System and method for preferred placement programming of iTV content

• US 8,943,533 B2
• Filed: 05/31/2012
• Issued: 01/27/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 09/19/2002
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Comcast Cable Communications Management LLC (Comcast Corporation)
• Original Assignee: TVWorks LLC (Comcast Corporation)
• Inventors: de Andrade, David, Carney, John, Moreau, Samuel, Singer, Tyson, Ganapavarapu, Srikanth
• Primary Examiner(s): Goodarzi, Nasser
• Assistant Examiner(s): HONG, MICHAEL HYUN
• Application Number:
  US13/484,425
• Publication Number:
  US 20120246682A1
• Time in Patent Office: 971 Days
• Field of Search: 725/32, 725/42
• US Class Current: 725/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25808 Management of client data terminal profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/303
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25866 Management of end-user data customer care in data networks H04L41/5077
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/262 Content or additional data distribution scheduling, e.g. sending additional data at off-peak times, updating software modules, calculating the carousel transmission frequency, delaying a video stream transmission, generating play-lists scheduling strategies for dispatcher in multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/4881; arrangements for scheduling broadcast services or broadcast-related services H04H60/06; flow control in packet networks H04L47/10; establishing a time schedule or organising the servicing of application requests H04L67/62
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/26241 involving the time of distribution, e.g. the best time of the day for inserting an advertisement or airing a children program
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2668 Creating a channel for a dedicated end-user group, e.g. insertion of targeted commercials based on end-user profiles information retrieval from the Internet by querying with filtering and personalisation G06F16/9535; arrangements for replacing or switching information during the broadcast H04H20/10; push services over packet-switching network H04L12/1859; adaptation of message content in packet-switching networks H04L51/063
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4316 for displaying supplemental content in a region of the screen, e.g. an advertisement in a separate window
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47 End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47202 for requesting content on demand, e.g. video on demand
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4725 using interactive regions of the image, e.g. hot spots details of information retrieval from the Internet by using URLs G06F16/955; processing chained hypermedia data for information retrieval G06F16/94
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4828 for searching program descriptors retrieval of video data G06F16/739
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/488 Data services, e.g. news ticker systems specially adapted for using meteorological information in broadcast systems H04H60/71
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8126 involving additional data, e.g. news, sports, stocks, weather forecasts
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/84 Generation or processing of descriptive data, e.g. content descriptors systems specially adapted for using meta-information in broadcast systems H04H60/73
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8543 using a description language, e.g. Multimedia and Hypermedia information coding Expert Group [MHEG], eXtensible Markup Language [XML] information retrieval of semistructured data, the underlying structure being taken into account, e.g. mark-up language structure data G06F16/80
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/45 Picture in picture , e.g. displaying simultaneously another television channel in a region of the screen

Abstract

Preferred placement of programming content is provided by a system and method to organize or sequence the display of a set of programmable content elements of an iTV application to a viewer, using business rules that describe the preferred placement conditions or criteria. Such criteria include brand, content owner, application location, current channel, current channel family, current channel category, time of day, content category, current program, current program genre, current iTV application, current content type, and/or subscriber and set-top box profile and behavior data. In one implementation, the present invention allows for managing the ‘shelf space’ within and for iTV applications.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

accessing, by a computing device, content placement rules that (a) describe conditions for placement of content elements within a user interface of an interactive television (iTV) application at defined locations along multiple dimensions and (b) prioritize placement of one of the content elements at one of the defined locations relative to the placement of other content elements at other ones of the defined locations;

placing, at one or more of the defined locations, one or more of the content elements based on an identification of a reference to a definition of a programming campaign that includes a key for uniquely identifying the programming campaign, a listing of candidate content elements, and at least one rule for selecting the one or more of the content elements from the candidate content elements; and

storing to a computer readable memory the user interface, which includes the one or more of the content elements placed at the one or more of the defined locations.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the content placement rules comprise rules adapted to control placement of tiles within tiled user interfaces, rules adapted to permit groupings of the tiles within the tiled user interfaces, and rules adapted to permit transitions between the grouping of the tiles within the tiled user interfaces.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein placing the one or more of the content elements is conditioned by parameters within the content placement rules that include one or more of:

current application, application type, location, time-of-day, day part, current channel, current network family, current channel category, current program, current program genre, current program attributes, current content type, or application data.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein placing the one or more of the content elements is conditioned on subscriber profile attributes including one or more of:

demographics, service tier, geography, or subscriber behavior.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the content placement rules prioritize the placement of each of the content elements according to pay-for-placement criteria.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the content placement rules prioritize the placement of each of the content elements according to one or more of:

brand, content owner, application location, current channel, current channel family, current channel category, time of day, content category, current program, current program genre, current iTV application, current content type, subscriber profile, set-top box profile, or subscriber behavior data.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the defined locations include tiles reserved for advertisements.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the conditions for placement of the content elements within the user interface includes time shifting so as to present different elements within the defined locations based on a time of day.

9. An apparatus, comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more computer readable storage media storing instructions configured to, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the apparatus to;

access content placement rules that (a) describe conditions for placement of content elements within a user interface of an interactive television (iTV) application at defined locations along multiple dimensions and (b) prioritize placement of one of the content elements at one of the defined locations relative to the placement of other content elements at other ones of the defined locations,

place, at one or more of the defined locations, one or more of the content elements based on an identification of a reference to a definition of a programming campaign that includes a key for uniquely identifying the programming campaign, a listing of candidate content elements, and at least one rule for selecting the one or more of the content elements from the candidate content elements, and

store to a computer readable memory the user interface, which includes the one or more of the content elements placed at the one or more of the defined locations.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the content placement rules comprise rules adapted to control placement of tiles within tiled user interfaces, rules adapted to permit groupings of the tiles within the tiled user interfaces, and rules adapted to permit transitions between the grouping of the tiles within the tiled user interfaces.

11. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein placing the one or more of the content elements is conditioned by parameters within the content placement rules that include one or more of:

current application, application type, location, time-of-day, day part, current channel, current network family, current channel category, current program, current program genre, current program attributes, current content type, or application data.

12. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein placing the one or more of the content elements is conditioned on subscriber profile attributes including one or more of:

demographics, service tier, geography, or subscriber behavior.

13. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the content placement rules prioritize the placement of each of the content elements according to pay-for-placement criteria.

14. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the content placement rules prioritize the placement of each of the content elements according to one or more of:

brand, content owner, application location, current channel, current channel family, current channel category, time of day, content category, current program, current program genre, current iTV application, current content type, subscriber profile, set-top box profile, or subscriber behavior data.

15. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the defined locations include tiles reserved for advertisements.

16. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the conditions for placement of the content elements within the user interface includes time shifting so as to present different elements within the defined locations based on a time of day.

17. One or more non-transitory computer readable storage media storing instructions configured to, when executed, cause an apparatus to:

access content placement rules that (a) describe conditions for placement of content elements within a user interface of an interactive television (iTV) application at defined locations along multiple dimensions and (b) prioritize placement of one of the content elements at one of the defined locations relative to the placement of other content elements at other ones of the defined locations,

place, at one or more of the defined locations, one or more of the content elements based on an identification of a reference to a definition of a programming campaign that includes a key for uniquely identifying the programming campaign, a listing of candidate content elements, and at least one rule for selecting the one or more of the content elements from the candidate content elements; and

store to a computer readable memory the user interface, which includes the one or more of the content elements placed at the one or more of the defined locations.

18. The one or more non-transitory computer readable storage media of claim 17, wherein the content placement rules comprise rules adapted to control placement of tiles within tiled user interfaces, rules adapted to permit groupings of the tiles within the tiled user interfaces, and rules adapted to permit transitions between the grouping of the tiles within the tiled user interfaces.

19. The one or more non-transitory computer readable storage media of claim 17, wherein the content placement rules prioritize the placement of each of the content elements according to pay-for-placement criteria.

20. The one or more non-transitory computer readable storage media of claim 17, wherein the defined locations include tiles reserved for advertisements.

21. A method, comprising:

accessing, by a computing device, content placement rules that (a) describe conditions for placement of content elements within a user interface of an interactive television (iTV) application at defined locations along multiple dimensions and (b) prioritize placement of one of the content elements at one of the defined locations relative to the placement of other content elements at other ones of the defined locations;

placing, at one or more of the defined locations, one or more of the content elements based on an identification of a reference to a definition of a programming campaign that includes a key for uniquely identifying the programming campaign, a listing of candidate content elements, and at least one rule for selecting the one or more of the content elements from the candidate content elements; and

outputting the user interface, which includes the one or more of the content elements placed at the one or more of the defined locations.