System and method of ad delivery

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10499100-B2
Application number	US-201614993515-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 12, 2016
Priority date	Jun 23, 2010
Publication date	Dec 3, 2019
Grant date	Dec 3, 2019

Abstract

A system that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, a device having a controller programmed to store a subscriber selectable preference for advertisements used for selecting advertisements to send to a set top box and receive a signal from a broadcast stream indicating the location for insertion of an advertisement based on the subscriber selectable preference. Other embodiments are disclosed.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method, comprising:
providing, by a system comprising a processing system including a processor, a graphical user interface for identifying advertisements for delivery to a communication device, wherein the graphical user interface enables the advertisements to be selected according to user preferences identified by ad selection information received using the graphical user interface, and wherein the user preferences are determined according to user input received via the graphical user interface;
initiating, by the system, storage of selected advertisements;
transmitting, by the system, a globally unique identifier (GUID) for the communication device to a billing server, wherein the GUID is distinct from the ad selection information, wherein the transmitting is performed upon initiation of the storage and responsive to the initiation of the storage;
forwarding, by the system, the ad selection information to the billing server;
splicing, by the system, the selected advertisements into a digital video stream comprising video content, wherein the digital video stream comprises a unicast stream directed to the communication device; and
providing, by the system, automated targeted advertisement delivery using the selected advertisements.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the billing server logs a subscriber based on the globally unique identifier of the communication device.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the selected advertisements are stored via indexing to the globally unique identifier.

4. The method of claim 2 , wherein the initiation of the storage of the selected advertisements is responsive to a selection from an advertisement catalog server.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the billing server logs the selection from the advertisement catalog server.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the automated targeted advertisement delivery is based on electronic programming guide information.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the electronic programming guide information is obtained from a network server of a service provider that provides communication services to the communication device.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein a subset of advertisements are filtered out of the advertisements identified by the graphical user interface based on purchased products or purchased services.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein a subset of advertisements are filtered out of the advertisements identified by the graphical user interface based on demographics associated with a user of the communication device.

10. The method of claim 1 , further comprising providing, by the system, the selected advertisements to the communication device using a unicast stream server.

11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising providing, by the system, a broadcast stream including cue tones to the communication device, wherein the selected advertisements are presented by the communication device responsive to the cue tones.

12. A non-transitory, machine-readable storage medium, comprising executable instructions that, when executed by a processing system including a processor, facilitate performance of operations, the operations comprising:
presenting a graphical user interface that describes a group of advertisements accessible via an advertisement catalog server;
receiving user input indicating a selection of an advertisement preference to obtain ad selection information, wherein a subset of advertisements is selected from the group of advertisements according to the selection of the advertisement preference;
forwarding the ad selection information to a billing server;
initiating storage of the subset of advertisements at a remote advertisement delivery server;
transmitting identification information for the remote advertisement delivery server to the billing server, wherein the identification information is distinct from the ad selection information, wherein the transmitting is performed upon the initiating of the storage and responsive to the initiating of the storage;
receiving a digital content stream via unicasting from a server, wherein the digital content stream comprises advertising segments spliced into the digital content stream;
extracting the advertising segments from the digital content stream; and
presenting the subset of advertisements at a display device according to the advertisement segments that are extracted by utilizing advertisement insertion points that are selected based on a target advertisement delivery policy.

13. The non-transitory, machine-readable storage medium of claim 12 , wherein the processor comprises a plurality of processors operating in a distributed processing environment.

14. The non-transitory, machine-readable storage medium of claim 12 , wherein the identification information enables the storage of the subset of advertisements indexed based on the identification information.

15. The non-transitory, machine-readable storage medium of claim 12 , wherein the advertisement insertion points are further based on electronic programming guide information that is obtained from a network server of a service provider that provides communication services.

16. The non-transitory, machine-readable storage medium of claim 12 , wherein the operations further comprise identifying cue tones in a broadcast stream, wherein the presenting of the subset of advertisements at the display device is according to the cue tones.

17. A billing server, comprising:
a memory to store executable instructions; and
a processing system including a processor communicatively coupled to the memory, wherein the processing system, responsive to executing the executable instructions, facilitates performance of operations, the operations comprising:
receiving, from an advertising server, identification information for a media device upon an initiation of storage of a subset of advertisements on the media device and responsive to the initiation of the storage of the subset of advertisements on the media device, wherein the storage of the subset of advertisements is initiated based on a user selection of an advertisement preference from a group of advertisements via a graphical user interface presented at the media device to obtain an ad selection information, wherein the advertising server selects the subset of advertisements from the group of advertisements according to the user selection of the advertisement preference;
logging the ad selection information, the identification information being distinct from the ad selection information; and
tracking advertisement segments presented at the media device, wherein the advertising server transmits to the media device a digital content stream including advertising segments spliced therein, wherein the media device presents the subset of advertisements at a display device according to the advertisement segments that are extracted from the digital content stream by the media device.

18. The billing server of claim 17 , wherein the identification information comprises a globally unique identifier of the media device, and wherein the processor comprises a plurality of processors operating in a distributed processing environment.

19. The billing server of claim 17 , wherein the operations further comprise logging the selection of the advertisement preference.

20. The billing server of claim 18 , wherein the operations further comprise logging a subscriber based on the globally unique identifier of the media device.

Assignees

• At & T Ip I Lp

Inventors

• Debois Dean
• Coppa Frank
• Wilson Brian

Classifications

• H04N21/44016

  involving splicing one content stream with another content stream, e.g. for substituting a video clip · CPC title

• H04N21/2543

  Billing {, e.g. for subscription services (payment schemes, architectures or protocols G06Q20/00; e-commerce G06Q30/00; arrangements for billing for the use of broadcast information or broadcast-related information H04H60/21)} · CPC title

• H04N21/4331

  Caching operations, e.g. of an advertisement for later insertion during playback · CPC title

• H04N21/2407

  Monitoring of transmitted content, e.g. distribution time, number of downloads (arrangements for monitoring programmes for broadcast or for distribution combined with broadcast H04H20/14) · CPC title

• G06Q30/0254

  based on statistics · CPC title