MX2014014279A - Third party server for verifying inventory splits. - Google Patents

Abstract

A method and system for verifying inventory splits is disclosed. A server retrieves from a memory a first inventory policy provided by a first content provider. The server retrieves from the memory a second inventory policy provided by the second content provider. The server verifies that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy are in agreement for at least one stipulation pertaining to a percentage of compensation to the first content provider for inventory owned by the first content provider and played by the second content provider. The server transmits the first inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the second content provider. The server transmits the second inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the first content provider.

Description

THIRD-PARTY SERVER TO VERIFY INVENTORY DIVISIONS DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates generally to video networks of service providers, and more particularly to a method and system for verifying inventory divisions.

Web pages connected to the Internet can be configured to provide advertising placement opportunities. When an Internet user accesses a commercial Web site, the user can be welcomed with an ad in a pop-up window, portions of the display screen occupied by fixed or animated advertisements, sliding ribbons, or fixed or mobile advertisements that appear when the user clicks on links or takes steps in a purchase. Advertising opportunities appear based on the user's space, time, content and context and can be highly non-linear (that is, the user chooses to start the reproduction of the content and in response to content starts).

Traditionally, broadcast programming and cable television and radio, include content (ie, the video or audio program) and (the placement of) advertisements in a stream of video or audio signals, have followed a linear model. The programming can be linear in the sense that a program starts and transmits and advances when a user chooses to watch the entertainment content. Figure 1 illustrates a conventional linear video-on-demand (VOD) model to place an advertisement. The entertainment content 2, when processed as digital data streams over a cable network, can be divided into a number of time slots. The 4 time intervals include time reserved for a viewed program (content), such as "Golden Girls". The intervals 6, 8, 9 represent sections of time reserved for advertisements or "available". These "available" can be seen as advertising placement opportunities. As used herein, a "placement opportunity" was traditionally called an available and is sometimes referred to as a space in which a commercial will be inserted (for example, an advertisement or content). A placement opportunity (PO) is a construction that represents an opportunity to insert an advertisement or entertainment content, and defines the rules for this opportunity, such as its duration, interactivity, ownership, and technical constructions.

As used herein, a "commercial" is an advertisement placed on a placement opportunity.

As used herein, the term "linkage" refers to an identification of signals and content within a placement opportunity (PO). POs are often created for large amounts of content that have not been published yet (that is, any program on the TNT network in the afternoon). When programs are aired and a signal is detected, the signal is linked to the relevant POs for that program.

As used herein, the term "impact" refers to a demonstration of an advertisement for a single viewer. For example, if a 30-second commercial is placed on 50,000 video-on-demand (VOD) streams and it is known that 30,000 of the streams actually reproduced the ad, then 30,000 impacts of that ad have been generated.

As used herein, a "status notification" may be, but is not limited to, an HTTP call from a VOD server with a unique ID that is created when a decision is distributed.

As used herein, the term "pause" refers to all space in a stream between entertainment content. For example, a group of 4 consecutive commercials of 30 seconds between 2 segments of "Two and a Half Men" can be considered as a single break.

As used herein, an estimated starting location of a pause in a signal stream is referred to as a signal point. In the context of ad placement, these signal points may be referred to as ad signal points advertising In non-linear systems, such as video-on-demand (VOD), intervals 6, 8, 9 may take on new relevance. Interval 6 is called a prior advertising video, that is, the space in a video that occurs immediately after a user clicks to start a VOD video. The interval 9 is known as a subsequent advertising video, that is, the space after all segments of the VOD video have finished playing. The intervals 8 may be intermediate advertising videos, ie, mini-pauses in the middle of a VOD video, or may be interstitial, ie, capsule-like locations among the consecutive VOD video segments. VOD ad placement opportunities can appear based on the user's space, time, content, and context and can be highly nonlinear (ie, the user chooses to start content playback and in response, the content starts) . All of the intervals 6, 8, 9 in such playlists are ready for the insertion of advertisements, i.e., advertisement placement opportunities.

In the traditional model for the placement of advertisements in television programming, the available spaces are specified by a simple combination of channel and time and are decided with weeks in advance of the broadcast. However, new distribution systems of cable content allow advertising commercials of variable duration, allow different levels of interactivity (for example, vote or link) through the use of buttons in a remote control, can be defined by geography, etcetera, in a world where the Watching television is becoming increasingly non-linear (for example, video-on-demand (VOD), network-based personal video recorders (PVR), interactive programs), a key goal of ad opportunity placement systems is determine how to define placement opportunities that are not deterministic and are manifested dynamically. Advanced advertising needs to accommodate ad placement opportunities that are invoked by user events, which can include anything from playing a VOD title to pausing one's DVR. As the spread of potential placement opportunities expand accordingly, it becomes necessary to define precisely those placement opportunities with attributes that represent relevant business rules. These can be used to specify such things as inventory divisions, quantity, duration and placement of ad breaks. (previous video, intermediate video, later video); placing pauses of advertisements and overlays; and levels and types of interactivity.

On the Internet, a content publisher and a Advertiser can be isolated from each other, with an advertising network acting as an intermediary. On television, the advertising network was the former national network, the cable network or the cable operator that had fixed spaces available. However, the emerging advanced advertising standards for dynamic television provide an opportunity for content providers to derive value from a cable operator's ad placement infrastructure by creating a new and more flexible ad inventory (it is say, potential audience * placement opportunities. = Inventory of advertisements). This new business model imposes unique technical challenges: unlike the Internet, where the browser accesses / displays the content and then is "referenced" separately to a shared ad network, the cable television infrastructure selects and It assembles both the advertisement and the content together in the network and distributes the combined result to the client's converter-decoder box. For this to work, advanced cable television advertising networks can operate at least partially within the infrastructure of a multiple system / service operator (MSO - a cable TV organization that owns more than one cable system and can provide broadband Internet service). To achieve a Optimal addressing and user experience and achieving bandwidth efficiency, advertising service elements and digital distribution components need to be located near the edge of a network, ie in or near converter-decoder boxes. They need to make decisions based on the relevant context (infrastructure, platform, content, geography, demographics, etc.), which can also be applied to non-advertising ads (for example suggested content). By making insertion placement decisions at the time of a user request - or even at appropriate times during content playback - the fully dynamic ad placement can be achieved.

Figure 2 depicts a configuration of a conventional Internet-based cable television infrastructure 200 for making the decision to place advertising on streams of signals for both of an MSO 202a (e.g., Comcast) and a network provider 202b ( for example, "ABC") each one providing Internet television. Unlike the Internet, where browsers access / display content and are then "referenced" separately to a shared advertising network, Internet-based television infrastructure 200 selects and assembles both the advertisement and the content together and distributes the combined result to the "smart appliances" 204a-204n of the clients (for example, televisions ready for the Internet, radios, smartphones, tablet computers, PC, etc.).

Intelligent apparatuses 204a-204n, such as Internet-ready televisions, have become capable of receiving content from Internet transmission services, such as Netflix movies, Pandora radio, etc., over WiFi or direct Ethernet connections. When a user clicks on an icon for an "application" that appears on a television corresponding to one of these services, the content is transmitted to the intelligent apparatus 204a-204n from a content distribution network (CDN) 206a, 206b directly to the application running on the intelligent apparatus 204a-204n without the need for a converter-decoder box.

A converter-decoder box can be configured to decode an analogous representation of two states of a digital signal, as is known in the art, which is continuously transmitted and inserted into the converter-decoder box through a broadcast facility on a coaxial or fiber optic cable and the converter-decoder box tune the channel and display the content. When a user observes program content distributed over the Internet, a browser within the 204a-204n intelligent device will search video in fragments of time predetermined - usually two sometimes three, sometimes fragments of ten seconds. The searched video fragments are perfectly linked together dynamically in the application software of the intelligent apparatus 204a-204n and are then displayed in a manner that resembles a continuous video in the intelligent apparatus 204a-204n.

The MSO 202a or network 202b may wish to re-broadcast video streams in intelligent apparatus. Unfortunately, every connected device, including smart devices, needs to get the video in the format it can consume. Apple, Microsoft, Adobe, etc., have very specific and incompatible formats. To overcome this problem, each of these companies has constructed facilities called content distribution networks (CDN) 206a-206b where a "converter-decoder box" for each channel is configured to receive broadcasts from satellites 208a, 208b. A signal received by a "converter-decoder box" of upstream devices 210a, 210b communicatively connected to satellites 208a, 208b is powered by transcoders 212a, 212b to place the signal in a desired format and fragment the formatted signal into the default data segments (for example, 2 seconds). These segments are often stored in CDN 206a, 206b in server farms located in the vicinity of where the content will be distributed.

MSO 202a and Content Networks 202b often share advertising or inventory spaces in a video stream. As described in the above, placement opportunities in widespread streams can be delineated by different commercials in 30 seconds where each owner can place an advertisement from their own business environment. In Streams of Single Diffusion where the same video can be observed by multiple parties, the placement opportunities can be "divided" between one or more MSO 202a and / or Content Networks 202b according to the percentages agreed in the above. These so-called "percentage divisions" or "inventory divisions" can be agreed by the MSO 202a and the Content Network 202b (for example, 20% for the MSO), where, for example, an MSO 202a can be granted the 20% of the available spaces.

During the distribution of the content (for example, video, audio, data, etc.), advertisements can be inserted dynamically within the content in certain locations in the content called pauses of advertisements. The routers 214a, 214b of content providers under the control of an associated advertisement service (ADS) 216a, 216b dynamically inserts the advertisements in the content provided by the CDN 206a, 206b prior to distribution to the devices 204a, 204n smart.

If a service provider is an MSO 202a, such as Comcast, the MSO 202a can provide the consumer with an application (hereinafter an "app") to allow viewing of the content from a plurality of networks (eg, ABC) . When a consumer "clicks" on a Comcast app icon, the consumer can see, after registering in the Comcast app, all of the content provided by Comcast, including, but not limited to, ABC. When the consumer "clicks" on an app icon provided directly by a content network 202b (eg, ABC), the consumer, after registering in the ABC app, can see the ABC network content provided in a way personalized, but still the same content provided with the Comcast app. The registration information allows CDNs 206a, 206b to identify an account to give credit to the customer that plays content and advertisements to generate revenue.

Although ABC, in effect, ignores Comcast, the ABCs may not harm your relationship with Comcast or affiliates. Therefore, ABC can compensate Comcast even when a user sees ABC on the ABC app application instead of the Comcast app.

Both Comcast and ABC can have similar data paths across the computer and the Internet, but the ABC data path can ignore the associated 204rd CDN with Comcast to a second CDN 204b associated with ABC that may be a bit further away from Comcast's 204d CDN. The user also registers in the content provider 214b associated with ABC instead of the provider 214a router associated with Comcast. The ADS 212a used for dynamic ad insertion for the Comcast data path can be coded to provide a 20 percent inventory split between Comcast and ABC. The ADS 216b used for dynamic ad insertion for the ABC data path can be coded to initially provide a 0 percent inventory split between Comcast and ABC. However, Comcast may believe that it is entitled to the same 20% split or at least a 10% split using its own ADS 216a.

Because the ADS 216a and the ADS 216b can not "see" each other, divisions may be less advantageous for a party (for example, ABC may be willing to provide Comcast with a 20% inventory split, but only during schedules not stellar).

Therefore, what could be desired, but not yet provided, is a system and method for managing and verifying inventory divisions.

The problems described in the above are addressed and a technical solution in the art is achieved by providing a method and system for verifying inventory divisions. A server retrieves from a memory a first inventory policy provided by a first content provider. The server retrieves from memory a second inventory policy provided by the second content provider. The server verifies that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy are in accordance with at least one stipulation that belongs to a percentage of compensation for the first content provider by the inventory owned by the first content provider and reproduced by the second content provider The server transmits the first inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the second content provider. The server transmits the second inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the first content provider.

In one embodiment, the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy may include, for example, placement preferences, ad loads, and inventory divisions.

In one example, before transmitting the first inventory policy to a second content provider, the server can receive authorization from the first inventory policy from the second content provider. Before transmitting the second inventory policy to the first Content provider, the server can receive authorization from the second inventory policy from the first content provider.

In one example, at least one stipulation pertaining to a compensation percentage may comprise at least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages. At least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages may be based on at least one measurement of a number of applications for placement opportunities, measurement of actual division percentages of types of placement opportunities, and percent placement opportunity calculations. based on received status notifications.

At least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages may be applied for a first POIS communicatively connected to the first content provider and a second POIS communicatively connected to the second content provider. In one example, the router of the first content provider may be coupled between the first POIS and a first ADS owned by the first content provider. The content provider router can be coupled between the second POIS and a second ADS owned by the second content provider.

The server can transmit the first data between the first POIS and the first ADS, and the server can transmit second data between the second POIS and the second ADS. The first data and the second data provide information to be applied to at least one stipulation that belongs to the ownership percentages of the inventory.

At least one of the first content provider or the second content provider can be a multiple systems / service operator (MSO). At least one of the first content provider or the second content provider can be a programming network.

In one modality, the inventory may comprise opportunities for placement of advertisements. Ad placement opportunities can be dynamically insertable placement placement opportunities.

In one modality, the inventory may comprise inventory that may comprise content. The content may include video, audio, data, or interactive overlays.

In one mode, at least one of the first inventory policy or the second inventory policy can apply to the online transmission of the inventory. At least one of the first inventory policy or the second inventory policy may apply to streaming video on demand by cable, optical, or aerial.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The present invention will be more easily understood from the detailed description of exemplary embodiments presented below considered together with the accompanying drawings, in which: Figure 1 illustrates a conventional linear video-on-demand model for advertisement placement; Figure 2 represents a configuration of a conventional Internet-based cable television infrastructure for making ad placement decisions in signal streams; Figure 3 represents a configuration of a modality to verify inventory divisions; Figure 4 is a flow diagram illustrating one embodiment of a method for verifying inventory divisions; Y Figure 5 illustrates a diagrammatic representation of a machine in an exemplary form of a computer system within which a set of instructions, to cause the machine to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein, may be executed.

It will be understood that the appended drawings are for purposes of illustrating the concepts of the invention and may not be to scale.

Certain embodiments of the present description are compatible with and make use of elements defined in accordance with the SCTE-130 standard. The SCTE-130 standard provides a message standardized and extensible based on the interface that defines a minimum set of logical cooperation services needed to communicate placement opportunities, placement decisions, and event data related to the placement necessary for the reliability of the measurements. SCTE-130 defines an extensible structure of interfaces between a set of logical services of advertising systems. The SCTE-130 standard covers: a minimum set of cooperative logical services needed to implement advanced dirigible advertising systems; extensible message structure and core data types that form a necessary vocabulary to communicate between the logical services; the interfaces between these logical services that use the kernel and message data types; and, mechanisms for extension capacity that allows innovation while preserving backward compatibility with already used systems - thus reducing the complexity for the incorporation of new features within the standard.

The normative parts of the SCTE-130 standard define mechanisms for integrating systems that implement features such as VOD-based advertising, linear-based advertising, enhanced advertising capabilities such as advertising rotation groups (rotation groups refers to placement that are executed in rotation so that the same ad can not be seen again immediately, subscriber-based address for custom design advertising or content, extension points for more advanced advertising or address features, logical services that are implemented as one or more physical systems created by the same provider, deployment of a logical service that can simultaneously include systems from one or more providers, and an implementation that can incorporate one or more of the defined logical services and interfaces.

The SCTE-130 standard defines a set of logical services that comprise an advanced advertising system. Each logical service can by itself be a complex system. In one embodiment, one or more of the following logical services may be used or interacted with certain embodiments of the present invention.

An Advertising Management Service (ADM) defines messages in support of ad insertion activities. The primary consumer of these messages is an Advertising Decision Service (ADS). The message interfaces exposed by an ADM allow both preconfigured ad decisions as well as real-time compliance models. An ADM implementation can incorporate some simple ad selection rules (for example, ad rotations) but more complex ad decisions are the responsibility of an ADS.

An Advertising Decision Service (ADS) determines how advertising content is combined with content assets without advertising (ie, entertainment). Decisions made by an ADS can be direct (ie, specific ad content placed at a specific time in a specific asset) or arbitrarily complex (based on subscriber data, advertising area, etc.).

A Content Information Service (CIS) handles metadata description assets (both advertising assets and non-advertising assets) available for the other logical SCTE-130 services. The CIS provides query and notification interfaces to other logical services. The consultation service is available ad-hoc and can be called by any other logical service at any time without any prior registration. Queries specify values or patterns that are found in the query message metadata and the specified match information (or an error indication) are returned in a reply message.

The Content Information Service (CIS) is a storage and distribution engine. Metadata about entertainment and advertising assets are stored; provides notifications to registered customers when the metadata is modified; register, receive and process notifications from other CIS services; and support metadata queries in real time. The CIS allows an Advertising Administrator (ADM) and / or Advertising Decision Service (ADS) to retrieve and use content metadata in their advanced advertising decision processing.

A Placement Opportunity Information Service (POIS) may contain, maintain, and retain descriptions of placement opportunities. The POIS may also contain attributes and restrictions for each placement opportunity, platform complement, rights, and content policies in which the placement opportunity exists. These placement opportunities are content specific, so the attributes and restrictions may vary according to the network, geographic region, or other dimension of content distribution.

The POIS is a storage execution engine and placement opportunity inventory (PO). Store metadata and PO statistics; provides notifications to registered customers when the PO metadata is modified; register, receive and process notifications from other POIS services; and support PO metadata queries in real time. Through the POIS apparatus, an Advertising Manager (ADM) and / or Advertising Decision Service (ADS) can retrieve and use placement opportunity metadata in their advanced advertising decision making.

The Subscriber Information Service (SIS) manages per-subscriber information relevant to placement decisions. The SIS provides a mapping between the subscriber or customer identifiers, such as a MAC address, serial number, etc., and subscriber or audience attributes, for example, age, sex, location of a subscriber.

The term "computer" or "computer platform" is intended to include any data processing device, such as a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a tablet computer, a main server computer, a server, a portable device, a digital signal processor (DSP), an integrated processor (an example of which is described in connection with Figure 5), or any other device capable of processing data. The computer / computer platform is configured to include one or more microprocessors communicatively connected to one or more non-transient computer readable media and one or more networks. The term "communicatively connected" is intended to include any type of connection, either wired or wireless, in which the data can be communicated. The term "communicatively connected" is intended to include, but not be limited to, a connection between devices and / or programs within a single computer or between devices and / or separate computers over a network. He term "network" is intended to include, but not be limited to, OTA (air transmission, ATSC, DVB-T), packet exchange networks (TCP / IP, for example, the Internet), satellite (microwave, MPEG or IP transport stream), direct broadcast satellite, cable transmission systems Analog (RF), and digital video transmission systems (ATSC, HD-SDI, HDMI, DVI, VGA), etc.

Figure 3 depicts a configuration of a system 300 for verifying inventory divisions. The system 300 may be executed by a decision server 302, interconnected by one or more networks (e.g., Internet 304) to a content provider system 306a (hereinafter "the first content provider 306a") under the control of the content provider router 308a, and to a content provider system 306b (hereinafter "the second content provider 306b") under the control of the content provider router 308b. The decision server 302 is also communicatively connected to a POIS 310a associated with the first content provider system 306a and a POIS 310b associated with the second content provider system 306b. The POIS 310a is configured to store an inventory policy associated with the second content provider 306b and the POIS 310b is configured to store an inventory policy associated with the first content provider 306a. The first content provider 306a is also provides with an ADS 312a under the control of the content provider router 308a to place advertisements in pauses of advertisements in subscriber data streams stored in an associated CDN 314a for distribution to one or more smart appliances 316a-31on over a network (for example, Internet 304).

Decision server 302 is configured to act as a neutral third party to facilitate and verify inventory division agreements between the first provider 306a of content and the second provider 306b of content. To facilitate and verify the inventory division agreements, the decision server 302, in one embodiment, implement an inventory policy manager 320 and a console 318 to allow an administrator (not shown) to update an inventory policy associated with the first content provider 306a and to authorize an inventory policy associated with the second content provider 306b under the control of the decision server 302a. The console 318 is also provided to allow the administrator to authorize an inventory policy associated with the second content provider 306b and authorize an inventory policy associated with the first content provider 306a under the control of the decision server 302.

In one embodiment, the inventory policy manager 320 is configured to receive a first policy that is it belongs to the inventory provided by a first content provider 306a and stores the first inventory policy in a memory 322, transmits the first policy to a second content provider 306b, and receives authorization from the first policy from the second provider 306b of content . The inventory policy manager 320 is further configured to receive a second policy belonging to an inventory provided by the second provider 306b of the content and store the second inventory policy in the memory 322, transmitting the second policy to the first content provider 306a , and receiving an authorization from the second policy from the first content provider 306a. The inventory provided by the first content provider 306a and the inventory provided by the second content provider 306b may comprise the same inventory. The inventory policy manager 320 is further configured to verify that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy are in accordance with at least one stipulation pertaining to a percentage of compensation to the first content provider 306a by the inventory owned by the first content provider 306a and reproduced by the second content provider 306b. The inventory policy manager 320 is further configured to transmit the first inventory policy to the placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) 310b communicatively connected to the second content provider 306b, and for transmitting the second inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) 310a communicatively connected to the first content provider 306a.

At least one stipulation pertaining to the percentage of compensation / ownership of inventory may be applied by POIS 310a and 310b. The first content provider router 308a is configured to transmit the first data between the POIS 310a and the ADS 312a owned by the first content provider 306a, and the content provider router 308b is configured to transmit the second data between the POIS 310b and the ADS 312b owned by the second content provider 306b. The first data and the second data provide information to apply at least one stipulation that belongs to inventory ownership percentages.

Figure 4 is a flow chart illustrating an example of a method 400 for verifying inventory divisions. The method 300 may be performed by a computer system 500 of Figure 5 and may comprise hardware (eg, circuitry, dedicated logic, programmable logic, icrocode, etc.), software (eg, executing instructions on a processing device). , or a combination thereof. In one example, the method 400 is performed by the inventory policy manager 320 of the decision server 302 of Figure 3.

In one embodiment, the method 400 starts when, in block 405, the inventory policy manager 320 of the decision server 302 retrieves from the memory 322 a first inventory policy provided by a first content provider 306a. The first inventory policy may include, for example, placement preferences, ad loads, and inventory divisions. In block 410, the inventory policy manager 320 retrieves from the memory 322 a second inventory policy provided by the second content provider 306b. The second inventory policy may include, for example, placement preferences, ad loads, and inventory divisions.

In block 415, the inventory policy manager 320 verifies that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy are in accordance with at least one stipulation pertaining to a percentage of compensation for the first 306th provider of content by the inventory owned by the first content provider 306a and reproduced by the second content provider 306b.

In block 420 the inventory policy manager 320 transmits the first inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) 310b communicatively connected to the second content provider 306b.

In an example, before transmitting the first inventory policy to a second content provider 306b, the inventory policy manager 320 may receive an authorization for the first inventory policy from the second content provider 306b and before transmitting the second inventory policy to the first content provider 306a , the inventory policy manager 320 may receive an authorization from the second inventory policy from the first content provider 306a.

In one example, at least one stipulation pertaining to a compensation percentage may comprise at least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages. At least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages may be based on at least one measurement of the number of applications for placement opportunities, the measurement of actual division percentages of the types of placement opportunities, and the calculation of percentages of placement opportunities. based on the received status notifications.

At least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages may be applied by POIS 310a communicatively connected to the first content provider 306a and the POIS 310b communicatively connected to the second content provider 306b. In one example, the first content provider router 308a may be coupled between the first POIS 310a and the ADS 312a owned by the first content provider 306a and the router 308b of the content provider may be coupled between the second POIS 310b and the AS 312b owned by the second content provider 306b.

The first content provider router 308a can transmit the first data between POIS 310a and the ADS 312a, and the content provider router 308b can transmit the second data between the POIS 310b and the ADS 312b. The first data and the second data provide information to apply at least one stipulation that belongs to inventory ownership percentages.

In one embodiment, POIS 310a, 310b may link placement opportunities (PO) to the content signals based in part on the inventory policy agreed upon above. The POIS 310a, 310b each have knowledge of the load, division and preferences of placing of the inventory desired for that content and others in the same context to which the inventory policy agreed in the above can be applied even before any current has been requested. For all available content covered by the inventory policy agreed upon above, the respective content provider routers 308a, 308b link the POs to the content signals according to the inventory percentages agreed upon in the above using their ADS 312a, 312b respective. The AD 312a, 312b are configured to insert advertisements in the placement opportunities within the content provided by the respective CDN 314a, 314b. Once inserted, the respective content provider routers 308a, 308b can initiate the transmission of the inventory to the smart devices 316a, 316n.

Figure 5 illustrates a diagrammatic representation of a machine in the exemplary form of a computer system 500 within which a set of instructions can be executed to cause the machine to perform any of one or more of the methodologies discussed herein. In some examples, the machine can be connected (for example, in a network) to other machines in a LAN, an intranet, an extranet or the Internet. The machine can operate in the capacity of a server machine in the client-server network environment. The machine can be a personal computer (PC), a converter-decoder box (STB), a server, a network router, switch or bridge, or any machine capable of executing a set of instructions (in sequence or otherwise) ) that specify actions to be taken by that machine. In addition, although only one machine is illustrated, the term "machine" can also be taken to include any collection of machines that individually or jointly execute a set (or multiple sets) of instructions to perform any of one or more of the methodologies discussed in the I presented .

The exemplary computer system 500 includes a processing device 502 (processor), a main memory 504 (eg, read-only memory (ROM), flash memory, dynamic random access memory (DRAM) (such as synchronized DRAM (SDRAM)). )), a static memory 506 (e.g., flash memory, static random access memory (SRAM)), and a data storage device 516, which communicates with each other via a bus 508.

The processor 502 represents one or more general-purpose processing devices such as a microprocessor, central processing unit, or the like. More particularly, the processor 502 can be a complex instruction set count compute microprocessor (CISC), small instruction set compute microprocessor (RISC), very long instruction word microprocessor (VLIW), or a processor that implements other sets of instructions, or processors that implement a combination of instruction sets. The processor 502 can also be one or more special purpose processing devices such as a specific application integrated circuit (ASIC), a field programmable gate arrangement (FPGA), a digital signal processor (DSP), a processor network, or similar. The inventory policy manager 320 shown in Figure 3 may executed by the processor 502 configured to perform the operations and steps discussed herein.

The computer system 500 may additionally include a 522 network interface device. The computer system 500 may also include a video display unit 510 (e.g., a liquid crystal display (LCD) or a cathode ray tube (CRT)), an alphanumeric input 512 device (e.g., a keyboard) ), a cursor control device 514 (e.g., a mouse), and a signal generating device 520 (e.g., a loudspeaker).

A disk unit 516 may include a computer readable medium 524 in which one or more sets of instructions are stored (for example, instructions from the inventory policy manager 320) representing any one or more of the methodologies or functions described. at the moment. The instructions of the inventory policy manager 320 may also reside, fully or at least partially, within the main memory 504 and / or within the processor 502 during the execution thereof by the computer system 500; the main memory 504 and the processor 502 also constitute computer readable media. The instructions of the inventory policy manager 320 may additionally be transmitted or received over a network by means of the network interface device 522.

Although the computer readable storage medium 524 is shown in one example to be a simple means, the term "computer-readable storage medium" should be taken to include a single non-transient medium or multiple non-transient media (eg, a database). centralized or distributed, and / or intermediate buffers and associated servers) that store one or more sets of instructions. The term "computer-readable storage medium" should also be considered to include any means that is capable of storing, encoding or carrying a set of instructions for execution by the machine and causing the machine to perform any of one or more of the methodologies of the present description. The term "computer readable storage medium" should therefore be considered to include, but not be limited to, solid state memories, optical media and magnetic media.

In the above description, numerous details are established. It is evident, however, for someone with ordinary experience in the technique that has the benefit of this description, that the examples of the description can be practiced without these specific details. In some cases, well-known structures and devices are shown in block diagram form, rather than in detail, to avoid obscuring the description.

Some portions of the detailed description are They present in terms of algorithms and symbolic representations of operations in data bits inside from a computer memory. These descriptions and algorithmic representations are the means used by those with experience in the data processing arts to more effectively transport the substance of their work to others experienced in the art. An algorithm is found here, and generally, it is conceived as a self-consistent sequence of steps leading to a desired result. The stages are those that require physical manipulations of physical quantities. Usually, though not necessarily, these quantities take the form of electrical or magnetic signals capable of being stored, transferred, combined, compared, and otherwise manipulated. It has been shown that it is sometimes convenient-, mainly for reasons of common use, to refer to these signals as bits, values, elements, symbols, characters, terms, numbers, or the like.

It should be kept in mind, however, that all of these terms and the like can be associated with the appropriate physical quantities and are simply convenient labels applied to these quantities. Unless stated otherwise specifically, as apparent from the previous discussion, it will be appreciated that through the description, the discussions that use the terms such as "receive", "write", "maintain", or similar, it refer to actions and processes of a computer system, or similar electronic computing device, that manipulates and transforms data represented as physical (eg, electronic) quantities within the computer system record and memories in other data represented in a similar way as physical quantities within the memories of the computer system or registers or other such storage devices of information, transmission or visualization.

Examples of the present disclosure also relate to an apparatus for performing the operations herein. This apparatus can be specially constructed for the required purposes or it can comprise a general-purpose computer activated selectively or reconfigured by a computer program stored in the computer. Such a computer program may be stored in a computer readable storage medium, such as, but not limited to, any type of disk including floppy disks, optical discs, CD-ROMs and magneto-optical disks, read-only memories (ROM). , random access memories (RAM), EPROM, EEPROM, magnetic or optical cards, or any type of suitable means to store electronic instructions.

The algorithms and visualizations presented herein are not inherently related to any computer or another particular device. Various general-purpose systems may be used with the programs in accordance with the teachings herein or may prove convenient to build a more specialized apparatus for performing the required steps of the method. The exemplary structure for a variety of these systems appears from the present description. In addition, the present description is not described with reference to any particular programming language. It will be appreciated that a variety of programming languages can be used to implement the teachings of the description as described herein.

It will be understood that the foregoing description is intended to be illustrative, and not restrictive. Many other examples will be apparent to those experienced in the technique after reading and understanding the above description. The scope of the description should, therefore, be determined with reference to the appended claims, together with the full scope of equivalents to which such claims are entitled.

Claims (22)

1. A method implemented by computer to verify inventory divisions, the method characterized because it comprises the stages of: recover, by a server from a memory, a first inventory policy provided by a first content provider, recover, by a server from a memory, a second inventory policy provided by the second content provider, verify, by the server, that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy agree to at least one stipulation pertaining to a percentage of compensation to the first content provider by inventory owned by the first content provider and reproduced by the second content provider, transmit, by the server, the first inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the second content provider; Y transmit, through the server, the second inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the first content provider.

2. The method according to claim 1, further characterized because it comprises: before transmitting the first inventory policy to a second content provider, receiving, by the server, an authorization of the first inventory policy of the second content provider; before transmitting the second inventory policy to the first content provider, receiving, using the server, an authorization of the second inventory policy of the first content provider;

3. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that at least one stipulation pertaining to the compensation percentage comprises at least one stipulation pertaining to ownership percentages of the inventory.

4. The method according to claim 3, characterized in that at least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages is based on at least one measurement of a number of requests for placement opportunities, measurement of actual division rates of opportunity types. of placement, and calculate percentages of placement opportunities based on received status notifications.

5. The method according to claim 3, characterized in that at least one stipulation pertaining to ownership percentages of the inventory is applied by the connected placement opportunity inventory service communicatively to the second content provider and the placement opportunity inventory service connected communicatively to the first content provider.

6. The method according to claim 5, characterized in that a first router coupled between the first placement opportunity inventory service and an advertisement decision service owned by the first content provider and wherein the second router is coupled between the second placement opportunity inventory service and an advertisement decision service owned by the second content provider.

7. The method according to claim 6, characterized in that the first router transmits the first data between the first placement opportunity inventory service and the advertisement decision service owned by the first content provider, wherein the second router transmits the second data between the second placement opportunity inventory service and the advertisement decision service owned by the second content provider; Y where the first data and the second data provide information to apply at least one stipulation that belongs to percentages of inventory property.

8. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that at least one of the first provider of content and the second content provider is a system / multiple service operator (MSO).

9. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that at least one of the first content provider and the second content provider is a programming network.

10. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the inventory comprises advertisement placement opportunities.

11. The method according to claim 10, characterized in that the advertisement placement opportunities are advertisement placement opportunities that can be inserted dynamically.

12. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the inventory comprises content.

13. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that at least one of the first inventory policy or the second inventory policy applies to Internet transmissions of inventory.

14. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that at least one of the first inventory policy or the second inventory policy applies to video-on-demand transmission by cable, optical, or aerial inventory.

15. The method implemented by computer according to claim 1, characterized in that time intervals designated for placement opportunities correspond to pauses, previous videos, subsequent videos, intermediate videos, interstitials, pauses, and video-on-demand requests.

16. A computer system to verify inventory division, characterized because it comprises: a memory; a processing device, coupled to the memory, the processing device configured to: recover, from memory, a first inventory policy provided by a first content provider; recover, from memory, a second inventory policy provided by the second content provider; Verify that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy agree for at least one stipulation pertaining to a compensation percentage of the first content provider for the inventory owned by the first content provider and reproduced by the second content provider; transmit the first inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) connected communicatively to the second content provider; Y transmit the second inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the first content provider.

17. The system according to claim 16, further characterized in that it comprises a console communicatively connected to the server, wherein at least one of the first inventory policy or the second inventory policy are originated or authorized using the console.

18. The system according to claim 16, characterized in that at least one stipulation pertaining to a percentage of compensation comprises at least one stipulation pertaining to percentages of inventory property.

19. The system according to claim 18, characterized in that at least one stipulation pertaining to percentages of inventory property is based on at least one of measuring a number of requests for placement opportunities, measuring real division percentages and types of opportunities. of placement, and calculate percentages of placement opportunities based on received status notifications.

20. The system in accordance with the claim 19, further characterized because it comprises: a first router coupled between the first placement opportunity inventory service and an advertisement decision service owned by the first content provider and a second router coupled between the second placement opportunity inventory service and an advertisement decision service owned by the second content provider, wherein at least one stipulation pertaining to inventory ownership percentages is applied by the placement opportunity inventory service communicatively connected to the second content provider and the placement opportunity inventory service communicatively connected to the first provider of content.

21. The system according to claim 20, further characterized in that it comprises: .where the first router transmits the first data between the first placement opportunity inventory service and the ad decision service owned by the first content provider, wherein the second router transmits the second data between the second placement opportunity inventory service and the advertisement decision service owned by the second content provider; Y where the first data and the second data provide information to apply at least one stipulation that belongs to percentages of inventory property.

22. A non-transient computer readable storage medium that includes instructions that, when executed by a processing system, cause the processing system to perform operations to verify inventory divisions, characterized in that it comprises: recover from a memory a first inventory policy provided by a first content provider; recover from memory a second inventory policy provided by the second content provider; verify that the first inventory policy and the second inventory policy are in accordance with at least one provision pertaining to a percentage of compensation to the first content provider for the inventory owned by the first content provider and reproduced by the second content provider; transmit the first inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the second content provider; Y transmit the second inventory policy to a placement opportunity inventory service (POIS) communicatively connected to the first content provider.