Google Inc.

Iain Merrick

Simon Michael Rowe

Yaroslav Volovich

Geoffrey R Smith

John Alastair Hawkins

Michael A Killianey

Ant Oztaskent

Greg Hecht

Raimundo Mirisola

Andrew Gildfind

Daniel John Zigmond

Nick Salvatore Arini

Jay Shrauner

Kaustuv

Kyle Maddison

Alastair Peter William Maw

Nicholas Salvatore Arini

David D Redell

Michael A Killaney

Andrew Gilfind

Nick Arini

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for providing customized television advertisements. In one aspect, television advertising templates are used for generating customized television advertisements. The television advertisement templates include targeting criteria specifying targeting conditions for the television advertising template, which are conditions for selecting the television advertisement template for an advertisement availability, and content selection criteria specifying availability content associated with an advertisement availability for use in selecting variable advertisement content elements for inclusion in a customized television advertisement generated from the television advertising template. The variable advertisement content elements can include video elements, audio elements, and text elements.

Customized variable television advertising generated from a television advertising template

A computer-implemented method for collecting and managing TV viewership data from multiple TV metering data providers is disclosed. The method includes: receiving an event log file at a distributed computer system that includes multiple computers; dynamically selecting one or more computers according to a predefined sharding function; at each of the selected computers: allocating a set of compressed event records, which corresponds to a subset of the event log file, at predetermined locations within the memory of the computer; and in accordance with a predefined schedule, replicating the compressed event records from a respective one of the selected computers to one or more other computers of the distributed system such that there are at least two replicas of any event record on at least two computers of the distributed computer system.

Method and system for collecting and managing TV viewership data

Methods and systems for determining and collecting information about channels being displayed on a display device are described. Such methods and systems provide an effective way for entities to collect reliable and detailed viewership information. Conditional access modules are associated with panelists who are part of a viewership measurement program. A conditional access module is also associated with a display device, and sends messages to a server. The messages include data that can be used to identify the channel to which the display device is tuned. The server collects and compiles data about a group of TV channels. The server determines a match between the stored data and the received message to determine what TV channel is being displayed at the display device.

Using a conditional access module for TV viewership information

A method for providing efficient and accurate estimates of TV viewership ratings through a distributed computer system that includes multiple computers is disclosed. The method includes: receiving a query from a client at the distributed computer system; dynamically selecting one or more computers according to a predefined sharding function; at each of the selected computers, determining a count of qualified event records that satisfy the query; aggregating the respective counts of qualified event records determined by the selected computers; statistically projecting the aggregated count of qualified event records into an estimated total count of qualified event records on the distributed computer system; and returning the estimated total count of qualified event records to the requesting client.

Method and system for providing efficient and accurate estimates of TV viewership ratings

Set top box logs are received from a television provider and processed to identify channel tunes and channel tune times. The channel tunes and channel tune times of the log data can be compared to expected air times of television advertisements on channels, and an impression values, e.g., projected viewers, can be generated for each television advertisement.

Determining automatically generated channel tunes based on channel tune dwell times

Log processing to determine impressions using an impression time window

A system and method is disclosed for calibrating a pointing device. A virtual movement of a position indicator is generated based on current acceleration parameters of an acceleration curve applied to a physical movement made at a pointing device and terminating at a target action. A plurality of virtual path segments are determined based on the physical movement, and an overall error representative of a deviation of the endpoint of each segment from the target action is generated. One or more hypothetical acceleration parameters are calculated that, when applied to the changing position information, generate an overall hypothetical error value less than the overall error. The current acceleration parameters are set equal to the one or more hypothetical acceleration parameters to calibrate the pointing device.

Automatic calibration curves for a pointing device

Reporting data related to content processing devices, e.g., television devices, are processed to identify channel tunes and corresponding tune times of the content processing devices. Automatically generated channel tunes based on the corresponding tune times are identified. Content items that are aired during a time period defined by the corresponding tune times can be adjusted.

Channel tune dwell time log processing

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for verifying content distribution authority. In one aspect, a method includes receiving a request for broadcast content for a broadcast feed from a requestor. In response to the request, specifying verification content for inclusion in the broadcast feed, the verification content being scheduled for presentation at a specified time. The broadcast feed is monitored for presentation of the verification content at the specified time. In turn, a determination is made whether the verification content was presented by the broadcast feed at the specified time. In response to determining that the verification content was presented by the broadcast feed at the specified time, the requestor is verified as an entity having content distribution authority over the broadcast feed.

Verifying content distribution authority

Log processing to determine impression values using reliable durations

Set top box logs are received from a television provider and processed to compensate for broadcast latency and generate normalized log data, e.g., log data that are indexed to a relative time. Channel tunes and the channel tune times of the normalized log data can be compared to expected air times of television advertisements on channels, and an impression values, e.g., projected viewers, can be generated for each television advertisement.

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London, United Kingdom

Iain Merrick