored at the alert server and the geographic region of the web browser sending the request for the advertisement are a match, and

in response to their being a match, transmitting, at the alert server, the automatic insertion order and a dynamic content alert to the advertisement server;

receiving, at the advertisement server, the dynamic content alert from the alert server for the geographic region and the automatic insertion order instructing the advertisement server to generate an advertisement that includes real-time information of the dynamic content alert for users of web browsers in the geographic region;

executing, at the advertisement server, the automatic insertion order, which includes,

dynamically generating the advertisement that includes the real-time information of the dynamic content alert for the geographic region and a sponsor of the advertisement, and

determining, at the advertisement server, locations of users of web browsers requesting advertisements and which of the users are located in the geographic region; and

transmitting, at the advertisement server, the advertisement that includes the real-time information of the dynamic content alert for the geographic region and the sponsor of the advertisement to the users of web browsers requesting advertisements from the advertisement server determined to be in the geographic region.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the dynamic content alert is an environmental event that relates to at least one of temperature, wind direction, wind speed, barometric pressure, hurricanes, tornadoes, thunderstorms, flooding, rate of rain fall, NWS Alert, Amber Alert, DHS, DOT or FEMA Alert.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the dynamic content alert is an environmental event that relates to traffic conditions, incidents and forecast.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the dynamic content alert is an environmental event that occurs from 1 second to 15 minutes prior to receiving the notice.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the advertisement includes one or more of real-time temperature, real-time wind speed, real-time wind direction, real-time barometric pressure, and real-time rate of rain fall, NWS Alerts, Amber Alerts, DHS, DOT and FEMA Alerts.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the dynamically generating comprises:

accessing a database that stores sponsor information in correspondence with a characteristic of the real-time information of the dynamic content alert;

determining, based on information stored in the database, which sponsor corresponds with the real-time information; and

including the sponsor that was determined to correspond with the real-time information in the advertisement.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the real-time information is information related to sports, information related to a financial market, or information related to weather.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

causing the advertisement including the real-time information and the sponsor to be displayed in an iframe, wherein the real-time information and the sponsor are in a same iframe.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of dynamically generating includes disposing a hyperlink to a website associated with the sponsor in the advertisement, wherein if the user activates the hyperlink, the browser retrieves information from the website associated with the sponsor.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the website associated with the sponsor includes additional information regarding the dynamic content alert.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the real-time information is a temperature and the dynamically generating further comprises:

selecting a first sponsor for the advertisement if the temperature is above a predetermined limit; and

selecting a second sponsor for the advertisement if the temperature is below the predetermined limit.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the dynamically generating comprises:

generating a video stream that includes video content of the sponsor and the real-time information of the dynamic content alert intermixed with the video content of the sponsor.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the dynamically generating comprises:

generating an audio stream that includes audio content of the sponsor and the real-time information of the dynamic content alert intermixed with the audio content of the sponsor.

14. A system for presenting content, comprising:

means for receiving requests for advertisements to be inserted into the web pages based on ad tags provided to web browsers by content providers of the web pages;

an alert server that determines a geographic region of a web browser sending the request for the advertisement,

wherein the alert server determines whether an automatic insertion order stored at the alert server and the geographic region of the web browser sending the request for the advertisement are a match, and in response to their being a match, transmits the automatic insertion order and a dynamic content alert;

means for receiving the dynamic content alert from the alert server for the geographic region and the automatic insertion order instructing generation of an advertisement that includes real-time information of the dynamic content alert for users of web browsers in the geographic region;

means for executing, at the advertisement server, the automatic insertion order, which includes,

means for dynamically generating the advertisement that includes the real-time information of the dynamic content alert for the geographic region and a sponsor of the advertisement, and

means for determining, at the advertisement server, locations of users of web browsers requesting advertisements and which of the users are located in the geographic region; and

means for transmitting, at the advertisement server, the advertisement that includes the real-time information of the dynamic content alert for the geographic region and the sponsor of the advertisement to the users of web browsers requesting advertisements from the advertisement server determined to be in the geographic region.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the dynamic content alert is an environmental event that relates to at least one of temperature, wind direction, wind speed, barometric pressure, hurricanes, tornadoes, thunderstorms, flooding, rate of rain fall, NWS Alert, Amber Alert, DHS, DOT or FEMA Alert.

16. The system of claim 14, wherein the dynamic content alert is an environmental event that relates to traffic conditions, incidents and forecast.

17. The system of claim 14, wherein the dynamic content alert is an environmental event that occurs from 1 second to 15 minutes prior to receiving the notice.

18. The system of claim 14, wherein the advertisement includes one or more of real-time temperature, real-time wind speed, real-time wind direction, real-time barometric pressure, and real-time rate of rain fall, NWS Alerts, Amber Alerts, DHS, DOT and FEMA Alerts.

19. The system of claim 14, wherein the means for executing further comprises:

means for accessing a database that stores sponsor information in correspondence with a characteristic of the real-time information of the dynamic content alert;

means for determining, based on information stored in the database, which sponsor corresponds with the real-time information;

means for including the sponsor that was determined to correspond with the real-time information in the advertisement.

20. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium encoded with instructions, which when executed by a computer, causes the computer to implement a method of presenting content, comprising steps of:

receiving, at an advertisement server configured to provide advertisements included at designated locations within web pages, requests for advertisements to be inserted into the web pages based on ad tags provided to web browsers by content providers of the web pages;

in response to receiving a request for an advertisement at the advertisement server, contacting, by the advertisement server, an alert server;

determining, at the alert server, a geographic region of a web browsers sending the request for the advertisement to the advertisement server;

determining, at the alert server, whether an automatic insertion order stored at the alert server and the geographic region of the web browser sending the request for the advertisement are a match; and

in response to their being a match, transmitting, at the alert server, the automatic insertion order and a dynamic content alert to the advertisement server;

receiving, at the advertisement server, the dynamic content alert from the alert server for a geographic region and the automatic insertion order instructing the advertisement server to generate an advertisement that includes real-time information of the dynamic content alert for users of web browsers in the geographic region;

executing, at the advertisement server, the automatic insertion order, which includes,

dynamically generating the advertisement that includes the real-time information of the dynamic content alert for the geographic region and a sponsor of the advertisement, and

determining, at the advertisement server, locations of users of web browsers requesting advertisements and which of the users are located in the geographic region; and

transmitting, at the advertisement server, the advertisement that includes the real-time information of the dynamic content alert for the geographic region and the sponsor of the advertisement to the users of web browsers requesting advertisements from the advertisement server determined to be in the geographic region.