Patents Assigned to Verizon Media Inc.
  • Patent number: 11128930
    Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed for providing non-intrusive advertising content to users. The method includes receiving user input reflecting user content preferences for receiving desired content related to specific topics in lieu of standard advertising slots while watching playable media content via a set-top box. The method may further include receiving a request for playable media content and then retrieving desired content based on user content preferences. Thereafter, the method may include choosing non-intrusive advertising content and generating datagrams that include the desired content and the non-intrusive advertising content. The datagrams may be concatenated with the playable media content to generate displayable content. The display content may then be provided for displaying.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 25, 2017
    Date of Patent: September 21, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventor: Jeffrey Todd Wilson
  • Patent number: 11126666
    Abstract: Techniques for clustering non-stationary data are disclosed. In embodiments, a method is disclosed comprising initializing a plurality of functional centroids; partitioning a non-stationary data set, using the functional centroids, into partitions, the number of partitions being equal to the number of functional centroids; generating a set of fitted functional centroids for each of the partitions; replacing at least one of the functional centroids with a corresponding fitted functional centroid if a computed energy of the corresponding fitted functional centroid is less than an energy of the at least one functional centroid; computing a summation of the energies associated with each of the functional centroids; and outputting the functional centroids upon determining that a termination condition is met.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 20, 2019
    Date of Patent: September 21, 2021
    Assignee: VERIZON MEDIA INC.
    Inventors: Ran Wolff, Nadav Yutal
  • Patent number: 11126675
    Abstract: Systems and methods are provided for optimizing displays in one or more user interfaces. An exemplary method may include retrieving web entries from a database and generating a plurality of candidates based on the retrieved web entries, where each web entry of the web entries is a clickable item that is displayed on the one or more user interfaces. Additionally, provide the plurality of candidates for display on the one or more user interfaces and determine click-through rates for each of the plurality of candidates. Thereafter, create a display pool of candidates to display from plurality of candidates based on the click-through rates and update the display pool of candidates responsive to retrieving additional web entries from the database.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 11, 2019
    Date of Patent: September 21, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Dmytro Solomakha, Maggie J. Xiong, Adam B. Denenberg
  • Patent number: 11120475
    Abstract: Methods are disclosed for providing an ad-supported mobile data plan, where ad display may be tied to data usage levels and user input. A method includes receiving, using at least one processor, user interaction with advertisement content displayed on a device; retrieving, using the at least one processor, a data usage limit associated with the device; and causing a change in the data usage limit based on the user interaction with the advertisement content displayed on the device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 7, 2020
    Date of Patent: September 14, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media, Inc.
    Inventors: Jeffrey B. Katz, Chad Gallagher, Lucas J. Matyja
  • Patent number: 11120002
    Abstract: The present teaching relates to concurrent database operation. In one example, a plurality of requests which includes a scan request to obtain first data associated with a plurality of first keys stored in a database is received concurrently. A global version number is updated upon receipt of the scan request. The first data associated with the plurality of first keys is obtained based on the updated global version number. The first data is provided in response to the scan request.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 20, 2016
    Date of Patent: September 14, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Edward Bortnikov, Anastasia Braginsky, Eshcar Hillel, Guy Gueta, Dmitry Basin, Moshe Sulamy
  • Patent number: 11120028
    Abstract: The present disclosure relates to systems and methods customizing electronic communications. A future event associated with a first user may be determined, and a second user that is associated with the first user may be identified. A plurality of communications involving the first user and the second user may be analyzed. A selection rule may be applied based on the analyzed plurality of communications, the selection rule identifying content from the database. Content from the database may be selected based on the application of the selection rule. An electronic message may be provided to the first user identifying the future event, and the selected content may be provided to the first user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 17, 2018
    Date of Patent: September 14, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Marcel Becker, Seth Halvaksz, William Wetherell, Alan Eyzaguirre
  • Patent number: 11120004
    Abstract: Method, system, and programs for analyzing user agent string are disclosed. In one example, a user agent string is received. A list of predefined keywords is obtained. Each of the predefined keywords is associated with a type of user agent information. One or more candidate keywords are extracted from the user agent string based on the list of predefined keywords. An extraction pattern is obtained for each of the one or more candidate keywords. A keyword is determined with a version from the one or more candidate keywords based, at least in part, on the extraction patterns for the one or more candidate keywords. The determined keyword with the version represents the type of user agent information in the received use agent string.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 25, 2014
    Date of Patent: September 14, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Ling Zhu, Min He, Fei Yu, Minzhang Wei
  • Patent number: 11113745
    Abstract: Disclosed are systems and methods utilizing neural contextual bandit for improving interactions with and between computers in content generating, searching, hosting and/or providing systems supported by or configured with personal computing devices, servers and/or platforms. The systems interact to make item recommendations using latent relations and latent representations, which can improve the quality of data used in processing interactions between or among processors in such systems. The disclosed systems and methods use neural network modeling in automatic selection of a number of items for recommendation to a user and using feedback in connection with the recommendation for further training of the model(s).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 3, 2020
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2021
    Assignee: VERIZON MEDIA INC.
    Inventors: Suleyman Cetintas, Xian Wu, Jian Yang
  • Patent number: 11113079
    Abstract: One or more computing devices, systems, and/or methods for assisting a user in performing a task are provided. For example, a request may be received from the user via a messaging interface, and the task (e.g., make a reservation) may be determined (e.g., identified) based upon the request. Questions associated with information required (e.g., name, location, dates, etc.) to perform the task may be determined and provided. Visual elements (e.g., selectable buttons) corresponding to answer choices associated with the questions may be provided. A selection of a first visual element of the visual elements may be received, and the task may be performed based upon the selection of the first visual element.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 19, 2016
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventor: Nadav Golbandi
  • Patent number: 11113714
    Abstract: A filtering machine receives sponsored content and filters the sponsored content according to a quality metric generated by quality model circuitry and assigned to the instance of sponsored content. The quality model circuitry generates the quality metric in accordance with historical feedback received about other sponsored content and a collection of quality factors pertaining to the sponsored content. Based on the quality metric for the sponsored content, the filtering machine can effect service of the sponsored content to a user device for display thereon.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 30, 2015
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Ke Zhou, Miriam Redi, Mounia Lalmas, Puneet Mohan Sangal
  • Patent number: 11113078
    Abstract: One or more computing devices, systems, and/or methods for monitoring a video are provided. For example, the video may be rendered within a canvas overlaying a webpage within a web browser. The video may comprise an opaque portion (e.g., a bike) and a transparent portion (e.g., a transparent background such that the bike appears to be driving across the webpage as the video plays). User input associated with the canvas may be evaluated to determine whether the user input occurs over the opaque portion or the transparent portion. Responsive to the user input occurring over the opaque portion, the web browser may be transitioned from the webpage to a biking website linked to by the video. Responsive to the user input occurring over the transparent portion, the canvas may be closed to terminate the video.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 18, 2020
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventor: Lawrence Anthony Deguzman
  • Patent number: 11113239
    Abstract: The present teaching generally relates to detecting providing pre-validated data buckets for online experiments. In a non-limiting embodiment, user activity data representing user activity for a first plurality of user identifiers may be obtained. A first set of values and a second values, representing first and second user engagement parameters, respectively, may be generated for each user identifier based on the user activity data. A first ranking and a second ranking may be determined for the first and second sets, respectively. A first exclusion range including a first number of values to be removed from the first and second sets may be determined. A homogenous value set may be generated by removing the first number of values from the first and second sets, where each value from the homogenous value set corresponds to a user identifier available to be placed in a data bucket for an online experiment.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 15, 2017
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Russell Chen, Miao Chen, Don Matheson, Mahendrasinh Ramsinh Jadav
  • Patent number: 11106732
    Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed for enabling sharing of audio feeds. One method includes receiving, from a user over a network, a request to add an audio feed to a collection managed by the user; storing, in a database, a URL of the audio feed in relation to the collection; receiving, from the user over the network, a request to share the collection; and generating an RSS URL of the collection by searching the database for URLs of audio feeds stored in relation to the collection.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 28, 2020
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventor: Bryce Barrand
  • Patent number: 11106746
    Abstract: One or more computing devices, systems, and/or methods are provided. An informational database may be analyzed based upon an entity to identify an informational article. The informational article may be analyzed to identify one or more first references associated with a first sentiment category and/or one or more second references associated with a second sentiment category. Sentiment tags, indicative of sentiment categories, may be assigned to one or more first reference content items associated with the one or more first references and/or to one or more second reference content items associated with the one or more second references. For each content item of a plurality of content items associated with the entity, a sentiment category associated with the content item may be determined based upon a comparison of the content item with the one or more first reference content items and the one or more second reference content items.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 21, 2019
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Shaunak Mishra, Aasish Kumar Pappu, Lakshmi Narayan Bhamidipati
  • Patent number: 11108710
    Abstract: Disclosed are systems and methods for improving interactions with and between computers in content providing, searching and/or hosting systems supported by or configured with devices, servers and/or platforms. The disclosed systems and methods provide a novel messaging framework that automatically applies a multi-factor analysis technique to incoming and received messages in order to properly identify a message's type and category, which dictates the manner in which the message is displayed within a recipient's inbox. The disclosed framework operates on two levels: i) it determines whether a message is from a human or machine sender (H/M classification), and ii) it determines the messages category (MAGMA categorization).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 28, 2020
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: VERIZON MEDIA INC.
    Inventors: Neeti Narayan, Hongwei Shang, Changsung Kang, Jean-Marc Langlois
  • Patent number: 11108752
    Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed for managing the resetting of online identities or accounts of users of Internet web pages. One method includes: receiving, through an electronic device, a request to reset login information to access a web page associated with the user's online account; determining that an IP address associated with the request is not identified as being suspicious; receiving user data intrinsic to the user's request; automatically verifying two or more values of the data intrinsic to the user's request as being indicative of a level of trust of the identity of the user; and transmitting, to the user over the Internet, a subset of options to reset the login information, the subset being selected based on the level of trust.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 23, 2019
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventor: Lachlan A. Maxwell
  • Patent number: 11107131
    Abstract: An example system can include a server that includes or is associated with a keyword recommendation module. The keyword recommendation module can be configured to select keywords for a search engine for use in a search engine marketing campaign, wherein the search engine provides more traffic to Internet content of a publisher than other search engines, for the keywords. The module can also be configured to determine, per keyword, user engagement with the Internet content resulting from the traffic provided by the search engine for the keywords, according to one or more of time spent viewing the Internet content, page views of the Internet content, and dwell times. The module can also be configured to score, per keyword, the keywords according to the determined user engagement with the Internet content, and generate keyword recommendations according to the scoring of the keywords.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 6, 2017
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventors: Supreeth Rao, Jianning Dong, Anurag Ojha, Matt Earls, Saurabh Dixit
  • Patent number: 11108719
    Abstract: Disclosed are systems and methods for automatically deleting messages from a recipient's inbox. The disclosed systems and methods provide the ability for automatic actions to be taken on delivered messages based on a passage of time. This enables a sender of messages, email service provider and/or email platform to exert control over sent messages to limit the number and type of operations that may be performed on such messages. For example, operations such as saving, forwarding, printing, copying, or otherwise duplicating the message and/or message data can be prohibited and all together rendered impossible. The disclosed systems and methods enables the purging of messages and associated message data from a recipient's inbox at a certain specified time, after the passage of a pre-determined amount of time, or upon the detection of a specified event.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 8, 2014
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: VERIZON MEDIA INC.
    Inventors: Varun Bhagwan, Gowri Kanugovi, Jeffrey Bonforte, Doug Sharp
  • Patent number: 11099714
    Abstract: Systems and methods are directed to implementations involving creation, viewing, playing sharing and/or utilization of information modules, such as mixed-media modules. A processor communicates a mixed-media module creator interface to a first client device. The mixed-media module creator interface is configured to enable a first user of the first client device to create a mixed-media module, the mixed-media module comprising both an updatable portion and a searchable portion, and communicating a mixed-media module player interface to a second client device, the mixed-media module player interface different than the mixed-media module creator interface and configured to enable a second user using the second client device to play the mixed-media module in a non-linear format.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 28, 2013
    Date of Patent: August 24, 2021
    Assignee: VERIZON MEDIA INC.
    Inventors: Doug Imbruce, Owen Bossola, Rasmus Knutsson, Hakim El Hattab, Tommy Chheng
  • Patent number: 11102270
    Abstract: A network address assigned a shared designation by a first client computer is received, in a first data format, automatically, at a host computer from the first client computer. The network address is categorized and published. Publishing the network address includes converting the network address into a second data format, receiving, at the host computer, a subscription request from a second client computer, and sending the network address to the second client computer in response to receiving the subscription request.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 29, 2019
    Date of Patent: August 24, 2021
    Assignee: Verizon Media Inc.
    Inventor: Timothy O'Shaughnessy