Situational decision engine and method for contextual user experience

• US 8,175,990 B1
• Filed: 01/04/2008
• Issued: 05/08/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 01/04/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: iLoop Mobile, Inc.
• Inventors: Hodjat, Babak, Chaddha, Parmeet, Hodjat, Siamak
• Primary Examiner(s): Gaffin, Jeffrey A
• Assistant Examiner(s): KENNEDY, ADRIAN L
• Application Number:
  US11/969,813
• Time in Patent Office: 1,586 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 706/45
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 5/04 Inference or reasoning models

Abstract

A situational decision engine (SDE) operates within a mobile device or server to present a user with display content specifically optimized to the user'"'"'s present situation. By acquiring characteristics about the user'"'"'s present situation, the SDE is capable of analyzing the general state of the user and make decisions about presenting information with situational relevance. With the SDE, promoters and marketing firms may target user incentives and present the incentives based on a correlation of incentive features and the users context. After acquiring key characteristics of a user'"'"'s context, the SDE analyzes and determines an optimal correlation to available incentives. By optimizing the matching of a promotion, an ad, or a survey to the user'"'"'s situation, maximum benefit to both user and the promoter may be realized. By analyzing a user'"'"'s context and presenting display content accordingly, the SDE is able to optimize the user'"'"'s experience.

Claims

1. A method of inducing selection of a target situation comprising:

acquiring a situational characteristic of a first user'"'"'s general state;

storing the situational characteristic in a computer-readable medium as an element of a computational system;

identifying a user situation corresponding to the situational characteristic of the first user'"'"'s general state;

identifying a position in a scenario associated with the identified user situation;

calculating a likelihood of the first user selecting a next situation in the scenario;

evaluating a next situation with a maximal likelihood of being selected; and

displaying, on a user-readable screen, an incentive corresponding to the next situation with the maximal likelihood of being selected.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

acquiring at least one further situational characteristic of the first user'"'"'s general state;

storing the at least one further situational characteristic in a computer-readable medium as an element of a computational system;

defining a new situational characteristic based on combining aspects of the situational characteristic and the at least one further situational characteristic;

generating a new situation comprising the new situational characteristic; and

displaying the new situation on a user-readable screen, the new situational characteristic being a component of the new situation displayed.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

generating a first aspect of a trigger context associated with the new situation and corresponding to the new situational characteristic;

calculating a correspondence of the trigger context with the situational characteristic of the first users general state;

generating at least one further aspect of the trigger context based on the calculated correspondence and in association with the new situation;

evaluating a display-relevance of the new situation based on the trigger context; and

displaying, on a user-readable screen, the new situation based on the display- relevance evaluation.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

positioning the new situation within a scenario based on the trigger context;

and

measuring a semantic proximity of key words within a present display content to the new situational characteristic of the new situation.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising inputting, by the first user, characteristics relating to a present general state.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

saving a present situational characteristics of the first user as an historical situational characteristic in a database;

retrieving the historical situational characteristic of the first user from the database;

analyzing a correlation between the historical situational characteristic and a characteristic of a next situation in the scenario;

inhibiting a probability of a situation being selected by the first user;

learning an association and probability of the historical situational characteristic and a situational characteristic corresponding to a potential next situation;

producing a new situation based on learning the association of the historical situational characteristic with the potential next situation characteristic;

generating a new scenario based on the new situation produced;

evaluating a usage statistic relating to the historical situational characteristic and a transition between an associated situation; and

reporting the historical situational characteristic and the usage statistic.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

selecting a next page to be included within a sequence of pages presented in an application based on the identified user situation;

acquiring situational characteristics corresponding to a plurality of users;

identifying a portion of the plurality of users with a high correlation of situational characteristics with a target situation; and

launching an application to the identified portion of the plurality of users.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

acquiring a plurality of situational characteristics of a general state of a plurality of other user'"'"'s;

evaluating a correlation of the plurality of situational characteristics with the situational characteristic of the first user'"'"'s general state; and

identifying one of the plurality of other users with maximal correlation of at least one situational characteristic with the user'"'"'s general state.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

acquiring content submitted by a second user, the content corresponding to a situation of the second users;

extracting a second-user situational characteristic corresponding to the second user'"'"'s situation;

evaluating a correlation between the second-user situational characteristic and the situational characteristic of the first user'"'"'s general state; and

displaying the content submitted by the second user.