Method and apparatus for realizing personalized information from multiple information sources

A receiver apparatus for obtaining content from multiple information sources for viewing by a viewer, comprising:

• an input/output (“I/O”) controller including an Internet connection input, a video output, and a selector input;
• an adaptive user profile database;
• a filter coupled to the adaptive user profile database, the filter being coupled to the I/O controller for filtering information from the Internet connection input in accordance with the adaptive user profile database, wherein said filtering comprises explicit and implicit filtering, wherein said explicit filtering provides filtering of information from said plurality of different media collections and said implicit filtering draws from collaborative data among said plurality of different media collections and similar user profiles,
• an output display device configured to display a virtual unified space including a virtual library transmitted through the video output;
• a populater that populates the virtual library with virtual multiple media collections using the filtered information from the filter;
• a browser that browses the virtual library by moving between multiple media collections in accordance with the selector input;
• and
• a recommender that recommends virtual media in the virtual multiple media collections in the virtual library to a user based on a user profile for the user, and
• an updater for updating the user profile based on at least one selection of the recommended virtual media, wherein said updating is reflected in a ratio in responding to said user's current programming choice or specific requests.

A computer program product comprising a computer readable medium having program logic recorded thereon for enabling a computer-enabled apparatus to display personalized information for a user from multiple information sources, comprising:

• a populater for populating a virtual library with a plurality of different virtual media collections in accordance with a user profile, wherein the virtual library is populated with different types of media obtained from different media sources;
• and
• a browser for browsing the virtual library by moving between the plurality of different media collections under user control;
• a search engine for searching the virtual library under user control;
• and
• a filter for filtering the results of the searching step in accordance with the user profile and said browsing step, wherein said filtering comprises explicit and implicit filtering, wherein said explicit filtering provides filtering of information from said plurality of different media collections and said implicit filtering draws from collaborative data among said plurality of different media collections and similar user profiles;
• a prioritizer for prioritizing results of the filtering step;
• and
• an updater for updating the user profile in accordance with at least one selection of the results of the filtering step, wherein said updating is reflected in a ratio in responding to said user's current programming choice or specific requests.