P2P real time media recommendations

• US 7,970,922 B2
• Filed: 08/21/2008
• Issued: 06/28/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 07/11/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Concert Technology Corporation
• Original Assignee: Napo Enerprises, LLC (Concert Technology Corporation)
• Inventors: Svendsen, Hugh
• Primary Examiner(s): Hamza, Faruk
• Application Number:
  US12/195,628
• Publication Number:
  US 20080319833A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,041 Days
• Field of Search: 709/200, 709/203, 709/204, 709/205, 709217-219, 709/230, 709/231, 707/748, 707752-754
• US Class Current: 709/231
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0282 Rating or review of business operators or products
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0631 Item recommendations
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/00 Data switching networks interconnection of, or transfer of information or other signals between, memories, input/output devices or central processing units G06F13/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1822 Conducting the conference, e.g. admission, detection, selection or grouping of participants, correlating users to one or more conference sessions, prioritising transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1859 adapted to provide push services, e.g. data channels
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2803 Home automation networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/104 Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/00 Network arrangements, protocols or services independent of the application payload and not provided for in the other groups of this subclass networks security protocols H04L9/40; wireless communication networks H04W
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4661 Deriving a combined profile for a plurality of end-users of the same client, e.g. for family members within a home user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4788 communicating with other users, e.g. chatting arrangements for providing for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms, to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1813; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4825 using a list of items to be played back in a given order, e.g. playlists
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4826 using recommendation lists, e.g. of programs or channels sorted out according to their score
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8113 comprising music, e.g. song in MP3 format
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/00 Television systems details H04N3/00, H04N5/00; methods or arrangements, for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals H04N19/00; selective content distribution H04N21/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/17318 Direct or substantially direct transmission and handling of requests

Abstract

Systems and methods are described for providing peer-to-peer (P2P) media recommendations. In one embodiment, a central streaming media service operates to stream media presentations to user devices of users. For each user desiring to send and receive recommendations, each time a media presentation is streamed to and played by a user device of the user, the central media service provides a recommendation identifying the media presentation to one or more other users associated with the user. Similarly, the central media service provides media recommendations to the user from one or more other users. Once streaming and playback of the media presentation is complete or substantially complete, the central streaming media service automatically selects a next media presentation for the user from a group of media presentations including those identified by the recommendations provided to the user and begins streaming the next media presentation to the user device of the user.

Claims

1. A method of operation of a central streaming media service comprising:

streaming a media presentation to a user device of a first user for playback;

automatically providing a media recommendation identifying the media presentation to a second user in response to playback of the media presentation at the user device of the first user;

receiving the media recommendation on behalf of the second user;

making a determination as to whether the media recommendation is to be filtered based on one or more criterion; and

if the determination is made not to filter the media recommendation;

automatically adding the media presentation identified by the media recommendation to a pre-existing list of media presentations maintained for the second user to provide an updated list of media presentations for the second user;

automatically selecting a select media presentation to stream to a user device of the second user from the updated list of media presentations for the second user based on user preferences of the second user; and

streaming the select media presentation to the user device of the second user for playback in such a manner that enables playback of the select media presentation to begin upon completion of playback of the first media presentation;

wherein receiving the media recommendation comprises receiving the media recommendation during streaming of a first media presentation to the user device of the second user for playback.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein automatically providing the media recommendation comprises automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user upon initiation of playback of the media presentation at the user device of the first user.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein automatically providing the media recommendation comprises automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user upon completion of playback of a threshold amount of the media presentation at the user device of the first user.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein automatically providing the media recommendation comprises automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user upon completion of playback of the media presentation at the user device of the first user.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user comprises automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to a data structure associated with the second user.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user comprises automatically providing the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to a component of the central streaming media service responsible for receiving media recommendations sent to the second user.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the pre-existing list comprises one or more media presentations identified by a corresponding one or more media recommendations sent to the second user.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the pre-existing list comprises one or more media presentations selected by the second user.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the pre-existing list comprises one or more media presentations identified by the central streaming media service.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the media presentation identified by the media recommendation is a song.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein the media presentation identified by the media recommendation is a video presentation.

12. The method of claim 1 wherein the media presentation identified by the media recommendation is an audio presentation.

13. The method of claim 1 wherein each media presentation in the pre-existing list of media presentations is scored, and the method further comprises:

scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation based on the user preferences of the second user;

wherein automatically selecting the select media presentation to stream to the user device of the second user comprises automatically selecting the select media presentation from the updated list of media presentations based on scores assigned to the media presentations, including the media presentation identified by the media recommendation, in the updated list of media presentations.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein the user preferences of the second user comprise weights assigned to a plurality of categories, and scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation comprises:

identifying one of the plurality of categories applicable to the media presentation identified by the media recommendation; and

scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation based on the weight assigned to the one of the plurality of categories.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein the plurality of categories comprises one or more categories selected from a group consisting of:

recommending user, genre, decade, and availability.

16. The method of claim 14 wherein the user preferences of the second user further comprise weights assigned to a plurality of possible attributes for each of the plurality of categories, and scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation comprises:

identifying one of the plurality of categories applicable to the media presentation identified by the media recommendation;

identifying one of the plurality of possible attributes for the one of the plurality of categories applicable to the media presentation identified by the media recommendation; and

scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation based on the weight assigned to the one of the plurality of categories and the weight assigned to the one of the plurality of possible attributes for the one of the plurality of categories.

17. The method of claim 14 wherein the user preferences of the second user further comprise weights assigned to a plurality of other users including the second user, and scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation comprises scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation based on a weight assigned to the second user.

18. The method of claim 14 wherein the user preferences of the second user further comprise weights assigned to a plurality of media presentation attributes, and scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation comprises:

identifying one or more of the plurality of media presentation attributes applicable to the media presentation identified by the media recommendation; and

scoring the media presentation identified by the media recommendation based on the weights assigned to the one or more of the plurality of media presentation attributes applicable to the media presentation identified by the media recommendation.

19. The method of claim 18 wherein the plurality of media presentation attributes comprises at least one of a group consisting of:

a plurality of music genres and a plurality of time periods.

20. The method of claim 14 wherein automatically selecting the select media presentation from the updated list of media presentations based on the scores assigned to the media presentations, including the media presentation identified by the media recommendation, in the updated list of media presentations comprises:

sorting the updated list of media presentations based on the scores to provide a sorted list of media presentations; and

automatically selecting a media presentation from the sorted list of media presentations having a most preferred score as the select media presentation to stream to the user device of the second user for playback.

21. The method of claim 1 wherein the central streaming media service is a subscription-based service.

22. The method of claim 1 further comprising automatically obtaining rights for the second user to access the select media presentation if the second user does not have access rights to the select media presentation.

23. The method of claim 1 wherein streaming the select media presentation comprises:

streaming a preview of the select media presentation to the user device of the second user if the second user does not have access rights to the select media presentation; and

streaming a complete version of the select media presentation to the user device of the second user if the second user has access rights to the select media presentation.

24. A central server hosting a central streaming media service, comprising:

a communication interface communicatively coupling the central server to a network; and

a control system associated with the communication interface and adapted to;

stream a media presentation to a user device of a first user via the network for playback;

automatically provide a media recommendation identifying the media presentation to a second user in response to playback of the media presentation at the user device of the first user;

receive the media recommendation on behalf of the second user;

make a determination as to whether the media recommendation is to be filtered based on one or more criterion; and

if the determination is made not to filter the media recommendation;

automatically add the media presentation identified by the media recommendation to a pre-existing list of media presentations maintained for the second user to provide an updated list of media presentations for the second user;

automatically select a select media presentation to stream to a user device of the second user from the updated list of media presentations for the second user based on user preferences of the second user; and

stream the select media presentation to the user device of the second user via the network for playback in such a manner that enables playback of the select media presentation to begin upon completion of playback of the first media presentation;

wherein receiving the media recommendation comprises receiving the media recommendation during streaming of a first media presentation to the user device of the second user for playback.

25. The central server of claim 24 wherein in order to automatically provide the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user, the control system is adapted to automatically provide the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to a data structure associated with the second user.

26. The central server of claim 24 wherein in order to automatically provide the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to the second user, the control system is adapted to automatically provide the media recommendation identifying the media presentation to a component of the control system that automatically adds the media presentation identified by the media recommendation to the pre-existing list of media presentations maintained for the second user to provide the updated list of media presentations for the second user.