Scheduling and delivering ad meetings

• US 8,346,229 B2
• Filed: 02/26/2010
• Issued: 01/01/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 02/26/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Scott, Sherryl Lee Lorraine
• Primary Examiner(s): WASHINGTON, ERIKA ALISE
• Application Number:
  US12/713,929
• Publication Number:
  US 20110212711A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,040 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 455/414.2
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0272 Period of advertisement exposure
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/04 specially adapted for terminals or networks with limited capabilities; specially adapted for terminal portability
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/06 specially adapted for file transfer, e.g. file transfer protocol [FTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72451 according to schedules, e.g. using calendar applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/06 Optimizing the usage of the radio link, e.g. header compression, information sizing , discarding information system modifying transmission characteristic according to link quality by modifying frame length H04L1/0007; dynamic adaptation of the packet size for flow control or congestion control H04L47/365

Abstract

A system and method for scheduling advertisement viewing sessions (“ad meetings”) and delivering those advertisements to a willing user. An ad meeting is scheduled by a user by creating and storing an ad meeting calendar item and sending a notification to an advertising agent. The advertising agent may select advertisements to send to the user based on the user'"'"'s specified preferences, location, the time of the meeting, the time of the shopping trip, and/or other criteria. Alternatively, the advertising agent may invite users to an ad meeting by sending an invitation containing an ad meeting calendar item, or alternatively a user may share advertisements with other users by forwarding advertisements or inviting other users to an ad meeting. As an incentive to view advertisements, the user may have credits applied to their communications service provider account based on their advertisement viewing and sharing activity.

Claims

1. A method for playing advertising content at a communication device, the method comprising:

establishing a predetermined time for an advertisement event for playing at least one advertisement at the communication device;

receiving, at the communication device from a server, advertising record data for said advertisement event, prior to the predetermined time;

receiving, at the communication device, at least one advertisement identified in the advertising record data;

playing the at least one advertisement at the communication device during the advertisement event at the predetermined time, such that an entirety of said advertisement is played at the communication device; and

transmitting to the server confirmation that the entirety of said advertisement was played at the communication device,

wherein the advertising record data comprises an identifier corresponding to said at least one advertisement, and further wherein said at least one advertisement is received in response to a request transmitted from the communication device during said advertisement event to the server, the request comprising the corresponding identifier.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising forwarding the at least one advertisement to a second communication device from the first communication device, such that the identifier corresponding to said at least one advertisement is provided to the second communication device, and further comprising transmitting to the server confirmation once the entirety of said advertisement has been played at the second communication device.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the advertising record data and the at least one advertisement are received at a plurality of communication devices, and wherein the playing is carried out at the plurality of communication devices at the predetermined time, and further wherein transmitting comprises transmitting confirmation from at least one of said plurality of communication devices.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the at east one advertisement is received prior to the predetermined time.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein at least two advertisements are received at the communication device, said at least two advertisements are displayed at the communication device such that an entirety of said at least two advertisements are displayed at the communication device, and further wherein the confirmation indicates that the entirety of each of said at least two advertisements were displayed at the communication device.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the communication device is a wireless communication device, and a network service is enabled for the wireless communication device if a minimum amount of advertisement is confirmed to have been displayed at the communication device.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one advertisement is delivered in a format selected from one of e-mail, SMS, HTML, video, chat, vibration, tactile communication, or audio.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein content of the at least one advertisement is selected according to at least one of:

a profile of a user of the communication device;

a time of day of the predetermined time;

or

a location of the communication device at the predetermined time.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the predetermined time is established using a calendar appointment.

10. A method for delivering advertising content from a server to a communication device, the method comprising:

establishing, at the server, a predetermined time for an advertisement event for playing of at least one advertisement;

transmitting from the server to the communication device advertising record data for said advertisement event, and further transmitting at least one advertisement identified in the advertising record data for playing during the advertisement event;

receiving at the server confirmation from the communication device that an entirety of said at least one advertisement was played at the communication device;

wherein a network service is enabled for the communication device if a minimum amount of advertisement is confirmed to have been displayed at the communication device,

wherein the advertising record data comprises a corresponding identifier for each of the at least one advertisement, and

wherein transmitting the at least one advertisement comprises;

receiving at the server, from the communication device, a request for an advertisement, the request comprising the corresponding identifier for said advertisement; and

transmitting to the communication device, in response to said request, the advertisement identified in the request, the advertising record data transmitted to the communication device prior to the predetermined time, and the request is received after the predetermined time.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein transmitting the advertising record data and the at least one advertisement comprises transmitting the advertising record data and the at least one advertisement to a plurality of communication devices, and wherein receiving confirmation comprises receiving confirmation from at least one of the plurality of communication devices.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein at least two advertisements are transmitted to the communication device, at least one of said at least two advertisements being transmitted to the communication device prior to the predetermined time.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the at least one advertisement is delivered in a format selected from one of e-mail, SMS, HTML, video, chat, vibration, tactile communication, or audio.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein content of the at least one advertisement is selected according to at least one of:

a profile of a user of the communication device;

a time of day of the predetermined time;

or

a location of the communication device at the predetermined time.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein the predetermined time is established using a calendar appointment.

16. A computer program product comprising a tangible computer-readable medium storing program code which, when executed, causes a computing device to:

establish a predetermined time for an advertisement event for playing at least one advertisement at a communication device;

receive, at the communication device, advertising record data for said advertisement event, prior to the predetermined time;

receive, at the communication device, at least one advertisement identified in the advertising record data;

play the at least one advertisement at the communication device during the advertisement event at the predetermined time, such that an entirety of said advertisement is played at the communication device; and

transmit to a server confirmation that the entirety of said advertisement was played at the communication device,

wherein the advertising record data comprises an identifier corresponding to said at least one advertisement, and further wherein said at least one advertisement is received in response to a request transmitted from the communication device during said advertisement event, the request comprising the corresponding identifier.

17. A computer program product comprising a tangible computer-readable medium storing program code which, when executed, causes a computing device to:

establish, at a server, a predetermined time for an advertisement event for playing of at least one advertisement;

transmit from the server to a communication device advertising record data for said advertisement event, and further transmitting at least one advertisement identified in the advertising record data for playing during the advertisement event; and

receive at the server confirmation from the communication device that an entirety of said at least one advertisement was played at the communication device;

wherein a network service is enabled for the communication device if a minimum amount of advertisement is confirmed to have been displayed at the communication device,

wherein the advertising record data comprises a corresponding identifier for each of the at least one advertisement, and

wherein transmitting the at least one advertisement comprises;

receiving at the server from the communication device, a request for an advertisement, the request comprising the corresponding identifier for said advertisement; and

transmitting to the communication device, in response to said request, the advertisement identified in the request, the advertising record data transmitted to the communication device prior to the predetermined time, and the request is received after the predetermined time.

18. A communication device for displaying advertisements, the communication device comprising:

a display and a memory;

a processor in communication with the display and memory and with a transceiver, the processor being adapted to;

establish a predetermined time for an advertisement event for playing at least one advertisement at a communication device;

receive advertising record data for said advertisement event, prior to the predetermined time;

receive at least one advertisement identified in the advertising record data;

play the at least one advertisement at the communication device during the advertisement event at the predetermined time, such that an entirety of said advertisement is played at the communication device; and

transmit to a server confirmation that the entirety of said advertisement was played at the communication device,

wherein the advertising record data comprises an identifier corresponding to said at least one advertisement, and further wherein said at least one advertisement is received in response to a request transmitted from the communication device during said advertisement event to the server, the request comprising the corresponding identifier.

19. The communication device of claim 18, wherein the communication device is a wireless communication device, and a network service is enabled for the wireless communication device if a minimum amount of advertisement is confirmed to have been displayed at the communication device.

20. The communication device of claim 18, wherein the processor is configured to establish the predetermined time by saving a calendar event for said predetermined time in the memory.