Behavior based processing of content

• US 9,183,258 B1
• Filed: 02/10/2012
• Issued: 11/10/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 02/10/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Inventors: Taylor, Brett R., Keller, Kevin E., Hayden, Andrew
• Primary Examiner(s): Bates, Kevin
• Assistant Examiner(s): Rahman, S M
• Application Number:
  US13/371,309
• Time in Patent Office: 1,369 Days
• Field of Search: 709/246
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24578 using ranking
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents

Abstract

Various features are provided for assisting users in efficiently locating and viewing network content of interest, including but not limited to particular portions of web pages. The features are particularly useful for users of mobile computing devices having a limited display size, but may be used with any type of client device. Some features identify popular content items by collectively analyzing the interactive behaviors of a population of users, such as zooming interactions. The results of such analyzes can be used in various ways to improve users'"'"' browsing experiences. For example, popular content items can be highlighted on a web page, an option to zoom in automatically on popular content items can be provided, popular content items may be rendered at relatively high resolution, and caching of content items may be based partly on a measure of their popularity.

Claims

1. A system for popularity-based processing of network content, the system comprising:

a proxy server comprising hardware configured to execute specific instructions, the proxy server operable to;

receive, from a client computing device, a request for a content page;

retrieve the content page requested by the client computing device;

identify, based at least in part on prior user interactions with the content page, including zoom interactions in which users zoom-in on particular portions of the page, a portion of the content page that is unpopular relative to other portions of the content page; and

in response to identifying the relatively unpopular portion of the content page;

adjust a quality characteristic of the relatively unpopular portion, wherein adjusting the quality characteristic comprises generating a reduced-resolution representation of the relatively unpopular portion; and

transmit, to the client computing device, a modified version of the content page, the modified version comprising the reduced resolution representation of the relatively unpopular portion such that a page load time is reduced.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein adjusting the quality characteristic of the relatively unpopular portion of the content page comprises compressing the portion.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the relatively unpopular portion of the content page comprises a video, and wherein adjusting the quality characteristic of the portion of the content page comprises replacing the video with a still image.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the proxy server is configured to preserve a resolution of a relatively popular portion of the content page in generating the modified version of the content page.

5. The system of claim 1, the proxy server further operable to transmit all portions of the content page associated with a popularity level exceeding a threshold prior to transmitting any portions of the content page not associated with a popularity level exceeding a threshold.

6. The system of claim 1, the proxy server further operable to cache one or more portions of the content page based at least partly on determinations that popularity levels thereof exceed a threshold.

7. A computer-implemented method, comprising:

receiving interaction data reported by mobile computing devices of a plurality of users, the interaction data reflective of zooming actions performed by said users on a network-accessible content page, including zooming actions in which users zoom-in on particular portions of the page;

calculating, based at least partly on the content page zooming actions, respective popularity levels of each of a plurality of content items of the content page; and

controlling rendering of the content page for one or more users based at least partly on the calculated popularity levels of the content items, wherein controlling the rendering of the content page comprises reducing a resolution of a content item that, based on the calculated popularity levels, has a relatively low popularity level, and transmitting the reduced resolution content item to a user device, thereby enabling the user device to load the content page with a reduced page load time;

said method performed by a computing system that comprises one or more computing devices, said computing system being separate from the user device.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the popularity levels of the content items are calculated based additionally on eye tracking data reported by mobile computing devices of users.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the popularity levels of the content items are calculated based additionally on relationships between the content page and content pages previously accessed by the mobile computing devices.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the popularity levels of the content items are calculated based additionally on demographic data reported by the users of the mobile computing devices.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the content page is a dynamically generated content page whose content varies.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein controlling the rendering of the content page comprises preserving a resolution of at least some of the content items of the content page, such that the content page is rendered with less than all of the content items having a reduced resolution.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein controlling the rendering of the content page comprises excluding a content item based on a low popularity level of the content item.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein controlling the rendering comprises highlighting a most popular content item on the page.

15. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the interaction data reflective of zooming actions includes coordinates identifying portions of the content page to which users have zoomed.

16. The computer-implemented method of claim 15, further comprising correlating the coordinates to content items of the content page.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 16, wherein correlating the coordinates to content items comprises comparing the coordinates to a rendering of the content page.

18. A computer process, comprising:

monitoring zoom actions performed by each of a plurality of users on at least first and second portions of a content page, wherein monitoring said zoom actions comprises receiving zoom interaction data reported by mobile devices of said users;

determining, based on the monitored zoom actions of the plurality of users, that users zoom-in on the first portion of the content page more frequently than users zoom-in on the second portion of the content page; and

based at least partly on the determination that users zoom-in more frequently on the first portion than the second portion, causing the content page to be rendered on user devices with a quality level of the second portion reduced relative to a quality level of the first portion, wherein the reduced quality level of the second portion reduces a page load time experienced by users;

said process implemented programmatically by a computer system that operates as an intermediary between user devices and a source of the content page.

19. The computer process of claim 18, wherein causing the content page to be rendered with a quality level of the second portion reduced comprises reducing a resolution of an image.

20. The computer process of claim 18, wherein causing the content page to be rendered with a quality level of the second portion reduced comprises reducing a resolution of a video.

21. The computer process of claim 18, wherein causing the content page to be rendered with a quality level of the second portion reduced comprises omitting a content item from the second portion.

22. The computer process of claim 18, wherein causing the content page to be rendered with a quality level of the second portion reduced comprises replacing a video with an image.

23. The computer process of claim 18, wherein the method comprises determining popularity levels of the first and second portions of the content page based at least partly on the reported zoom interaction data, and using the popularity levels to select respective resolution levels for rendering the first and second portions.