System and method for estimating prevalence of digital content on the world-wide-web

• US 8,661,111 B1
• Filed: 10/25/2000
• Issued: 02/25/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/12/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nielsen Company (US), LLC
• Original Assignee: The Nielsen Company LLC (MOOD Media Corporation)
• Inventors: Lauckhart, Gregory J., Horman, Craig B., Korol, Christa, Bartot, James T.
• Primary Examiner(s): MACILWINEN, JOHN MOORE JAIN
• Application Number:
  US09/695,216
• Time in Patent Office: 4,871 Days
• Field of Search: 709/202, 709/217, 709/218, 709/219, 709/224, 709/200, 705/14.61, 705/14.68
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0246 Traffic
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement

Abstract

The present invention is a system, method and computer program product for tracking and measuring digital content that is distributed on a computer network such as the Internet. The system collects online advertisement data, analyzes the data, and uses the data to calculate measurements of the prevalence of those advertisements. The system processes raw traffic data by cleansing and summarizing the traffic data prior to storing the processed data in a database. An advertisement sampling system uses site selection and definition criteria and a probe map to retrieve Web pages from the Internet, extract advertisements from those Web pages, classify each advertisement, and store the data in a database. A statistical summarization system accesses the processed raw traffic data and the advertisement data in the database to calculate advertising prevalence statistics including the advertising frequency, impressions, and spending.

Claims

1. A system for estimating a number of times content has been accessed via a network, the system comprising:

an estimating device to determine an estimate of a number of times that a webpage has been accessed at a web server;

a prober to repeatedly send requests to the web server for the webpage and, in response, receive content files; and

a statistical summarization system including a processor to determine a number of times that a first content object is included in the content files received in response to the requests, determine a total number of the requests, and estimate a number of times that the first content object has been accessed by visitors of the webpage by;

determining a rotation rate for the first content object by dividing the number of times that the first content object was included in the content files received in response to the requests by the total number of the requests; and

determining the number of times that the first content object has been accessed by visitors by multiplying the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed by the rotation rate.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the estimating device is to receive the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed from at least one proxy cache server.

3. The system of claim 1, further comprising a sampling device that includes:

an extractor to locate a fragment of the webpage that includes the first content object; and

a classifier to perform a structural analysis of the fragment to classify the content.

4. A system as defined in claim 1, wherein at least a portion of the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed is received from a proxy.

5. A system as defined in claim 1, wherein the system comprises an advertising prevalence system.

6. A system as defined in claim 1, wherein at least a portion of the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed is received from at least one panelist computer.

7. A system as defined in claim 1, wherein the content object is an advertisement.

8. A method of estimating a number of times content has been accessed via a network, the method comprising:

repeatedly sending requests for a webpage and, in response, receiving content files;

determining a number of times that a first content object is included in the content files received in response to the requests; and

estimating, with a processor, a number of times that the first content object has been accessed by visitors of the webpage by;

determining a rotation rate for the first content object by dividing the number of times that the first content object was included in the content files received in response to the requests by a total number of the requests; and

determining the number of times that the first content object has been accessed by visitors by multiplying an estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed by the rotation rate.

9. A method as defined in claim 8, wherein at least a portion of the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed is received from a proxy.

10. A method as defined in claim 8, wherein the method is performed by an advertising prevalence system.

11. A method as defined in claim 8, wherein at least a portion of the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed is received from at least one panelist computer.

12. A method as defined in claim 8, wherein the content object is an advertisement.

13. A storage device or storage disk storing instructions that, when executed, cause a machine to at least:

repeatedly sending requests for a webpage;

determine a number of times that a first content object is included in content files received in response to the requests; and

estimate a number of times that the first content object has been accessed by visitors of the webpage by;

determining a rotation rate for the first content object by dividing the number of times that the first content object was included in the content files received in response to the requests by a total number of the requests; and

determining the number of times that the first content object has been accessed by visitors by multiplying an estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed by the rotation rate.

14. A storage device or storage disk as defined in claim 13, wherein at least a portion of the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed is received from a proxy.

15. A storage device or storage disk as defined in claim 13, wherein the instructions stored on the storage device or storage disk are to be executed by an advertising prevalence system.

16. A storage device or storage disk as defined in claim 13, wherein at least a portion of the estimate of the number of times that the webpage has been accessed is received from at least one panelist computer.

17. A storage device or storage disk as defined in claim 13, wherein the content object is an advertisement.