A system and method for operating an ad extraction and reconciliation system for a broadcast system includes an extraction manager module that receives an advertisement schedule for an advertisement from an ad sales module. The system also includes a controller module that receives broadcast channel schedule data for broadcast channel signal from a broadcast channel system and generating an advertising content data request signal for advertising content data including an advertisement content identifier for the advertisement. The ad extraction manager module forms an advertisement insertion schedule having advertisement content identifier and an advertising insertion spot associated with the advertising content identifier. The controller communicates the advertisement insertion schedule to a broadcast scheduling system.

A system may receive a plurality of requests to record a plurality of programs. Based on these requests, resources may be provisioned for transcoding variable bit rate streams into constant bit rate streams. Resources may be provisioned based on assigning transcoding tasks to an existing set of deployed devices in which the transcoding tasks correspond to the plurality of requests. Resources may further be provisioned based on incrementally deploying an additional device to the existing set of deployed devices when the transcoding capacity reaches a certain level.

The serving of content with (e.g., on) video documents may be improved in a number of ways. For example, a system may accept information defining at least one ad spot associated with at least one instance of an video document, accept offers to have ads served in the ad spot(s), and arbitrate among competing ads, using at least the offers, to determine at least one ad to be served in that ad spot(s). As another example, a system may accept relevance information for an ad, determine at least one video document using the accepted relevance information, present information about the video document(s) to an ad provider associated with the ad, and accept, from the ad provider, an offer to have its ad served with at least one of the video document(s) accepted. As yet another example, a system may accept relevance information for an video document, determine a plurality of ads relevant to the video document using the relevance information and serving constraints of the ads, and select at least one of the determined relevant ads to be served with the video document. Examples of video documents include video files published on the Internet, television programs, live or recorded talk shows, video-voice mail, segments of a video conversation, etc.

A method and an apparatus are used to target interactive virtual objects to subscribers in a television delivery system. Programs are selected and virtual object locations are defined in the selected programs. The virtual objects available for targeting are categorized and the categories are correlated to subscriber information to determine the optimum targeting of the virtual objects. The virtual objects may be targeted based on individual subscriber information or on information related to groups of subscribers. When a frame of a program includes a virtual object location, a default or an alternate virtual object is displayed. The virtual object location may change over space or time. The virtual object may be interactive, and may be used to link a subscriber to a remote location, such as an Internet web site. An operations center or a cable headend may generate a group assignment plan that assigns the subscribers' television terminals to groups, based on factors such as area of dominant influence and household income. A retrieval plan is then generated that instructs the television terminals to select the desired virtual object for display. The television terminals record which virtual objects were displayed, and report this information to the cable headends and the operations center. The reported information is used to generate billing for commercial advertisers, and to analyze viewer watching habits. Interactive virtual objects are received by the television terminal with directions on actions to be taken upon selection of the interactive virtual object. Actions may result in the initiation of processes locally at the television terminal, or communication with a remote site for the initiation of processes to be performed remotely. The invention uses upstream data reception hardware, databases and processing hardware and software, and corresponding features in the televisions to accomplish these functions.

A method and apparatus for storing and distributing video information in an interactive information distribution system by storing video information on either a centralized or de-centralized secondary storage partition in a network of provider and subscriber equipment, and therein distributing the video information to a subscriber having made a request for such video information.

A communal media system includes a content management system for storing multimedia content and a synchronization system configured to: retrieve the multimedia content for delivery to a plurality of user devices and receive social media content generated by the user devices; separate the multimedia content and the social media content into a set of prioritized layers; determine a timestamp offset for each of the user devices; and adjust simultaneous deliveries of the multimedia content and the social media content to the user devices, based on a priority associated each layer and the timestamp offset associated with each user device, The multimedia content is delivered to each user devices at the same time and the social media content is delivered to the user devices at the same time while the multimedia content is being viewed on the user devices.

A system and method to tag portions of a video with an access-control-list (ACL) for those periods of time (e.g., video segments, series of video frames, etc.) within a video that require elevated permission to view or access is provided. At playback time, the access-control-list is dynamically enforced in real-time to ensure that a user viewing or editing the video has permissions to view upcoming portions of the video. When a user has insufficient permission to view a portion of the video, a filler frame, blurred content or blank frame is displayed in the place of the actual video content. Audio may also be muted or beeped out during the periods of the video for which there is insufficient permissions.

In various embodiments, a graph streaming application computes a first distance along a first potential playback path between a first playback position and a first media content block. The graph streaming application then computes a first score for the first media content block based on the first distance and a first probability associated with the first potential playback path. Similarly, the graph streaming application computes a second score for a second media content block based on a second playback position, a second potential playback path, and a second probability associated with the second potential playback path. The graph streaming application compares the first score and the second score to determine that the first media content block should be buffered by a client device. The graph streaming application then causes the first media content block to be stored in a playback buffer for subsequent playback on the client device.

Provided is a system that includes a circuit to generate an interactive item based on a request received from a first distribution network or a second distribution network. The interactive item is overlaid over a media item present in media content. The circuit then activates the generated interactive item overlaid over the media item of the media content. Further, the circuit receives an event trigger, from a client application engine operational on a user device associated with a user, for a selection of the activated interactive item. A personalized list is generated for the event trigger for the selection of the interactive item. Further, the generated personalized list is transmitted for a display for a defined time duration, to one of the first distribution network, the second distribution network or the client application engine operational on the user device.

A television advertising management system that handles a plurality of deals for a plurality of advertiser, determines which of the plurality of deals have a guaranteed audience, and are under delivering, and allocates reserve under delivery units to each of the plurality of deals that are under delivering to bring each of the plurality of deals that are under delivering to corresponding attainable lower targets while honoring corresponding deal constraints. An under delivery value is maximized such that the attainable lower targets are met, while honoring corresponding deal constraints to provide an allocation solution, and a total penalty from deviations from selling title mix distributions, and weekly distributions is minimized for each of the plurality of deals that are under delivering subject to an additional lower bound on the under delivery value.