Methods and systems for receiving and distributing annotations of a digital work include receiving an annotation of the digital work, storing the annotation, and providing the annotation to a user. The user may be required to submit a valid authorization credential for the annotation. annotations may be textual or graphical, and may be associated with particular content in a digital work. Indicators may be displayed to identify content in the digital work for which annotations are available. A user may exchange compensation or perform a specified action for access to an annotation. Some or all of the compensation received for an annotation may be distributed to the author of the annotation. Multiple annotations may be listed in an order based a criterion, such as ranking, price, or date of receipt. users that purchase a digital work may automatically receive an authorization credential to receive annotations of the digital work.
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44. A computing system programmed to provide a marketplace for annotations of digital works, comprising:
a computing subsystem that receives digital works from a plurality of sources;
a computing subsystem that receives annotations of digital works from a plurality of authors;
a computing subsystem that receives requests for annotations from a plurality of users and delivers annotations to requesting users; and
a computing subsystem that facilitates receiving compensation from users for delivery of annotations and distributing compensation to authors of the delivered annotations,
wherein the compensation distributed to an author is conditioned on an indication of satisfaction from the user to whom the annotation was delivered.
33. A computer-implemented method for providing an annotation of a digital work, comprising:
under control of instructions that are executed by one or more computing devices:
obtaining a first representation of a digital work, the first representation comprising one or more images;
obtaining a second representation of the digital work, the second representation comprising content of the digital work in a form that allows particular content of the digital work to be indicated, the particular content being correlatable with one or more locations in the one or more images at which the particular content is represented;
receiving an annotation of the digital work in regard to indicated particular content of the digital work; and
providing to a user the annotation in context with regard to the digital work.
49. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, in response to execution by a computing system, cause the computing system to:
receive multiple annotations from different authors for particular content in a digital work;
store the annotations in association with the digital work;
provide a list of abbreviated versions of the annotations to a user desiring to access one or more of the annotations, wherein the list presents the annotations in an order determined by reference to a criterion;
receive an authorization credential from the user desiring to access one or more of the annotations; and
if the authorization credential is valid, provide a full version of the one or more annotations of the digital work to the user in context with regard to the digital work.
1. A computer-implemented method for providing an annotation of a digital work, comprising:
under control of instructions that are executed by one or more computing devices:
receiving multiple annotations from different authors for particular content in a digital work;
storing the annotations in association with the digital work;
providing a list of abbreviated versions of the annotations to a user desiring to access one or more of the annotations, wherein the list presents the annotations in an order determined by reference to a criterion;
receiving an authorization credential from a user desiring to access one or more of the annotations; and
if the authorization credential is valid, providing a full version of one or more of the annotations of the digital work to the user in context with regard to the digital work.
23. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, in response to execution by a computing system, cause the computing system to:
receive from a client system an annotation of a digital work by a first user;
store the annotation in a memory in association with the digital work;
require a second user desiring to access the annotation of the first user to perform a specified action before providing an authorization credential to the second user, wherein the specified action is contributing an annotation of a digital work; and
upon receipt of the authorization credential from the second user desiring to access the annotation, provide the annotation to a client system for output to the second user, wherein the annotation is provided in context with regard to the digital work.
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The present invention relates to distribution of digital works, and more particularly to creating a market for distribution of annotations of digital works.
For many years, print media provided the only way to transmit information and ideas in a fixed form. With the advent of photography and audio recording, additional media have become available for transmitting information and ideas. The information in such media, however, is static. Updated information is provided only by preparing and distributing additional media. However, widespread distribution of updated information, including comments, supplements, features, thoughts, insights, etc., becomes difficult when the information is authored by multiple parties. Media consumers having additional information or insight typically do not have a way to effectively share that information with other consumers. What is needed is a method and system that allows users of media to easily annotate the media and afterward distribute such annotations to others in an economical and efficient manner. The present invention addresses this need and other shortcomings in the prior art.
In one aspect, a method and system for receiving and distributing annotations of a digital work includes identifying a digital work and receiving an annotation of the digital work. The annotation may be stored in a database in association with the digital work. A user desiring to access the annotation submits an authorization credential that, if valid, enables the user to receive the annotation of the digital work. The annotation may be presented to the user in context with regard to the digital work.
In some embodiments, a digital work may be annotated with textual or graphical annotations. Examples of graphical annotations include handwritten text and pictures, as well as typed text, clips from other works, images, etc. Annotations may also include, for example, highlighting of text in a digital work. If desired, an annotation may be associated with particular content in a digital work.
An annotation delivered to a user may be viewable concurrent with a display of the digital work with which the annotation is associated. In some embodiments, annotations may be normally hidden and become viewable when a user positions a cursor or pointer near particular content in the digital work to which the annotations pertain. Indicators may be displayed with the digital work to identify content in the digital work for which annotations are available. If the digital work is an audio or audiovisual work, indicators identifying annotations may be displayed with a playback control provided for playback of the digital work. In yet other embodiments, the availability of annotations for a digital work may be identified by indicators in a listing of contents for the digital work.
In another aspect, a user may obtain an authorization credential for an annotation in exchange for compensation. The user may then submit the authorization credential to obtain the desired annotation. In some circumstances, the authorization credential may represent compensation from the user. Where monetary compensation is received for an annotation, some or all of the compensation may be distributed to the author of the annotation. An indication of satisfaction from the user to whom the annotation is provided may be required before the compensation is distributed to the author. A user may submit an authorization credential that is specific to an annotation and have it considered as a request for the particular annotation.
When multiple annotations are associated with particular content in a digital work, a user desiring annotations may be provided with a list that presents the multiple annotations in an order determined by reference to a criterion. In some embodiments, the criterion may be a ranking of the annotations assigned by others who have previously viewed the annotations. In other embodiments, the criterion may be a price assigned to each of the annotations. In yet other embodiments, the criterion may be a date of receipt of each of the annotations.
In another aspect, users that purchase a digital work may automatically be given an authorization credential that enables them to receive annotations of the digital work. Such annotations, when combined with the digital work to which they pertain, may be configured to become accessible to the user upon accessing the digital work.
In another aspect, a user may be given an authorization credential in exchange for performance of a specified action. For example, an authorization credential may be given to a user as a reward for electronically previewing a digital work or contributing an annotation of a digital work.
Embodiments of the invention may also enable multiple parties to be authorized distributors of credentials for access to annotations. Members of a family, a group of students in a class, or participants in a book club, for example, may annotate a digital work and share their annotations with the others in their family or group by distributing appropriate authorization credentials among the family or group.
Computer systems may be configured to provide features and aspects of the present invention. For example, a server system may be configured to interact with a client system to receive and provide annotations of a digital work. The server system may comprise, for example, an interface for communicating with one or more client systems, a memory, and a processor for executing program instructions stored in the memory. The server system may receive from a client system an annotation of the digital work. If desired, the annotation may be associated with particular content in the digital work. The server system may store the annotation in the memory and upon receipt of a valid authorization credential from a client system, the server system may provide the annotation to the client system, possibly with an indication of the particular content in the digital work to which the annotation pertains.
The foregoing aspects and many of the attendant advantages of this invention will become more readily appreciated as the same become better understood by reference to the following detailed description, when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
Also depicted in
The terms “user”, “author” and “source” are generally used herein. A “user” typically refers to a person, entity or device that seeks to receive an annotation previously stored in association with a digital work. An “author” typically refers to a person, entity or device that prepares an annotation for storage and distribution to users. A “source” typically refers to a person, entity, or device that originates a digital work that may be annotated by an “author”. As should be readily appreciated, a person, entity or device can be a source, an author and/or a user, depending on the distribution of a digital work and whether an annotation is being prepared or requested. Accordingly, at different times, the users 18, 20 can be “authors” and the authors 32, 34 can be “users”, and any of them (or some other third party) may be the source of a digital work.
As will be described with regard to the particular embodiments shown herein, the server system 10 is configured to exchange data and information, including digital works and annotations thereof, with the users 18, 20 who are operating the client systems 12, 14 and the authors 32, 34 who are operating the client systems 28, 30. In some circumstances, the server system 10 may be associated with a merchant, such as an online retailer authorized to provide a marketplace for selling and distributing digital works to consumers. Digital works, in the context of this description, may include any type of content that can be stored and distributed in digital form. By way of illustration, without limitation, digital works can include all forms of textual information such as books, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, manuals, guides, references, photographs, articles, reports, documents, etc., and all forms of audio and audiovisual works such as music, multimedia presentations, audio books, movies, etc.
Digital works may be stored as media files in a digital works database 22 that resides in or is otherwise communicatively connected to the server system 10. An annotations database 24 and a transaction information database 26 are also shown in
The network 16 shown in
When software formed in accordance with the invention is implemented in one or more computer systems, for example, of the type illustrated in
The server system 10 shown in
The server system 10 shown in
The memory 52 additionally stores program code and data for providing network services that allow client systems to exchange information and data files with the server system 10. Accordingly, the memory 52 may store a Web server application 68, which may be provided by any one of a number of commercially available software packages. The Web server application 68 comprises computer executable instructions, that, when executed by the processor 50, generate or otherwise obtain configurable markup documents such as the sample Web pages shown in
The video display adapter 54 provides display signals to a local display (not shown in
Further included in the server system 10 is a mass storage 74 comprising facilities such as one or more CD-RW/DVD-RW drives, hard disk drives, tape drives, etc., or combinations thereof, that are utilized to store digital content and information, such as annotations. In the embodiment shown in
Turning back to
The above-described computer systems may store software instructions that, when executed, implement aspects and features of the present invention. For example, such software can be stored on a computer-accessible medium (e.g., magnetic or optical disk or other device), or downloaded from a remote source, for loading into memory 52 to be executed by the processor 50. For illustrative purposes, described herein are embodiments of the invention that allow authors and users to access digital works, to receive annotations of those digital works from authors and to provide annotations of digital works to users, typically in exchange for some form of compensation or completed action by the user. Although the illustrative examples described herein depict a Web-based implementation, those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that other embodiments of the invention may use other implementations for communication and display of information to authors and users.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/669,088, filed Sep. 23, 2003, which is commonly owned by the assignee of the present invention and incorporated by reference herein, discloses embodiments of systems that may be used in connection with embodiments of the present invention. Such systems may include one or more databases that include digital works in multiple representations. One representation of a digital work may include images of pages of content, while another representation of the digital work may include text searchable forms of the content. The content in the page images correlates with the text searchable form of the content. The page images may be stored in a page image database, while the searchable text may be stored in a text searchable database. Images of pages of content may be acquired using methods known in the art, such as scanning printed pages, converting electronic text to document images, retrieving page images from memory, receiving page images from others, etc.
For each image of a page of content, a recognition routine, such as an optical character recognition (OCR), may be performed on the page image to identify the text, position, and size of each word on the page and provide a text searchable representation of the page. A “word,” in this context, may encompass any grouping of one or more characters, numbers, or symbols. Moreover, a word may stand alone or be associated with a non-text object, such as a picture or graphic. OCR routines are well known in the art of electronic document processing and do not require further discussion herein. The resulting text, position, and size information obtained from processing text on page images is may be stored in the text searchable database.
The text searchable database may be organized as desired, which may include using data structures optimized for full text searching. In one suitable embodiment, each word in the text searchable database has associated therewith content identification numbers for digital works (e.g., SKU numbers) and page numbers corresponding to the digital work and the images in the page image database where the particular word is found. Furthermore, the text searchable database typically includes information that identifies the position and size of the text (and possibly non-text objects associated with the text) as found on each respective page image. In one implementation, the position and size information is recorded as “quads,” which include four numbers representing the X and Y position and the width and height of the text as it appears on a particular page image. All of this information may be encoded in the text searchable database to reduce the storage space required.
As will be described in more detail below, in some embodiments an annotation may be received in regard to particular content of a digital work. A text searchable database as discussed above can be used to enable an author of an annotation (or other person, entity or device) to indicate particular content in a digital work and associate an annotation with the particular content. As noted, the text searchable database may be constructed to include information that helps identify the image(s) in the page image database corresponding to the particular content. Thus, when an author of an annotation indicates particular content in a digital work by selecting text in the text searchable database, the selected text not only identifies the particular content that the author is annotating, but also identifies the corresponding page image(s) in the page image database where the particular content is represented. Word position and size information as discussed above may be helpful in this regard in that it correlates text in the text searchable database with the location of text as represented in a corresponding page image.
Supposing, for example, the author 34 (
As indicated at block 84 in
Embodiments of the present invention have a wide applicability of which the following examples are only a small part. The following examples give selected contexts for appreciating several advantages of the invention. An annotation, for example, may be a critique or alternatively a summary of the digital work. An annotation may be a separate essay on the same topic presented in the digital work. Annotations may be words, graphs, formulae, files, images, enhancements, etc., provided by the user. For example, a user may wish to annotate a travel book by providing recent images of locations described in the travel book. For digital works that are audio, such as music files, authors can annotate the music files with additional content commenting on the songs, providing background information on the singer or the recording process, alternative lyrics, technical information as to the composition, related musical compositions, etc. In a circumstance where the digital work is a cookbook, for example, authors may submit alternative ingredients that enhance a recipe, ingredients that make a spicier dish, ingredient substitutions considered to be lower in fat or carbohydrates, etc. In another circumstance, a student or teacher as an author may provide a markup of an academic textbook. As can be appreciated from the foregoing, there is virtually no limitation to the type, form and content of annotations that can be added to a digital work. By way of illustration, an annotation can also be in the form of a link or address to another page, file, or document available to the server system or the client system(s).
A user, such as the user 18 shown in
As indicated at block 88 in
Authorization credentials presented by users may take any form appropriate for processing in the server system 10. For example, an authorization credential may be a token comprised of symbols or an alphanumeric code that is recognized in the server system 10. Users may obtain authorization credentials for accessing annotations in various ways. For example, a user purchasing a digital work may automatically receive an authorization credential to receive present and/or future annotations of the digital work without charge. Alternatively, a user may provide some form of compensation to the server system 10, such as a monetary payment or other item or representation of value. A user may also receive an authorization credential as an incentive for performing an action specified by the server system 10. For example, a user may receive an authorization credential for electronically previewing a digital work or purchasing one or more related digital works or annotations. Users may also receive authorization credentials for performing actions such as filling out surveys, participating in games, or providing annotations to digital works. In some circumstances, free access to annotations may be provided by simply giving the user an authorized credential when the user requests access to the annotation.
The server system 10 is configured to receive an authorization credential from a user requesting an annotation and determine whether the credential is valid, thus enabling the user to access the annotation. A user's authorization credential can be determined valid in any suitable manner, including comparing a user-submitted credential to a list of known credentials that have been authorized and distributed to users. Use of a credential may cause the credential to be removed from the list in this example, in cases where the credential is intended for a single use. Validation of an authorization credential may be separately communicated to the user or simply followed by delivery of the requested annotation to the user.
In other embodiments, an authorization credential may be generated and distributed for use with a specific annotation or group of annotations and as such, may be used only to authorize access to the specific annotation or group of annotations. Moreover, depending on the format of the authorization credential, the authorization credential may itself identify the annotation to which it pertains. In that case (where the authorization credential identifies the annotation), embodiments of the invention may be configured to receive the authorization credential and automatically consider it as a request for the annotation. A user may thus request an annotation and present the authorization credential in a single step.
Authorization credentials can be advantageously used to create a market for distribution of annotations to others. For example, where a user intends to submit monetary compensation for annotations, the user may be given a price list for annotations to a digital work. The user can then select which annotations the user desires to receive and pay for the annotations. In other embodiments, a subscription model may be used where the user pays a monthly or annual fee to have access to certain groups or all available annotations. Commercially-available payment processing systems may be used by an online marketplace 36 (
Another aspect of creating a market for annotations of digital works is to provide incentive for users to submit annotations.
It should be noted that “authors” and “users” can be, and typically are, distinct from the persons, entities, or devices that are the creators, originators, producers, publishers, distributors, or other “sources” of digital works to be annotated. To further illustrate distinctions between “authors”, “users”, and “sources”, consider a person A who writes a book that publisher P publishes in hardbound, paperback, audio (e.g., “books on tape”), and/or digital forms (e.g., electronic books that can be viewed using a suitable device incorporating a visual display), these forms of the book being distributed to the public, for example, through retail outlets such as book stores, book clubs, and online marketplaces accessible via computer networks. As to the last, publisher P may authorize the limited reproduction of all or selected portions of the book by such online marketplaces for promotional purposes.
Now consider a person B who wishes to write a review of the book, as for a newspaper, magazine, online journal, or even for one of the online marketplaces that offers the book for sale. In accordance with suitable embodiments of the invention, person B's review can be (or can become) an annotation to A's book, given proper authorization(s) by A, P, and/or B for this to occur, and can be bought, sold, traded, rented, etc., at the same online marketplace as A's book and/or at other online marketplaces or retail establishments. B's review need not be limited to a conventional self-contained review essay that is written to be read separately from A's book. Instead (or additionally), in accordance with embodiments of the invention, B may write some or all of the book review as a set of annotations that pertain to, and are fully understandable when read in context with, specific sections or passages of the book.
For example, B's review may focus on textual passages or pictures or diagrams in A's book that, to B's sensibilities, seem particularly noteworthy, and link or associate these with corresponding portions of the review. In other words, B annotates the passages or images, and the annotations, taken together, make up some or all of B's book review.
With A's original work and B's review now available, it becomes possible for another person C to annotate both A's book and B's review thereof, as digital works. A and/or B may, if they choose, respond to C's comments and to one another, with all these comments and responses being added as yet further annotations to A's book, suitably limited to or associated with pertinent passages and/or prior annotations, as appropriate, that are read in context with the pertinent sections or passages of the book.
The entire set of annotations or subsets thereof (e.g., only C's annotations, or only A's responses, or only annotations made at the behest of publisher P) can be made available with appropriate authorizations from A, B, C, and P, as may be necessary (or, in some instances, under the doctrine of fair use or other legal rubric without prior authorization) for purchase, rental, exchange, or other use by a consumer D. Thus, A and P may be considered “sources” in this example; B, C and A (in the role of responding to B's and C's annotations) may be considered “authors”; and D may be considered a “user”. Further, a particular online marketplace M (or other forum in which annotations and annotated digital works according to the invention are made available to “users”) may be considered none of these, although it will be appreciated that in some situations where publisher P owns marketplace M or vice versa, or where A self-publishes a book through M without the assistance of a conventional publisher P, M may be viewed as a “source”.
As will be described below in reference to
Furthermore, indicators may be included in the digital work to identify particular content having annotations. In a textual digital work for example, the indicators may appear as footnotes, graphical icons, symbols, characters, or other indicia that are located with the text. Where the digital work is an audio work or an audiovisual work, an annotation associated with particular content in the digital work may be identified by an indicator in a playback control provided for playback of the digital work. In yet another alternative, a digital work having annotations pertaining to particular content in the digital work may provide a listing of contents for the digital work with indicators in the listing of contents identifying the location of the annotations.
Turning now to the example given in
Displayed with the digital work 122 are indicators 124, 126 indicating the presence of annotations to the digital work. The indicators 124, 126 may be graphical icons, characters, or symbols that are simply displayed with the digital work. Alternatively, the indicators 124, 126 may provide active links that initiate the display of corresponding annotations when a user activates (e.g., checks or clicks on or hovers over) the indicators 124, 126.
The Web page illustrated in
In yet another embodiment of the invention, a Web browser 140 as shown in
Digital works and/or annotations may also be received from authors and presented to users in an audio or audiovisual form, as illustrated in
Annotations to the audio or audiovisual work may be indicated by indicators 156 and 158, for example, associated with the playback control 152. In the embodiment shown in
Alternatively, a digital work may be presented in textual form with annotations in an audio or audiovisual format. Activating an indicator in the display of the digital work may cause a playback control 152 and controls 153 to appear for operating the playback of the annotation to the digital work. If the annotation of a digital work is an image, activating the annotation indicator in the digital work may cause a window, such as window 154, to appear with the image annotation. As should be appreciated from the foregoing, the presentation and format of annotations of digital works is not limited.
Another criterion for ordering a list of annotations is the price assigned to each of the annotations. A user may choose to have the lowest priced annotations or the highest priced annotations listed first. Yet another criterion for determining the order of annotations is the date of receipt of each of the annotations. For example, annotations that are more recent may be presented above annotations that are older. Other suitable criteria can be readily recognized by persons having ordinary skill in the art.
In some circumstances, user receipt of annotations may be conditioned on prior purchase of the digital work to which the annotations pertain. Conditioning the receipt of annotations on the purchase of the underlying digital work provides incentive to users to purchase the work. Moreover, authors of underlying digital works are more likely to grant permission to users to add annotations to the digital work, where such permissions are necessary. A user's purchase of the underlying digital work may be recorded by the transaction manager 72 in the transaction information database 26 and later referenced when the user requests the annotations to the digital work.
Also as noted earlier, authors submitting annotations may indicate particular content in the digital work to which the annotations pertain. Where the digital work is, for example, a book, annotations may pertain to the whole work or particular portions of the work, for example, a chapter, certain pages, or certain text on a page.
Further embodiments of the invention may allow users to receive authorization credentials to access annotations from one or more authorized distributors of credentials. For example, an entity providing only annotations to digital works may have a relationship with an online retailer that permits the online retailer to give authorization credentials to purchasers of digital works, which authorization credentials are valid for use in accessing annotations of the purchased works from the entity. In another circumstance, the author of an annotation may become an authorized distributor and distribute authorization credentials to others, allowing them to access the particular author's annotations. Distribution of access credentials in this manner may be advantageous where an author wishes to provide access to his or her annotations to selected family, friends, etc. For example, a group of students in a class or book club may each annotate a digital work and share their annotations with the others in their group by appropriate distribution of authorization credentials among the group. In yet another environment, a publisher may be an authorized distributor that distributes valid credentials for accessing annotations to works published by the publisher.
In still further embodiments of the invention, a computer-implemented method may be provided which includes obtaining a first representation of a digital work, the first representation comprising one or more images. A second representation of the digital work is obtained, the second representation comprising content of the digital work in a form that allows particular content of the digital work to be indicated. The particular content is correlatable with one or more locations in the one or more images at which the content is represented. The method further includes receiving an annotation of the digital work in regard to indicated particular content of the digital work, and providing to a user the annotation in context with regard to the digital work. In regard to the latter, one or more images of the digital work may be provided to the user such that the annotation is perceptibly associated by the user with the particular content in the digital work. For example, the annotation may be configured to appear to the user superposed on one or more of the images of the digital work. Alternatively, the annotation may be configured to appear adjacent to one or more of the images of the digital work. The one or more images may further include an indication of the particular content to which the annotation pertains. The indication of particular content to which the annotation pertains is typically received from the author of the annotation, though it may be received from others.
As previously noted, the annotation may be received from an author that is different than the source of the digital work. Likewise, the user to whom the annotation is provided may be different than the source of the digital work. It should be recognized that an annotation of a digital work may be further subject to annotation by another author.
In some embodiments, the annotation may be provided to the user via an online marketplace. If desired, the annotation may be provided to the user together with the digital work via the online marketplace.
While several exemplary embodiments of the invention have been illustrated and described above, it will be appreciated that various changes can be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. The scope of the invention, therefore, should be determined from the following claims and equivalents thereto.
Manber, Udi, Leblang, Jonathan, Siegel, Hilliard B
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