Patents by Inventor Michael R. Sheppard

Michael R. Sheppard has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 11783354
    Abstract: Methods and apparatus to estimate census level audience sizes, impression counts, and duration data are disclosed. Example instructions cause one or more processor to at least set up a system of equations based on first census data; select a census parameter value based on a constraint for census parameter selection, the constraint based on media access represented in panel data; iteratively solve for second census data that satisfies the system of equations using the panel data and the census parameter value, the second census data including an audience size value, an impression count value, and a duration value for a media item accessed by anonymous audience members in a demographic group; and generate a report including the second census data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 20, 2021
    Date of Patent: October 10, 2023
    Assignee: The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Dongbo Cui, Edward Murphy, Jessica Lynn White, David Forteguerre
  • Patent number: 11727416
    Abstract: An example apparatus includes an association controller to generate a tree structure association for a total audience size that accessed a plurality of media items, the tree structure association including a first node representative of a first media item accessed by first audience members of the total audience size and a second node representative of a second media item accessed by second audience members of the total audience size, a matrix generator to generate a matrix by selecting a sum of probabilities value corresponding to the tree structure association, the sum of probabilities value representative of a probability of the first audience members accessing the first media item and storing the sum of probabilities value in an element of the matrix, and a commercial solver to estimate a deduplicated audience size of the total audience size using the matrix.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 27, 2019
    Date of Patent: August 15, 2023
    Assignee: THE NIELSEN COMPANY (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Damien Forthomme, Molly Poppie
  • Publication number: 20230245145
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture to estimate cardinality of users represented in arbitrarily distributed bloom filter arrays are disclosed. A system includes a communication interface to: access a first Bloom filter array representative of first entries in a first database, the first entries allocated to ones of first elements in the first Bloom filter array based on a non-uniform distribution of outputs of a hash function applied to the first entries, and access a second Bloom filter array representative of second entries in a second database. The system also includes machine readable instructions to cause one or more processors to estimate a cardinality of a union of the first and second entries based on the non-uniform distribution of the outputs of the hash function.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 11, 2023
    Publication date: August 3, 2023
    Inventors: Jonathan Sullivan, Diane Morovati Lopez, Christie Summers, Jake Ryan Dailey, Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui
  • Publication number: 20230206256
    Abstract: Disclosed examples determine constraints based on a structure of initial audience totals; for a number of iterations: select values for modified audience totals that satisfy the constraints, the modified audience totals corresponding respectively to the initial audience totals; and determine an output based on the values for the modified audience totals and the initial audience totals; select final values of the modified audience totals resulting from completion of the number of iterations, the final values of the modified audience totals to be logically consistent; and generate a report including the final values of the modified audience totals.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 28, 2022
    Publication date: June 29, 2023
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui, Edward Murphy, David Forteguerre, Jessica Lynn White
  • Patent number: 11687967
    Abstract: A disclosed example includes at least one memory, programmable circuitry, and instructions to cause the programmable circuitry to increment a first value corresponding to a first position in a vector based on a first bit value representation, the first bit value representation corresponding to a first audience member identifier; increment a second value corresponding to a second position in the vector based on a second bit value representation, the second bit value representation corresponding to a second audience member identifier; estimate the second frequency moment of the media impression data using the vector; determine the variance of the second frequency moment; and based on the second frequency moment, schedule a query of the media impression data to be processed by a computer at a future time.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 19, 2022
    Date of Patent: June 27, 2023
    Assignee: The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Jonathan Sullivan, Jake Ryan Dailey, Diane Morovati Lopez, Molly Poppie
  • Patent number: 11676160
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture to estimate cardinality of users represented in arbitrarily distributed bloom filter arrays are disclosed. An apparatus includes a communications interface to obtain a first Bloom filter array generated by a first computer of a first database proprietor and obtain a second Bloom filter array generated by a second computer of a second database proprietor. The apparatus includes a cardinality analyzer to estimate a total number of unique users included in a union of corresponding ones of the first and second users represented in the first and second Bloom filter arrays regardless of whether the first and second users are mapped, based on a first distribution or a second distribution different than the first distribution, to the corresponding first and second Bloom filter arrays.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 31, 2020
    Date of Patent: June 13, 2023
    Assignee: THE NIELSEN COMPANY (US), LLC
    Inventors: Jonathan Sullivan, Diane Morovati Lopez, Christie Summers, Jake Ryan Dailey, Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui
  • Publication number: 20230117942
    Abstract: Disclosed examples access data from a database, the data stored across multiple registers of the database; determine (a) a maximum rank for each of the multiple registers and (b) a maximum rank count for each of the multiple registers; determine a frequency distribution based on the maximum ranks and the maximum rank counts; and generate a report including at least one of the frequency distribution, the maximum ranks, or the maximum rank counts.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 8, 2022
    Publication date: April 20, 2023
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Jonathan Sullivan
  • Publication number: 20230120709
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture to estimate cardinality through ordered statistics are disclosed. In an example, an apparatus includes processor circuitry to selects a sample dataset from a first reference dataset of media assets and partitions the sample dataset into m mutually exclusive subsets of approximately equal size. The processor circuitry then estimates a ratio of a sample weighted average and empirical cumulative distribution of an approximately largest order statistic from at least one of the m subsets and generates an estimate of a total cardinality of the first reference dataset by multiplying the ratio by approximately m.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 29, 2022
    Publication date: April 20, 2023
    Inventor: Michael R. Sheppard
  • Publication number: 20230105467
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems and articles of manufacture to estimate and deduplicate audiences are disclosed herein. An example apparatus includes a controller to determine a subunion of at least first and second marginal audiences of media based on of panel data and census data, the panel data including a panel impression count and a panel audience size, and the census data including a census impression count, an audience size calculator to determine a census audience size of the at least the first and second marginal audiences based on the panel impression count and the panel audience size and determine a subunion census audience size, the subunion census audience size corresponding to an overlap between the at least the first and second marginal audiences; and a report generator to generate a report including the census audience size and the subunion census audience size.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 6, 2022
    Publication date: April 6, 2023
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui, Diane Morovati Lopez, Molly Poppie
  • Publication number: 20230052274
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture are disclosed to determine unique audience size via clustered data. An example apparatus includes memory, machine readable instructions, and processor circuitry to at least one of execute or instantiate the machine readable instructions. The example processor circuitry is to form a first matrix identifying matching and non-matching instances of first values of respective demographics of an audience of media and second values of the respective demographics. Also, the processor circuitry is to normalize the first matrix to generate an account sharing adjustment matrix. Additionally, the processor circuitry is to apply the account sharing adjustment matrix to a vector of one or more counts of impressions of the media to correct for one or more members of the audience that share a user account registered with a database proprietor, the one or more counts of the impressions corresponding to the respective demographics.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 28, 2022
    Publication date: February 16, 2023
    Inventors: Dipti Umesh Shah, Michael R. Sheppard, Jing Liu, Olabode O. Oyeneye, Edward Murphy, Jonathan Sullivan, Matthew Zipoy
  • Publication number: 20230023392
    Abstract: A disclosed example includes at least one memory, programmable circuitry, and instructions to cause the programmable circuitry to increment a first value corresponding to a first position in a vector based on a first bit value representation, the first bit value representation corresponding to a first audience member identifier; increment a second value corresponding to a second position in the vector based on a second bit value representation, the second bit value representation corresponding to a second audience member identifier; estimate the second frequency moment of the media impression data using the vector; determine the variance of the second frequency moment; and based on the second frequency moment, schedule a query of the media impression data to be processed by a computer at a future time.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 19, 2022
    Publication date: January 26, 2023
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Jonathan Sullivan, Jake Ryan Dailey, Diane Morovati Lopez, Molly Poppie
  • Patent number: 11562015
    Abstract: Methods and apparatus for determining a unique audience exposed to media while reducing memory resources of a computing device are disclosed herein. An example apparatus includes memory; instructions in the apparatus; and processor circuitry to execute the instruction to, based on impression requests from a plurality of client devices via a network, log a plurality of impressions corresponding to media accessed at the client devices; generate a product by multiplying a count of the impressions by a square of a count of registered users of a database proprietor exposed to the media; generate a quotient by dividing the product by a count of demographic impressions logged by the database proprietor; and determine a unique audience size based on a square root of the quotient.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 21, 2022
    Date of Patent: January 24, 2023
    Assignee: The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Jonathan Sullivan, Peter Lipa, Matthew B. Reid, Peter C. Doe, Peng Fei Yi
  • Patent number: 11481802
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems and articles of manufacture to estimate and deduplicate audiences are disclosed herein. An example apparatus includes a controller to determine a subunion of at least first and second marginal audiences of media based on of panel data and census data, the panel data including a panel impression count and a panel audience size, and the census data including a census impression count, an audience size calculator to determine a census audience size of the at least the first and second marginal audiences based on the panel impression count and the panel audience size and determine a subunion census audience size, the subunion census audience size corresponding to an overlap between the at least the first and second marginal audiences; and a report generator to generate a report including the census audience size and the subunion census audience size.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 31, 2020
    Date of Patent: October 25, 2022
    Assignee: The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Dongbo Cui, Diane Morovati Lopez, Molly Poppie
  • Patent number: 11455652
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems and articles of manufacture are disclosed that estimate the second frequency moment. An example apparatus includes a hashing generator to input a first audience member identifier and a second audience member identifier of the media impression data through a hashing function, an output of the hashing generator being a first bit-value representation of the first audience member identifier and a second bit-value representation of the second audience member identifier, a vector generator to increment first and second values of corresponding first and second positions in a vector based on the first and second bit-value representations, respectively, a second frequency moment generator to estimate the second frequency moment of the media impression data using the vector, and a comparator to, using the second frequency moment, determine whether a computer can complete a query request of the media impression data based on query processing constraints.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 30, 2020
    Date of Patent: September 27, 2022
    Assignee: The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Jonathan Sullivan, Jake Ryan Dailey, Diane Morovati Lopez, Molly Poppie
  • Publication number: 20220277340
    Abstract: A disclosed example apparatus includes a communication interface to: access impression count data corresponding to a plurality of platforms; and access deduplicated total audience size data; an arithmetic logic unit to: generate a total impressions count by aggregating the impression count data corresponding to the plurality of platforms; generate an estimated per-platform impression count by dividing the total impressions count by a number of the platforms, a solver controller to: instruct a numerical solver to utilize the number of the platforms, the deduplicated total audience size data, and the estimated per-platform impression count to estimate the deduplicated audience size of a first platform of the platforms; and store the deduplicated audience size of the first platform in memory.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 27, 2021
    Publication date: September 1, 2022
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui, David Forteguerre, Jessica Lynn White, Edward Murphy
  • Publication number: 20220264187
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture to perform computer-based monitoring of audiences of network-based media using information theory to estimate intermediate level unions are disclosed. An example apparatus to determine a deduplicated, census-based audience metric of media includes panel union calculator circuitry to calculate a threshold statistic corresponding to an intermediate union of a panel hierarchy, and census union calculator circuitry to calculate a deduplicated audience value corresponding to the intermediate union of the census hierarchy based on the threshold statistic.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 7, 2022
    Publication date: August 18, 2022
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui, David Forteguerre, Jessica Lynn White, Edward Murphy
  • Publication number: 20220253466
    Abstract: Methods, and apparatus are disclosed to estimate a deduplicated audience of a partitioned audience of media presentations. An example apparatus includes interface circuitry, instructions in the apparatus, and processor circuitry to execute the instructions to at least: identify one or more nodes of a graph structure selected for estimation of a deduplicated audience, and estimate a value indicative of the deduplicated audience across a first selected node of the graph structure and a second selected node of the graph structure.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 8, 2022
    Publication date: August 11, 2022
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, DongBo Cui, David Forteguerre, Jessica Lynn White, Edward Murphy
  • Publication number: 20220253895
    Abstract: A disclosed example includes determining a plurality of cross-demographic total census parameter values based on ratios of third-party impression counts and third-party audience sizes, selecting a first cross-demographic total census parameter value as an upper bound constraint from the plurality of cross-demographic total census parameter values based on comparisons between ones of the plurality of cross-demographic total census parameter values, selecting a second cross-demographic total census parameter value from the plurality of cross-demographic total census parameter values based on the second cross-demographic total census parameter value being less than the upper bound constraint, determining a first census-level audience size based on the second cross-demographic total census parameter value, and determining a first census-level impression count based on the second cross-demographic total census parameter value.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 18, 2022
    Publication date: August 11, 2022
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Edward Murphy, Beate Sissenich, Edmond Wong, Jing Liu, Ludo Daemen
  • Publication number: 20220147559
    Abstract: Methods and apparatus for determining a unique audience exposed to media while reducing memory resources of a computing device are disclosed herein. An example apparatus includes memory; instructions in the apparatus; and processor circuitry to execute the instruction to, based on impression requests from a plurality of client devices via a network, log a plurality of impressions corresponding to media accessed at the client devices; generate a product by multiplying a count of the impressions by a square of a count of registered users of a database proprietor exposed to the media; generate a quotient by dividing the product by a count of demographic impressions logged by the database proprietor; and determine a unique audience size based on a square root of the quotient.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 21, 2022
    Publication date: May 12, 2022
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Jonathan Sullivan, Peter Lipa, Matthew B. Reid, Peter C. Doe, Peng Fei Yi
  • Patent number: 11308514
    Abstract: An example apparatus to determine census-based audience metrics of media across multiple demographics includes an audience size determiner to determine a first census-level audience size based on a third-party audience size, a third-party impression count, and a first cross-demographic total census parameter value; an impression counts determiner to determine a first census-level impression count based on the third-party audience size, the third-party impression count, and the first cross demographic total census parameter value; and a verifier to determine whether the first cross-demographic total census parameter value satisfies a constraint based on the first census-level impression count; and when the constraint is not satisfied the verifier to: (a) discard the first cross-demographic total census parameter value, and (b) select a second cross-demographic total census parameter value, the second cross-demographic total census parameter value to determine a second census-level audience size and a second ce
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 27, 2019
    Date of Patent: April 19, 2022
    Assignee: The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
    Inventors: Michael R. Sheppard, Edward Murphy, Beate Sissenich, Edmond Wong, Jing Liu, Ludo Daemen