| US 7,373,313 B1 | ||
| Service for enabling users to share information regarding products represented on web pages | ||
| Brewster P. Kahle, San Francisco, Calif. (US); Niall P. O'Driscoll, San Francisco, Calif. (US); Ronna C. Tanenbaum, San Francisco, Calif. (US); Jeffrey Bartolotta, San Francisco, Calif. (US); Sondra L. Cholach, San Francisco, Calif. (US); and Paul Van Der Merwe Sauer, San Francisco, Calif. (US) | ||
| Assigned to Alexa Internet, San Francisco, Calif. (US) | ||
| Filed on Mar. 28, 2001, as Appl. No. 9/820,207. | ||
| Claims priority of provisional application 60/199569, filed on Apr. 25, 2000. | ||
| Int. Cl. G06Q 30/00 (2006.01) | ||
| U.S. Cl. 705—26 [705/1; 705/14; 705/27] | 22 Claims |
| 1. A system for facilitating sharing of information between web users, the system comprising:
a client program that runs on user computers in conjunction with web browsing software, and presents supplementary information
associated with web pages accessed by users on said user computers; and
a data server that communicates over a network with the user computers that run the client program, and sends said supplementary
information to the user computers for presentation by the client program, wherein the data server interacts with the client
program to identify products described on particular web pages;
wherein the client program and data server collectively implement a service in which (a) when a first user accesses a first
web page that describes a first product, the first user is provided an option to complete and submit a form that requests
at least one specific type of product-related information associated with the first product, (b) after the first user completes
and submits the form, as presented in association with the first web page, to submit product-related information associated
with the first product, the submitted product-related information is stored on the data server in association with an identifier
of the first product, and (c) when a second user accesses a second web page identified by the service as describing said first
product, the second user is provided an option to view at least the product-related information submitted by the first user,
said option to view provided independently of whether the second user has selected the first product;
whereby the client program and data server collectively provide functionality for users to share product-related information
across different web pages that describe a common product.
|