Personal broadcast engine and network
AssigneeYahoo! Inc.
InventorsMarc E. Davis, Ronald G. Martinez, Christopher W. Higgins
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A personal broadcasting system and method is described herein for automatically matching and introducing users based on their real-time locations, such that users identified as capable of or likely to form a relationship can be notified of that fact at a point in time when it is easy to meet. A system and method is also described herein that allows at least one of two users that have visited or passed through the same location at different points in time to automatically receive information about the other despite the temporal separation between them.
Claims24
A method for matching and introducing users, comprising:
- determining that a first user and a second user are within a predefined distance of each other based on real-time location information associated with the first user and the second user;
- responsive to determining that the first user and the second user are within a predefined distance of each other, determining if the first user is eligible to transmit a personal broadcast to the second user;
- and
- responsive to determining that the first user is eligible to transmit a personal broadcast to the second user, transmitting a personal broadcast associated with the first user to a user device associated with the second user over a network.
A system for matching and introducing users, comprising:
- a matching manager configured to determine that a first user and a second user are within a predefined distance of each other based on real-time location information associated with the first user and the second user and, responsive to determining that the first user and the second user are within a predefined distance of each other, to determine if the first user is eligible to transmit a personal broadcast to the second user;
- and
- a personal broadcast exchange manager communicatively connected to the matching manager, the personal broadcast exchange manager configured to transmit a personal broadcast associated with the first user to a user device associated with the second user over a network responsive to a determination that the first user is eligible to transmit a personal broadcast to the second user.
A method for matching and introducing users, comprising:
- transmitting a personal broadcast associated with a first user to a network node responsive to determining that the first user has entered a predefined area around the network node;
- storing the personal broadcast locally with respect to the network node;
- and
- transmitting the personal broadcast from the network node to a user device associated with a second user responsive to determining that the second user has entered the predefined area around the network node;
- wherein the second transmitting step occurs after the first user has left the predefined area around the network node.
A system for matching and introducing users, comprising:
- a personal broadcast engine;
- and
- a network node communicatively connected to the personal broadcast engine;
- wherein the personal broadcast engine is configured to transmit a personal broadcast associated with a first user to the network node responsive to determining that the first user has entered a predefined area around the network node, and
- wherein the network node is configured to store the personal broadcast and to subsequently transmit the personal broadcast to a user device associated with a second user responsive to determining that the second user has entered the predefined area around the network node.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.