MEDIA DELIVERY SYSTEM

• US 20090048908A1
• Filed: 10/23/2008
• Published: 02/19/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/31/2007
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Vulcan Ip Holdings Inc.
• Original Assignee: Vulcan Portals Incorporated
• Inventors: Garcia, Johann, Kaplan, Robert E., Arora, Ajay, Tanumihardja, Mars, Jayakody, Prasantha, Graham, Stuart
• Application Number:
  US12/257,161
• Publication Number:
  US 20090048908A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/10
• 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 30/0204 Market segmentation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0246 Traffic
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0272 Period of advertisement exposure
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/45 for identifying users
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/66 for using the result on distributors' side
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2387 Stream processing in response to a playback request from an end-user, e.g. for trick-play
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25891 being end-user preferences retrieval of video data in a video database based on user preferences G06F16/739; arrangements for recognizing users' preferences H04H60/46; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306; processing of user preferences or user profiles in wireless networks H04W8/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44218 Detecting physical presence or behaviour of the user, e.g. using sensors to detect if the user is leaving the room or changes his face expression during a TV program methods or arrangements for recognising human body or animal bodies or body parts G06V40/10; methods or arrangements for acquiring or recognising human faces, facial parts, facial sketches, facial expressions G06V40/16; methods or arrangements for recognising movements or behaviour G06V40/20; arrangements for identifying users in broadcast systems H04H60/45
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6582 Data stored in the client, e.g. viewing habits, hardware capabilities, credit card number arrangements where receivers interact with the broadcast H04H20/38
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/17318 Direct or substantially direct transmission and handling of requests

Abstract

A media delivery system that may be used for tracking the number and type of human impressions of media content rendered by the system during the time the media was rendered is provided. The media delivery system includes a rendering device for rendering media content, an environmental sensor for sensing impressions and other environmental variables and a computing device configured to gather data related to the external states detected by the environmental sensor. The data may be provided to a backend server for correlating the data to the rendered media content. The system may include rules that interpret that data and may cause the system to custom select, tailor or control future playback of media on the system.

Claims

1. A media delivery system comprising:

a media rendering device configured to render an instance of media content;

at least one environmental sensor positioned proximate the media rendering device and configured to detect an environmental state in proximity to the media rendering device;

an environmental data server coupled to the at least one environmental sensor and configured to gather environmental data using the at least one environmental sensor during rendering of the media content; and

a backend server coupled to receive the environmental data and configured to correlate the environmental data to the media content rendered on the media rendering device to generate data indicative of a number of impressions for the rendered media content.

2. The media delivery system of claim 1 wherein the backend server is coupled to be in communication with the environmental data server and receive the environmental data therefrom.

3. The media delivery system of claim 2 wherein the backend server is further coupled to be in communication with the media rendering device and receive data regarding the rendering of the media content.

4. The media delivery system of claim 1 wherein the environmental data server is further coupled to the media rendering device and configured to provide environmental data to the same.

5. The media delivery system of claim 1, further comprising a plurality of environmental data servers coupled to a respective environmental sensor and further coupled to the backend server, the back end server configured to be in communication with the plurality of environmental data servers and configured to aggregate the environmental data therefrom.

6. The media delivery system of claim 5 wherein the backend server is further configured to generate data indicative of a number of impressions for the rendering of media content from each of the plurality of environmental data servers.

7. The media delivery system of claim 1 wherein the backend server is configured to generate data indicative of at least one of human impressions, impression dwell time, tracking attention or length of time of attention.

8. The media delivery system of claim 1 wherein the environmental data server is configured to include data indicating transitions between and end and beginning of media content rendered by the media rendering device with the environmental data.

9. The media delivery system of claim 1 wherein the backend server is further configured to provide the media rendering device with rules governing rendering of media content by the media rendering device.

10. The media delivery system of claim 1 wherein environmental data server is included in the media rendering device.

11. A system for collecting impressions during rendering of media content by a media rendering device, comprising:

at least one environmental sensor configured to detect an environmental state proximate the media rendering device and generate signals in response thereto;

an environmental data server coupled to the at least one environmental sensor to receive the signals and configured to generate environmental data therefrom, the environmental data indicative of impressions occurring during rendering of media content; and

a backend server coupled to be in communication with the environmental data server to receive the environmental data, the backend server configured to correlate the environmental data to the rendered media content to provide impression data indicative of the number of impressions made during rendering of respective media content.

12. The system of claim 11 wherein the backend server is further configured to receive a playback history log of the rendering of media content by the media rendering device and correlate the impression data to the playback history log to calculate a number of impression made during the rendering of respective media content.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein the backend server is coupled to be in communication with the media rendering device and configured to receive the playback history log therefrom.

14. The system of claim 11, further comprising a sensor coupled to the environmental data server and configured to detect transitions between an end of a first media content and the beginning of a second media content and provide indication of the transition detection to the environmental data server.

15. The system of claim 11 wherein the environmental data server is coupled to be in communication with a time server providing time information to the media rendering device, the environmental data server configured to utilize the time information of the time server to synchronize with the media rendering device.

16. The system of claim 11 wherein the backend server is configured to be in communication with a plurality of environmental data servers and further configured to aggregate the environmental data from the plurality of environmental data servers.

17. The system of claim 16 wherein the backend server is configured to process the environmental data from the plurality of environmental data servers and monitor a count of impressions for a particular media content rendered on a plurality of different media rendering devices.

18. A method for collecting data indicative of a number of impressions made during rendering of media content by a media rendering device, the method comprising:

sensing at least one environmental state in proximity of the media rendering device during rendering of media content;

generating environmental data corresponding to detected environmental states;

providing the environmental data to a backend server;

processing the environmental data to provide impression data indicative of a number of impressions detected during rendering of the media content; and

correlating the impression data to rendering information associated with the media content to calculate a number of impressions made during rendering of respective media content.

19. The method of claim 18 wherein providing the environmental data to a backend server comprises providing the environmental data from a environmental data server coupled to a sensor located in proximity to the media rendering device.

20. The method of claim 18 wherein providing the environmental data to a backend server comprises providing the environmental data from the media rendering device.

21. The method of claim 18, further comprising receiving the rendering information at the backend server from the media rendering device.

22. The method of claim 18, further comprising detecting end-beginning transitions of the rendered media content and providing data indicative of the detected transitions to the backend server.

23. The method of claim 18, further comprising providing the environmental data to the media rendering device.

24. The method of claim 18, further comprising synchronizing time information related to the environmental data and the rendering of the media content.

25. The method of claim 24 wherein synchronizing time information comprises receiving time information from a common time server.