Broadcast of content data to geographic areas by devices

• US 9,730,016 B2
• Filed: 07/31/2015
• Issued: 08/08/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 07/31/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Oberbeck, John Woodbridge, Tawa, Jr., Roger
• Primary Examiner(s): SCHWARTZ, JOSHUA L
• Application Number:
  US14/814,897
• Publication Number:
  US 20170034654A1
• Time in Patent Office: 739 Days
• Field of Search: 4554041, 4554143, 4554563
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/18 for broadcast or conference , e.g. multicast
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1845 broadcast or multicast in a specific location, e.g. geocast protocols for adapting network applications to user terminal location H04L67/52; services specially adapted for wireless communication networks making use of the location of users or terminals H04W4/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/52 for supporting social networking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25841 involving the geographical location of the client retrieval from the Internet by querying based on geographical locations G06F16/9537; arrangements for identifying locations of receiving stations in broadcast systems H04H60/51; location of the user terminal in data switching networks 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 21/44213 Monitoring of end-user related data arrangements for monitoring the users' behaviour or opinions in broadcast systems H04H60/33
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6405 Multicasting data broadcast and multicast in packet switching networks H04L12/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/06 Selective distribution of broadcast services, e.g. multimedia broadcast multicast service [MBMS]; Services to user groups; One-way selective calling services

Abstract

Implementations generally relate to broadcast of content data to geographic areas by devices. In some implementations, a computer-implemented method to broadcast data includes obtaining an indication at a first device to broadcast a content post, determining a broadcast area based on a stored broadcast history for one or more previous content posts related to the content post, and broadcasting the content post. The broadcast is configured such that the content post is to be received by one or more receiving devices located in the broadcast area.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method to broadcast data, the method comprising:

obtaining an indication at a user device to broadcast a new content post;

determining a broadcast area for the new content post based on a stored broadcast history associated with one or more previous content posts related to the new content post, wherein the stored broadcast history indicates one or more previous geographical locations where the one or more previous content posts related to the new content post were previously received by one or more first mobile devices via one or more previous broadcasts, and wherein determining the broadcast area includes defining at least one of a geographical size and a geographical shape of the broadcast area based on the one or more previous geographical locations of the stored broadcast history where the one or more previous content posts were previously received; and

broadcasting the new content post, wherein the broadcasting is configured such that the new content post is to be received by one or more receiving devices located in the broadcast area.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the broadcast area defines a geographic area in which devices are eligible to receive the new content post, wherein the one or more previous content posts are a plurality of previous content posts, and wherein determining the broadcast area includes:

determining a resulting broadcast area that includes a combined area of a plurality of different broadcast areas associated with the plurality of previous content posts; and

determining the broadcast area based on the resulting broadcast area.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the stored broadcast history includes:

a user broadcast history of a user that indicates a first set of the one or more previous geographic locations where one or more previous user posts of the one or more previous content posts were initiated in an initial broadcast by the user and were re-broadcast by a first set of mobile devices of the one or more first mobile devices that received the one or more previous user posts in the initial broadcast; and

a topic broadcast history of one or more topics included in the new content post, wherein the topic broadcast history indicates a second set of the one or more previous geographic locations where one or more previous topic posts of the one or more previous content posts associated with least one of the one or more topics were re-broadcast by a second set of mobile devices of the one or more first mobile devices that received the one or more previous topic posts,

wherein the broadcast area is based on the user broadcast history and the topic broadcast history such that the broadcast area includes the first set of the one or more previous geographic locations and the second set of the one or more previous geographic locations.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more geographic locations are a plurality of different previous geographical locations, and wherein defining at least one of the geographical size and the geographical shape of the broadcast area includes defining the shape of the broadcast area to include the plurality of different previous geographical locations.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein determining the broadcast area includes:

determining the geographical size of the broadcast area based on a distance of a current geographical location of the user device to at least one of the one or more previous geographical locations, wherein the size of the broadcast area is determined to be a first size in response to the distance being a first distance, and the size of the broadcast area is determined to be a second size smaller than the first size in response to the distance being smaller than the first distance.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the stored broadcast history is a stored data broadcast history related to content data of the new content post, wherein the one or more previous content posts include at least a portion of content data similar to at least a portion of the content data of the new content post.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the content data includes one or more topics included in a text message input by a user, and the stored data broadcast history includes a stored topic broadcast history, and wherein determining the broadcast area includes:

referencing one or more stored region topics previously broadcast in a geographical region by a plurality of mobile user devices to other mobile user devices, wherein the geographical region includes a current geographical location of the user device;

determining that one or more topics in the new content post are similar to one or more corresponding region topics of the one or more stored region topics, wherein content posts associated with the one or more corresponding region topics were previously broadcast to one or more topic geographical locations by at least some of the plurality of mobile user devices; and

using one or more individual broadcast histories associated with the corresponding region topics to determine the broadcast area, wherein the broadcast area is defined to include the one or more topic geographical locations.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein determining the broadcast area includes using respective ranks of the one or more corresponding region topics to scale a size of the broadcast area, wherein the one or more stored region topics are ranked based at least in part on a number of times that the one or more stored region topics have been broadcast by the plurality of mobile user devices.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the stored broadcast history indicates the one or more previous geographical locations where the one or more previous content posts related to the new content post were previously received by the one or more first mobile devices and, after being previously received, were previously re-broadcast by the one or more first mobile devices to be received by one or more second mobile devices, and wherein determining the at least one of the geographical size and the geographical shape of the broadcast area is based on the one or more previous geographical locations where the one or more previous content posts were previously received by the one or more first mobile devices and were previously re-broadcast to be received by the one or more second mobile devices.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the one or more previous broadcasts are a plurality of previous broadcasts, the one or more previous content posts are a plurality of previous content posts, and the one or more previous geographical locations are a plurality of previous geographical locations, wherein the broadcast history is stored as one or more directed graphs of the plurality of previous geographical locations, wherein the one or more directed graphs indicate one or more directions of broadcast flow in the plurality of previous broadcasts of the plurality of previous content posts to the one or more first mobile devices and from the one or more first mobile devices to the one or more second mobile devices at the plurality of previous geographical locations.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the new content post is a user content post initiated by a user and includes content data provided by the user, wherein the stored broadcast history is a stored user broadcast history that indicates that the one or more previous content posts were initiated in the one or more previous broadcasts by the user in at least one previous geographical location of the one or more previous geographical locations, and wherein the one or more previous content posts are related to the new content post based on the user causing the one or more previous broadcasts of the one or more previous content posts to the one or more first mobile devices.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the one or more previous content posts are determined to be related to the new content post by having been previously broadcast from the at least one previous geographical location that is within a threshold distance of a current geographical location of the user device, wherein the new content post includes text content not in the one or more previous content posts.

13. A system to broadcast data, the system comprising:

a storage device; and

at least one processor operative to access the storage device and configured to;

receive a current content post in a received broadcast sent by a sending device and store the current content post in the storage device;

obtain an indication to broadcast the current content post;

determine a re-broadcast area based on a stored broadcast history associated with a user of the system, wherein the stored broadcast history indicates a plurality of different geographical locations at which one or more previous content posts were previously received by one or more previous receiving mobile devices via one or more previous broadcasts, wherein determining the re-broadcast area includes determining a geographical shape of the re-broadcast area, wherein the geographical shape is defined based on the plurality of different geographical locations; and

broadcast the current content post, wherein the broadcast is configured such that the current content post is receivable by one or more receiving devices located in the re-broadcast area.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the at least one processor is configured to determine the re-broadcast area based on the stored broadcast history for the one or more previous content posts that were sent in the one or more previous broadcasts initiated by the user of the system, wherein at least one of the plurality of different geographical locations is within a particular distance of a location from which the system initiated at least one previous broadcast of the one or more previous broadcasts.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the current content post includes a message that includes text that was input at the sending device the at least one processor is configured to receive the current content post in

the received broadcast that is a re-broadcast by the sending device based on a prior broadcast received by the sending device.

16. The system of claim 13, further comprising a display device, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause a display of the current content post by the display device,

wherein the stored broadcast history indicates the plurality of different geographic locations at which:

the one or more previous content posts were previously received by the one or more previous receiving mobile devices via the one or more previous broadcasts, and

the one or more previous content posts were previously re-broadcast by the one or more previous receiving mobile devices to one or more other mobile devices as commanded by respective users of the one or more previous receiving mobile devices.

17. The system of claim 13, wherein the at least one processor is configured to modify a size of the re-broadcast area from a first geographical area to a second geographical area based at least in part on an amount of the previous content posts that were initiated in a geographic region of the system by one or more initiating devices located in the geographic region, wherein the size is determined to be a first size in response to the amount of the previous content posts being a first amount, and the size is determined to be a second size larger than the first size in response to the amount of the previous content posts being larger than the first amount.

18. The system of claim 13, wherein the current content post is associated with a current broadcast history including one or more previous geographical locations at which the current content post was previously broadcast by one or more previous receiving devices, and wherein the at least one processor is further configured to:

store a current geographical location of the system in the current broadcast history of the current content post.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the at least one processor is configured to store the current broadcast history of the content post as a directed graph including the one or more previous geographical locations at which the current content post was previously broadcast by the one or more previous receiving devices, and wherein the at least one processor is configured to store the current geographic location of the system by adding the current geographical location as a node to the directed graph.

20. A non-transitory computer readable medium having stored thereon software instructions to implement broadcast of content data and, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform operations including:

receiving a command at a user device from a user to broadcast a current content post stored by the user device;

determining an initial broadcast area based on;

a) a stored user broadcast history of the user indicating a plurality of first previous geographical locations that define first broadcast areas in which a first set of previous content posts initiated by the user were received by one or more first mobile devices; and

b) a stored topic broadcast history indicating a plurality of second previous geographical locations that define second broadcast areas in which a second set of previous content posts were received by one or more second mobile devices as provided from one or more other user devices, wherein the second set of previous content posts includes content data topics that are included in the current content post,

wherein the initial broadcast area includes a combined area that is a combination of the first broadcast areas and the second broadcast areas; and

broadcasting the current content post, wherein the broadcasting is configured such that the current content post is receivable by one or more first devices in the initial broadcast area and is not receivable by one or more second devices not in the initial broadcast area.