CONTEXTUAL BASED INFORMATION AGGREGATION SYSTEM

• US 20110314084A1
• Filed: 06/17/2010
• Published: 12/22/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 06/17/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Saretto, Cesare John, Somuah, Henry Hooper, Mulcahy, Kathleen P., Kinnebrew, Peter Tobias, Kamuda, Nicholas Ferianc, McCloskey, Matthew John, Hebenthal, Douglas C.
• Granted Patent: US 9,002,924 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• 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 30/0259 based on store location
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0261 based on user location
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0269 based on user profile or attribute
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• 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 21/44226 on social networks
• 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: H04W 4/023 using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/185 by embedding added-value information into content, e.g. geo-tagging
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/21 for social networking applications

Abstract

A system automatically and continuously finds and aggregates the most relevant and current information about the people and things that a user cares about. The information gathering is based on current context (e.g., where the user is, what the user is doing, what the user is saying/typing, etc.). The result of the context based information gathering is presented ubiquitously on user interfaces of any of the various physical devices operated by the user.

Claims

1. A method for delivering content, comprising:

receiving, at a server system, indications of topics of interest from a first client;

automatically gathering content about the topics in response to receiving the indications;

receiving context information at the server system from the client;

identifying a subset of the gathered content based on the received context information; and

reporting the identified subset of the gathered content.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the indications of topics are associated with a first user; and

the context information is associated with the first user.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein:

the reporting includes transmitting the identified subset of the gathered content to a second client that is a different type of device than the first client; and

the first client and the second client are associated with the first user.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein:

the gathering content includes determining information about one or more other users identified by the first user in one or more applications; and

the identifying a subset of the gathered content is performed in response to the context information and the information about one or more other users.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein:

the gathering content is performed without a request by the first user.

6. The method of claim 2, wherein:

the received context information includes an indication of a function being performed by the first user.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the gathering content includes identifying events relevant to one or more of the topics.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the indications of topics includes a photograph;

the gathering content includes automatically recognizing an object in the photographs, searching for information about that object using a network, and finding a retailer selling that object;

the contextual information includes a location of the client; and

the reporting includes identifying that the retailer is selling the object in proximity to the client.

9. A system that delivers content, comprising:

a first set of one or more computers comprising a radar service that is in communication with one or more clients, the first set of one or more computers receives indications of topics of interest and context information from a first client associated with a first user; and

a second set of one or more computers comprising an intelligence service that is in communication with the first set of one or more computers comprising the radar service, the second set of one or more computer stores one or more indexes of information available for aggregation, the first set of one or more computers uses the indications of topics of interest and the one or more indexes to automatically and continuously gather content about the topics of interest from the information available for aggregation, the first set of one or more computers filters the gathered content based on the context information and pushes that filtered content to a client for the first user.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein:

the client for the first user is the first client.

11. The system of claim 9, wherein:

the first set of one or more computers include a relevancy engine that participates in filtering the gathered content by assigning a relevancy score to the gathered content based on how pertinent the gathered content is to the context information.

12. The system of claim 9, wherein:

the first set of one or more computers include magnets, which are persistent and personalized software processes that automatically and continuously collect information about a topic of interest;

the magnets automatically and continuously gather the content about the topics of interest.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein:

the first set of one or more computers include one or more recommendation engines, the magnets use the recommendation engines to identify content via a network; and

the first set of one or more computers include a relevancy engine that participates in filtering the gathered content by assigning a relevancy score to the gathered content based on how pertinent the gathered content is to the context information.

14. The system of claim 12, wherein:

the second set of one or more computers include a public index about content available via a network, one or more private indices about content available via the network, a data structure for ads and offers, and user profile data; and

the magnets automatically and continuously gather the content about the topics of interest based on the public index, the one or more private indices, the data structure for ads and offers, and user profile data.

15. The system of claim 9, wherein:

the context information includes an indication of an action being performed by the first user.

16. The system of claim 9, wherein:

the context information includes intent of the first user derived from an inference based on an action of the first user.

17. The system of claim 9, wherein:

the context information includes location and time.

18. One or more processor readable storage devices having processor readable code embodied on the one or more processor readable storage devices, the processor readable code for programming one or more processors to perform a method for delivering data, the processor readable code comprises:

interface software code that interfaces with a plurality of clients for receiving context information, the interface software code receives first context information from a particular user about what the particular user is currently doing, the particular user is communicating with the interface code using a particular client of the plurality of clients;

first magnet software code that receives a first topic of interest from the particular user and continuously collects information about the first topic of interest via a network, the first magnet software code is persistent;

second magnet software code that receives a second topic of interest from the particular user and continuously collects information about the second topic of interest via the network, the second magnet software code is persistent;

filtering software code that filters information collected by the first magnet software code and the second magnet software code based on the first context information, the interface software code transmits at least a subset of the filtered information to the particular user.

19. The one or more processor readable storage devices of claim 18, wherein:

the first magnet software code receives additional information from the particular user and narrows its field of search in response.

20. The one or more processor readable storage devices of claim 18, wherein:

the first magnet software code interacts with the second magnet software code to identify content that is an intersection of the first topic of interest and the second topic of interest.