METHODS AND APPARATUS TO COLLECT BROADBAND MARKET DATA

• US 20100191577A1
• Filed: 10/09/2009
• Published: 07/29/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/29/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: The Nielsen Company LLC (MOOD Media Corporation)
• Original Assignee: The Nielsen Company LLC (MOOD Media Corporation)
• Inventors: Baccelli, Jerome, Fry, Ranney, Lu, Shi
• Granted Patent: US 8,280,996 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/7.32
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0203 Market surveys; Market polls
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services

Abstract

Example methods and apparatus to collect broadband market data are disclosed. A disclosed example method includes selecting a panelist household, the panelist household subscribing to at least one broadband service delivered via a modem, and identifying an Internet protocol (IP) address assigned to the modem by an Internet service provider (ISP). The example method also includes retrieving a range of IP addresses associated with the ISP, selecting a random subset of IP addresses from the range of IP addresses, and testing each of the IP addresses from the random subset to determine an activity status of each IP address.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method to identify an Internet protocol (IP) address activity status, comprising:

selecting a panelist household, the panelist household subscribing to at least one broadband service delivered via a modem;

identifying an IP address assigned to the modem by an Internet service provider (ISP);

retrieving a range of IP addresses associated with the ISP;

selecting a random subset of IP addresses from the range of IP addresses; and

testing each of the IP addresses from the random subset to determine an activity status of each IP address.

2. A method as defined in claim 1, wherein retrieving the range of IP addresses comprises querying a registry database with the identified IP address associated with the modem.

4. A method as defined in claim 2, further comprising:

providing the registry database with an organization keyword to retrieve a seed IP address associated with the organization; and

selecting the range of IP addresses based on the seed IP address.

5. A method as defined in claim 1, further comprising saving the range of IP addresses to a market information database to allow iterative IP address testing without additional registry queries.

10. A method as defined in claim 1, wherein testing each of the IP addresses further comprises querying a registry to identify an organization associated with the IP address.

11. A method as defined in claim 10, further comprising performing a reverse resolve to identify whether the identified organization is an end-user of the IP address.

12. A method as defined in claim 11, further comprising parsing results from the reverse resolve to match a plurality of labels with at least one resolution keyword, the at least one resolution keyword to identify the end-user.

13. A method as defined in claim 12, further comprising identifying a threshold number of label matches to confirm the identified end-user.

15. A method as defined in claim 1, wherein testing each of the IP addresses further comprises performing a multi-hop trace-route to identify a plurality of multi-hop router names and derive a location associated with each of the identified IP address.

16. A method as defined in claim 15, further comprising comparing each of the plurality of multi-hop router names returned from the multi-hop trace-route to confirm a common last-hop router.

17. A method as defined in claim 16, further comprising extracting a label indicative of a geographic location from the router names.

18. A method as defined in claim 16, further comprising comparing the label indicative of the geographic location with a resolution keyword to confirm the geographic location of the identified IP address.

3. (canceled)

6-9. -9. (canceled)

14. (canceled)

19. An apparatus to identify an activity status of an Internet protocol (IP) address, comprising:

a test manager to select a panelist household and identify an IP address assigned to a household modem;

a registry manager to retrieve a range of IP addresses registered by an Internet service provider (ISP), the identified IP address within the retrieved range of IP addresses; and

an activity determiner to identify whether each IP address in the range of IP addresses is active or inactive.

20. An apparatus as defined in claim 19, wherein the activity determiner comprises a ping manager to send at least one echo request to the identified IP address and to receive at least one echo return from the identified IP address to confirm an activity status.

21. An apparatus as defined in claim 19, wherein the activity determiner comprises a port scan manager to initiate at least one port scan to the identified IP address to confirm an activity status.

22. An apparatus as defined in claim 19, wherein the registry manager queries a registry database with an organization name to retrieve the range of IP addresses associated with the organization name.

23. An apparatus as defined in claim 19, further comprising a hostname resolver to reverse resolve each IP address in the range of IP addresses, the reverse resolve generating a corresponding hostname for each IP address.

24. An apparatus as defined in claim 23, further comprising a resolution keyword table including a plurality of resolution keywords associated with a plurality of Internet service providers, the hostname resolver to compare the plurality of resolution keywords to the corresponding hostname for each IP address.

25. A method to calculate broadband market statistics, comprising:

selecting an Internet protocol (IP) address;

reverse resolving the selected IP address to obtain a domain name associated with the IP address;

parsing the domain name to extract a plurality of domain labels;

comparing the plurality of labels to a plurality of resolution keywords to identify an owner of the IP address; and

calculating a broadband market statistic based on the identified owner of the IP address.

26. A method as defined in claim 25, wherein selecting the IP address further comprises retrieving a panelist household IP address.

27-45. -45. (canceled)