WO2000017824A1 - System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to various subject matter - Google Patents
System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to various subject matter Download PDFInfo
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- WO2000017824A1 WO2000017824A1 PCT/US1999/021201 US9921201W WO0017824A1 WO 2000017824 A1 WO2000017824 A1 WO 2000017824A1 US 9921201 W US9921201 W US 9921201W WO 0017824 A1 WO0017824 A1 WO 0017824A1
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- G—PHYSICS
- G07—CHECKING-DEVICES
- G07C—TIME OR ATTENDANCE REGISTERS; REGISTERING OR INDICATING THE WORKING OF MACHINES; GENERATING RANDOM NUMBERS; VOTING OR LOTTERY APPARATUS; ARRANGEMENTS, SYSTEMS OR APPARATUS FOR CHECKING NOT PROVIDED FOR ELSEWHERE
- G07C13/00—Voting apparatus
Definitions
- the present invention relates generally to communications through the utilization of a computer and the infrastructure of the Internet or an Intranet and more particularly to the utilization of a computer program to provide individual users an opportunity to express their opinions regarding defined subject matter or to signify agreement with other's opinions relating to such subject matter and to then rank the opinions relative to each other according to the number of agreements which each such opinion has received and to display such ranking.
- an interactive electronic apparatus for the purpose of user polling or testing or for message delivery, or for re-enforcement of information, or for didactic purposes.
- visual material is presented to a user and the user then reacts thereto by way of entries from a user activated input device such as a key pad, mouse, or the like.
- a user activated input device such as a key pad, mouse, or the like.
- these devices are used for preference sampling, educational test achievement or level, or in game playing.
- the material presented to the user in these interactive applications is normally fixed by the presenter.
- Applicant is unaware of any prior art system or method which permits a plurality of individuals to engage in a debate regarding a specific issue, without regard to geographic location, and to ascertain how other individuals agree or disagree with that individual's position through ranking of opinions on a computer screen in at least two dimensions.
- the present invention provides a system and method whereby an individual may obtain the opinions of other individuals with regard to predetermined issues, read those opinions and then express agreement or disagreement with respect to those opinions.
- the individual after reading the opinions of others with respect to a particular issue may then generate his or her own opinion regarding the issue in question and then submit that opinion for reading by others who may then designate their agreement or disagreement therewith.
- Such a system truly allows individuals to engage in interactive debate on issues of interest to them.
- the agreements or disagreements which are registered with regard to each opinion respecting a particular issue are instantaneously tallied.
- the number of specified agreements with a particular opinion are then compared to the specific agreements with respect to all of the other opinions relative to the particular issue and all of these various opinions directed to a particular predetermined issue are ranked according to the number of agreements therewith.
- the ranking is then displayed upon the computer screen in at least two dimensions which when taken together determine the relative ranking of each opinion with respect to all of the other opinions directed to that particular issue and will also indicate that opinion which has received the greatest number of agreements.
- Each of the opinions is represented on the computer screen by a symbol or element which can take any geometric form desired. These symbols also appear grouped within an additional geometric format which again may take any particular form desired such as a triangle, circle, square, cube, hexagon, stepped pyramid, or the like. As will be seen from discussions herein below a preferred form is a pyramid or triangular shape (with the base at the bottom) with each of the opinion symbols also being in the form of such a pyramid or triangle. To provide further information with respect to each of the opinions the symbol representing that opinion may be assigned a predetermined color.
- the colors assigned can indicate various information such as, for example, that opinion has been read and agreed with, that opinion has been read and disagreed with, that opinion is an unread opinion, or that opinion is the opinion of the individual viewing the information on the screen at that time.
- these colors provide information which is unique to that user with regard to what he or she has done with respect to each of the opinions shown on the screen with regard to the particular issue of concern.
- any remaining opinion symbols are left blank or transparent and thus only the background appearing on the screen behind the symbol shows through until such a time as another opinion is rendered and occupies another symbol.
- the user may by moving the cursor to a particular opinion symbol have displayed immediately on the screen an abstract of that particular opinion. Merely by moving the cursor to a different opinion symbol a brief or abstract of that opinion is immediately shown on the screen. Thus by merely positioning the cursor on an opinion symbol the brief of that opinion is shown. If the user desires to obtain the full opinion, then the user may merely click the mouse on that opinion symbol, the brief of which is displayed, to receive the full opinion.
- the status of the various opinions as to whether they are read, unread, agreed with or disagreed with, or are the user's opinions, is displayed and any unread opinions can be briefed and then the full opinion obtained with ease.
- the user is also provided with the ability of recalling any opinion which the user has read and agreed or disagreed with and changing the agreement or disagreement. By such change the relative rank of the opinion may be also changed.
- the user is provided the ability to search all of the debates which exist according to various criteria. The search may be conducted by subject matter, author, date, my debates (those debates created by the user) new debates and any combination of these criteria.
- pull-down menus are provided from which the user may select. If the user, for example, wishes to search by subject then the user is provided with a pull-down menu listing a multiplicity of nouns. The user then can select a combination of up to four nouns which would define a subject matter and an area for the debate of interest. The computer software program then queries the database containing the information regarding the various debates for existing debates with titles which would match one or more of the up to four nouns selected by the user. If the query does not find any debate which matches any of nouns then the user is so notified and is given the opportunity to select different nouns or to actually create the users own debate subject matter.
- the user interconnects to the web server from a personal computer connected to the Internet or an intranet through a web browser (Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Explorer for example) and requests a web page which includes a call to a debate Java applet.
- the web server downloads the debate applet thus causing the personal computer and its browser to become a virtual machine that runs the debate applet.
- the main function of the applet is to display the debate user interface and to communicate with a debate servlet to execute within a JVM (Java Virtual Machine).
- the servlets handle the communications with the applets, program logic and send read and write requests to the database server through a JDBC (Java Database Connectivity) driver.
- JDBC Java Database Connectivity
- the database utilized is a relational database that stores all the information regarding various debate users, such as geographic location, sex, race, religious background, age, income and the like, as well as subjects, opinions, votes and the like.
- the combination of web server, Java server and debate servlets constitutes a debate server.
- the debate server also extracts certain of the information which exists in the database such as opinion briefs, ranking, author and the like and stores it in a cache at the debate server. Some of the information is also placed in the browser cache in the user's personal computer.
- the database need only be accessed in the event that the users activity requires an updating of the database such as by voting or adding an opinion or if the user requests the full text of an opinion.
- the system may be scaled to handle a multiplicity of users, a multiplicity of web servers and a multiplicity of database servers if the demand by users for the debates program is extensive.
- a system and method for ranking opinions within a predetermined defined subject matter and by displaying information related thereto on a computer display screen which includes establishing defined subject matter upon which opinions may be rendered, identifying individuals who are qualified to have access to those opinions, allowing such individuals to access the opinions, to read the opinions and to specify an agreement or disagreement therewith, then comparing each agreement with each opinion with agreements with every other opinion related to the subject matter and then ranking all of the opinions relative to each other according to the number of agreements and displaying such rankings on the computer display screen in at least two dimensions.
- Figures 1 A through IE are illustrations of two and three dimensional opinion ranking shapes which may be displayed on the computer screen.
- Figure 2 is a simplified schematic illustrating the fundamental components of the system of the present invention
- Figure 3 is a schematic diagram illustrating in more detail a system in accordance with the present invention which utilizes a multiplicity of users, servers and databases;
- Figure 4 is an illustration of a screen showing the debates home page
- Figure 5 is a flow chart illustrating the entry by a user into the program; and showing the setup as required;
- Figure 6 illustrates the computer screen which is used in the setup step
- Figure 7 is a flow chart illustrating the search capability of the program
- Figure 8 is an illustration of a computer screen illustrating various search criteria available
- Figure 9 is an illustration of a computer screen showing a pull down menu with regard to certain search criteria
- Figure 10 is a flow chart illustrating the search by subject capability of the program
- Figure 11 is a flow chart showing administration and deployment of debates and opinions with respect thereto;
- Figure 12 is an illustration of a computer screen illustrating a brief and a full opinion which may be selected utilizing the flow chart of Figure 11 ;
- Figure 13 is a flow chart showing further administration and deployment with regard to opinions which have been selected;
- Figure 14 is an illustration of the computer screen showing one manner in which the opinions may be displayed and ranked;
- Figure 15 is a flow chart illustrating the search by author portion of the program
- Figure 16 is a flow chart showing the search by date portion of the program
- Figure 17 is an illustration of a computer screen providing a custom search by date entry by the user
- Figure 18 is an illustration of a computer screen displaying a list of debates found by a search.
- Figure 1 A there is shown a rectangle which has been divided into a plurality of sections by vertical and horizontal gridlines.
- the opinion which appears in the upper left hand corner would be ranked as the opinion having the most agreements of all of the opinions with respect to a particular debate subject matter which is of interest to the user and the opinions of which have been requested by the user.
- the ranking of the opinions for example would be accomplished in descending order line by line as illustrated in Figure 1 A.
- Figure IB An alternative geometric configuration is shown in Figure IB which is in the form of a step pyramid suggestive of the pyramids generated during the Mayan culture dominance in Mexico, Central and South America. Utilizing this geometric configuration it also may be divided into a plurality of sections by vertical and horizontal lines with each of the sections representing an opinion. The opinion residing in the upper most block would be the opinion which has the most agreements of all of the opinions with regard to the particular debate subject matter of interest to the user.
- a pyramid configuration or a triangle with the base at the bottom may be utilized.
- the pyramid shape shown in Figure 1 C is again sectionalized by lines drawn parallel to each of the three sides of the pyramid to thus create a plurality of additional pyramids or triangles within the two dimensional pyramidal shape.
- each of the internal pyramids or triangles represent an opinion with the uppermost one being the opinion having the most agreements of all of the opinions which have been generated with respect to the subject matter which is of particular interest.
- the rankings are then noted in a descending order on a line by line basis as indicated by the numbers 1 through 9.
- Figure ID there is illustrated a plurality of concentric circles which may form an additional geometric configuration within which debates may be ranked in a two dimensional manner.
- the concentric circles are divided by radial spokes into segments with each segment representing an opinion.
- the opinion at the center of the concentric circles will be the opinion having the most votes of all of those opinions which have been generated and which relate to the subject matter of interest to the user.
- the opinions may also then be ranked in a clockwise descending order as indicated by the numbers 2 through 12. Obviously, the ranking may be accomplished in other fashions utilizing the concentric circles, such for example, in a counterclockwise fashion, radially outward or the like.
- Figure IE there is illustrated a cube which has been sectioned to provide a plurality of additional cubes and would permit ranking in three directions with the opinion having the most agreements being positioned in the upper left hand corner and the remaining opinions then being ranked in a descending order on a line by line and column by column basis and then subsequently in the third dimension from the front toward the rear of the three dimensional cube like grid as shown in Figure IE.
- each of the symbols representing an individual opinion may also be color coded to provide yet further information to the user such, for example as to whether he has already read the particular opinion, not read it, agreed with it, whether it is his opinion or the like. This would also provide further guidance to the user to enable him in selecting which of the opinions he or she wishes to access at the particular instance.
- the architecture provided is three tiered which provides advantages such as universal access, extensibility and application scalability.
- the computer program in accordance with the present invention may be used in any system using any operating system or code desired.
- the presently preferred system is Java and the following description is given with respect thereto.
- the first tier includes the client personal computer 10 which includes a web browser 10A.
- the term client may be used throughout this specification interchangeably with the term user.
- each user of a personal computer who is on the Internet has included as part of the software, a web browser.
- the web browser most desirable in accordance with the principles of the present invention is one that is a Java enabled browser.
- the hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) software is available which enables direct communication over the Internet.
- the second tier is a debate server which includes a web server 12 which runs Java Servlet.
- the Java Servlets is capable of handling program logic and database access.
- most commercial web servers support this feature of utilizing Java Servlets and particularly those web servers identified as Netscape Fast Track, Enterprise Server, Fast Cap, Sun Web Server and Apache.
- the web server 12 communicates Java Applets to the client web browser 10 A.
- the client web browser 10A for all intents and purposes becomes a virtual machine capable of executing the debates program.
- the user through the web browser and the computer mouse or keyboard (not shown) will communicate commands, requests and queries to the web server 12 between the Applets and Servlets.
- the web server Java Servlets will then communicate with the third tier which is the database server 14 to store therein or extract therefrom the data and information which is being generated or requested by the user.
- the Java Servlets can access information in the database through Java Data Base Connectivity (JDBC) standard API (Application Program Interface).
- JDBC Java Data Base Connectivity
- An important feature of the web server 12 is that the Java Servlets is loaded once when it is called and stays resident in the memory. Static or persistent information can be stored in a cache 12A and shared across multiple invocations of the Servlets therefore allowing access to this information without accessing the Database.
- a servlet may have unique features like interservlets communications as well as the ability for one servlet output to be connected as an input to another servlet.
- a critical feature is the web server 12.
- the web server 12 has a number of extremely desirable characteristics. One of these characteristics is that it provides distributed execution based on the modular design of the components. For example one Servlet can be programmed to have specific features which can be run in a dedicated server as a way to distribute the load.
- Such Servlet can be implemented with spell checking capabilities to search for offensive words or expressions which could possibly find their way into an opinion which a user is attempting to post with respect to a particular debate. Also, such a Servlet could be programmed to do simple word processing or to handle such items as making characters bold, in italics, or to underline characters, words or the like.
- Another characteristic of the web server 12 is its scalability. Referring now to Figure 3, there is shown a schematic diagram and expanded architecture illustrating a number of users, a cluster of servers and a plurality of databases. Servlet engines can be added to the architecture. The only requirement is that it be inco ⁇ orated into whatever balancing scheme is being utilized in the system as will be described more fully below.
- the architecture may handle increasing numbers of simultaneous user requests by spreading the work between the servers in the cluster. Since Servlets are stateless, that is they do not care what server they are on, they can easily be hosted on any engine within the server cluster and still perform properly.
- a further feature of the web server is that only one instance of a Servlet is loaded and thereafter it can handle many simultaneous requests through multiple threads. This dramatically minimizes the work load of the server. With prior art type applications such as Perl scripts, C, or C++ a new process is created for each request thus slowing down the communication and generating dramatically larger work loads.
- the purpose of the illustration in Figure 3 is to demonstrate the scalability of the architecture to provide the ability to server large numbers of users simultaneously.
- a user may have a personal computer having a browser with the Applet and an appropriate keyboard or other inputting device as shown at 16 and at 18.
- There may be any number of such users as is illustrated by the user N and the dashed line 20 interconnecting the users 18 and N.
- Each of the these user units are interconnected to a balancing or distribution device 22 as indicated by the interconnections 24, 26 and 28. Obviously, there would be additional interconnections up to N such interconnections.
- the balancing device 22 may be any known to the art which is capable of routing requests from users to the servers in order to distribute the load thereby preventing overload of any one portion of the system and thereby slowing down communication with the users.
- the preferred such balancing device is DNS Round Robin.
- FIG. 3 there are a plurality of servers as shown at 30, 32 and SN with the dashed line 34 connected between the server 32 and the server SN thereby indicating that there may be N such servers.
- a Servlet 36 and a data provider module such as shown at 36, 40 and 44 for the servlets in server 30, 32 and SN and at 38, 42 and 46 for the data provider module respectively in the servers 30, 32 and SN.
- the DNS Round Robin 22 receives communications from the user browsers 16 through N and then by determining which server 30 through SN is available and was not last contacted will then transmit the request from the user by way of the connections 48, 50 and 52 to the desired and appropriate Servlets 36, 40 and 44. Obviously, there will be sufficient connections as indicated by the dashed line 54 between the lines 50 and 52 to provide appropriate communications to the servers depending upon the number SN thereof. As user requests that require access to the Database are received by particular servlets for example Servlet 36, it will communicate with its data provider module 38. The data provider module is then connected by the connection 62 to an additional DNS Round Robin balancing device 64 which in turn is connected through a connection 66 to a database 68.
- the servers 30, 32 through SN are connected to the DNS Round Robin 64 by connections 62, 70 and 72. It should be recognized that there may be additional databases as illustrated at 74 and 76. Typically, these databases are a mirror image of the database 68 as is indicated by the dashed lines 78 and 80.
- the mirrored database 74 is connected to the DNS Round Robin 64 by the connection 78 while the mirrored database 76 is connected thereto by the connection 80.
- Servlets will communicate through the data provider module with the database to record the information being generated or to provide the information which is being requested by the user or to otherwise process the data as will be described more fully below.
- Certain types of information which will remain static may be extracted from the database and placed in a cache, for example as shown at 84, which may be directly accessed by the Servlet 36 and provided to the users browser, for example at 16. That information may also be retained and cached in the users browser depending upon the particular applications and the program.
- Such information would, for example be the opinion briefs, the noun look up tables, the relative positions of the various opinions, with respect to each other and the like.
- that type of information is readily available to the user without a communication being directed to the database to retrieve it.
- the communication between the Servlets, the data provider module and the database will basically be reserved for those situations where the user is voting, that is showing agreement or disagreement with respect to a particular opinion or is writing a new opinion, to be posted in the database, or is conducting a search for a particular opinion by subject matter author, date or the like.
- the home page which, for example, may appear as is illustrated in Figure 4 to which reference is hereby made.
- the home page there is the identification of the program and the ability to obtain information about debate, to SETUP (or Register), to ENTER the program, view the RULES and then to EXIT the program. If an individual has already registered and is thus an identified and qualified individual he or she may participate in the Debate program by clicking on the ENTER bar 96.
- the individual may click on the EXIT bar 90 and depart the program without further action. However, if the individual does wish to participate in the Debate program, after viewing all of the above-referred to information, the individual would click on the SETUP bar 88 to which reference is made.
- the actual SETUP information which appears on the users screen is shown in Figure 6.
- the user is requested to insert his or her first and last name, his or her birth date, the country in which the user resides, the zip code within that country where the user resides and the gender of the user.
- the user is also requested to provide his or her e-mail address.
- the screen at 101 on Figure 6 there is provided a place for the individual to insert an alias if that individual desires to do so. This option is provided because in many instances an individual would be desirous of expressing an opinion and having that opinion posted for others to view on the Internet but may be somewhat reluctant to initially accept responsibility for the position which is stated in the opinion.
- the user may select an alias by which that user may sign opinions in the future.
- settings which indicate that the Internet or Intranet address of the server to be accessed is Debate.com and there is also provided a place for the user to insert the user's password which will be used in the future for access by that particular user to the debate program.
- the password as is the case with regard to many such programs, may be any series of numbers or letters desired by the user up to the maximum number permitted in that field, for example, eight characters or numbers or a combination thereof. In the case of an Internet implementation, this password can be sent to the user via e-mail after being automatically generated by a server.
- the user is provided the ability to find ongoing debates by several criteria.
- the user may search by subject, by author, by date, by my debates, by new debates and by the hottest debates. The user then will decide which of these criteria is to be used to search for debates in which the user is interested at the present time.
- the user would then click on, for example, by subject on the screen ( Figure 8) which would activate the subject block 106.
- the subject search criteria is placed on the user's screen 108.
- the subject search screen is shown in Figure 9.
- the user may select a combination of area, subarea and up to four nouns to define a particular debate in which the user may have an interest.
- Selections for each of these columns is provide by a pull down menu or any other similar interface technique, such as alpha search.
- a pull down menu which identifies various geographical areas while under the subarea column there may be a pull down menu identifying various subareas within those geographical areas.
- under area can be listed countries and under subarea can be listed cities.
- a plurality of pull down menus under each of the columns labeled noun one, noun two, noun three and noun four. An example of such a pull down menu is shown under the column noun four.
- the data which is extracted at this step will include the rankings of the opinions and the indication according to specific color as above-referred to as to whether the user has read or not read and agreed or disagreed with the opinions represented by the various opinion symbols appearing on the screen. All of this information is transmitted as shown to the user's screen 134 where such data is displayed for information and use by the user. The user may, from the information displayed on the screen 134, make various selections as illustrated at 136 through 146 ( Figure 11).
- FIG 14 there is illustrated one way in which the various opinions may be displayed on the user's screen.
- a pyramid similar to that shown in Figure la having a plurality of smaller pyramids or triangles (opinion symbols) disposed therein is preferable.
- Each of the triangles represents an opinion posted with respect to the debate selected.
- Each of the opinions is identified by a specific code to indicate whether the user has read the opinion, agreed or disagreed with it and whether the opinion was authored by the user.
- the code is a color code.
- the user may by placing the cursor over a triangle obtain the brief of that opinion and such is displayed on the user's screen along with the name or alias of the author, along with the number of votes or approvals and the position relative to other opinions on the same debate subject matter as is shown in Figure 14. If the cursor is moved to another triangle the brief for that opinion is displayed.
- the triangles representing each of the debates may be assigned various colors to indicate criteria of that particular debate opinion with regard to the user, for example, a first color, such as blue, may be assigned to the triangle opinion symbol to represent that the particular user has not read that specific opinion. A second color, such for example as gold, may be assigned to those triangle opinion symbols which have been read and agreed with by the user.
- a third color such as black, may be assigned to those opinion symbols representing opinions which have been read and not agreed with by that specific user.
- a fourth color such as red, may be assigned to the triangular opinion symbols which represent those opinions which have been written and posted by the user.
- colors and/or codes may be chosen as desired.
- the opinion symbols will remain empty or transparent indicating the lack of sufficient number of opinions to fill the pyramid.
- the Debate program extracts the full opinion text from the database server as shown at 148 and displays on the user screen not only the brief of the opinion which has been selected, but also the opinion in full and the position ranking on the pyramid and the number of approvals, such is illustrated at 150 and also illustrated in Figure 12. It will also be noted that across the screen are the various criteria utilized to select the debate in this instance, football, cup and referee. The brief for the opinion which has been selected is, "The referee should not have called the penalty in the last minute of the match". The full opinion with regard to that brief is then set forth below the bar showing the position.
- the author is identified as John Doe and in the lower right portion of the area where the opinion is presented is given the date upon which that opinion was posted.
- keyboard symbol 152 on Figure 13 to which reference is hereby made, the user now has an opportunity to agree with the opinion. If the user desires to do so, then such may be accomplished by clicking on the Agree button 152 and as shown in Figure 12. If the user agrees, such is fed to the program which updates database as shown at 156 to mark this particular opinion as having been agreed upon by the user so that the rankings may be rearranged to take into consideration the new agreement.
- the user will click on the Back button 160 which is also shown on the lower left portion of the screen at Figure 12. By clicking on the Back button the information appearing on the screen will be returned to the previous display, which in this instance will be the pyramid showing the opinion symbols.
- the program will ascertain whether or not this particular opinion has been read by this particular user at a previous time as is illustrated at 162. If the opinion has not been read as is shown at 164, then the database as shown at 166 will be updated to recognize that this particular opinion has now been read by this user but has not been agreed with by this particular user.
- connection 168 If, however, as is illustrated by the connection 168 the opinion has previously been read but not agreed with then the updating will be by passed since such is not necessary. As is indicated above, if the Back button at 160 is clicked on by the user then the previous screen will be returned to which will be the pyramid showing the rankings for all of the opinions relating to the particular debate subject matter such as shown in Figure 14. The user may then again place the cursor over any of the filled triangle opinion symbols and have the brief of that opinion appear at the top of the screen above the pyramid along with its position, the author and the number of approvals.
- the user has other options and may instead of moving the cursor from symbol to symbol to view the briefs desire to view all of the briefs and if such is desired, he may click on view briefs as shown on Figure 14 and indicated at 142 on Figure 11. If such is clicked on then all of the briefs of all of the opinions existing on the debate pyramid which has been selected will be placed on the screen as is shown at 170 on Figure 11. Then as is shown on Figure 13 by the connector 12 appearing on both Figures 11 and 13, the user has an opportunity to select any one of the opinions by clicking on the opinion symbol representing that brief as shown at 172 and have that full opinion extracted from the database server as shown at 174 and displayed on the screen.
- the user has the opportunity to change the agreement previously expressed with regard to that opinion and if the user does so by clicking on the Withdraw Agreement button, then such is transmitted to update the database as shown at 186, to reduce the approval counter and make the changes needed in the ranking of the opinion.
- the user may also select to view only those briefs which have been unread as illustrated at 144. Under those circumstances as shown at 190 the briefs of the unread opinions will be displayed on the user's screen. As also indicated by the off page connector 13 appearing on Figures 11 and 13, those briefs of unread opinions once displayed on the screen, will give the user an opportunity to select a particular opinion by placing the cursor thereon and clicking it as is shown at 193. That will then cause the entire opinion for the brief which has been clicked to be extracted from the Debate's database server as shown at 195 and displayed on the opinion screen as shown at 150. Again, as previously discussed the user will have an opportunity to agree with the opinion by clicking on the agree button as shown at 152 in Figure 13. This will be followed by updating of the database as has previously been described.
- the user also has the opportunity to place the cursor on one of those symbols for opinions which have been previously read and agreed upon such, for example as a gold triangle, as is illustrated at 140.
- the opinion which has been now clicked on will be extracted from the database as shown at 192 and displayed upon the screen as shown at 194. This will provide the opportunity for the user to withdraw the agreement previously given to this particular opinion as illustrated by the symbol with the off page connector 11 appearing on both Figures 11 and 13 as illustrated at 182 and as above described.
- the user may by placing the cursor upon the symbol appearing on Figure 14 having the color corresponding to the user's own opinion, such for example as a red triangle, and clicking thereon may cause the opinion which the user has generated and posted to be extracted from the Debate's database as shown at 196 on Figure 11 and to be displayed upon the screen as shown at 198 on Figure 11.
- the user now has an opportunity as is shown at 200 on Figure 13 to change the authorship.
- the change of authorship may be from the actual name of the author, assuming that the previously posted opinion bears that, to an alias or from the alias to the actual name of the author depending upon the circumstances.
- the user may now enter his or her opinion with regard to the New Debate subject which has been generated and entered in the database as shown at 206.
- the user may click on the Add Opinion button as shown at 146 and the opinion will appear on the add opinion screen as shown at 210 on Figure 11.
- the add opinion screen appearing at 210 is activated and the user then has the opportunity through utilization of the keyboard to generate the brief, the actual full text of the opinion, select either the user's alias or name, whichever the user desires, and then to click upon the Add Opinion button.
- the Add Opinion button is clicked on, as is shown at 212 then the database is updated as shown at 214 with the new opinion, brief and the other data related to it.
- the user has an opportunity to search by the author of the opinion as shown at 220, by the date of the opinion as is shown at 222 by searching only the author's debates, that is my debates as shown at 224, by searching only new debates as shown at 226 and this would be those debates which have been authored since the previous inquiry with regard to such debate or by the hottest debates as shown at 228.
- the hottest debates would be those debates which have the greatest amount of activity. If the user clicks on my debates, new debates or hottest debates as shown at 224, 226 or 228 then a query is sent to the debates database as shown at 230 regarding which of these search criteria has been activated.
- the database is queried to identify all of those debates created by the user and these are then displayed on the screen 126 as shown in Figure 11 and as indicated by the common numeral 6 appearing in both places.
- the query to the database is to extract all of those debates which have been authored and posted since the last time the database was searched and these are listed on the screen 126 as shown in Figure 11.
- the query to the database is to extract that debate which has been visited most frequently and that debate would then be displayed on the screen 126 as shown in Figure 11.
- the user then will select from the pull down menu the name search criteria as illustrated at 242 and then activate the query to the database as shown at 246.
- the Debates database in response to this query will provide the information requested and as indicated by following the connector 6 on Figures 15 and 11 will provide that information which will be listed on the user screen 126. This information will be a list of all of the Debates which respond to the query according to name as submitted by the user.
- the user may then click on a specific debate as shown at 128 and the display debate pyramid will be displayed on the screen as shown at 134 after extracting from the database all of the opinions posted for that selected debate.
- the user may then continue by selecting the full opinions based upon briefs that can be displayed simply by moving the cursor through the opinion symbols appearing on the pyramid on the screen all as has been described in conjunction with Figure 11.
- a similar search criteria such as area, subarea, and alias may be provided as is shown at 248 on Figure 15.
- a similar process occurs by picking the alias search criteria as shown at 250. This initiates a query to the database as shown at 252 and then the display of the information as extracted on the user screen 126 as shown at Figure 11 with additional operational capabilities as above described with regard to the name search.
- the user may now select the author desired and reinitiate the search by authors name as above-described.
- the back button may be activated and the user is returned to the previous screen permitting a selection by area and subarea for ranking of additional authors.
- the user may also be provided the ability to search by date as indicated at 222 on Figure 7.
- the custom button may be activated to provide the opportunity for the user to provide custom entries. If however a preset choice, as shown at 266, is clicked on then a query is sent to the debate database, depending upon the specific criteria selected such as last week to retrieve all of the debates created during that particular time as shown at 268, this information once retrieved is then, as is indicated by the off page connector 6 is listed on the user screen 126 as shown in Figure 11 with the opportunity for the user to utilize those debates and select particular opinions as above described.
- a specific screen a range of dates during which debates may have been created and to have those debates identified for the user in 270.
- a screen may be that as shown at Figure 17.
- the database is queried as shown at 274 to extract those debates generated between those dates selected and to provide them to the user screen 126 as shown in Figure 11 again with the option for the user to utilize the information so presented to select a particular debate and then opinions with respect thereto.
Abstract
Description
Claims
Priority Applications (6)
Application Number | Priority Date | Filing Date | Title |
---|---|---|---|
EP99949662A EP1114401A1 (en) | 1998-09-18 | 1999-09-15 | System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to various subject matter |
BR9913962-6A BR9913962A (en) | 1999-09-09 | 1999-09-15 | System method for obtaining and classifying opinions by votes in relation to various subjects |
JP2000571410A JP2002525765A (en) | 1998-09-18 | 1999-09-15 | System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by voting related to various issues |
AU62491/99A AU6249199A (en) | 1998-09-18 | 1999-09-15 | System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to varioussubject matter |
MXPA01002870A MXPA01002870A (en) | 1998-09-18 | 1999-09-15 | System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to various subject matter. |
CA002343763A CA2343763A1 (en) | 1998-09-18 | 1999-09-15 | System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to various subject matter |
Applications Claiming Priority (4)
Application Number | Priority Date | Filing Date | Title |
---|---|---|---|
US10105398P | 1998-09-18 | 1998-09-18 | |
US60/101,053 | 1998-09-18 | ||
US39322099A | 1999-09-09 | 1999-09-09 | |
US09/393,220 | 1999-09-09 |
Publications (2)
Publication Number | Publication Date |
---|---|
WO2000017824A1 true WO2000017824A1 (en) | 2000-03-30 |
WO2000017824A8 WO2000017824A8 (en) | 2000-09-28 |
Family
ID=26797851
Family Applications (1)
Application Number | Title | Priority Date | Filing Date |
---|---|---|---|
PCT/US1999/021201 WO2000017824A1 (en) | 1998-09-18 | 1999-09-15 | System and method for obtaining and ranking opinions by votes related to various subject matter |
Country Status (6)
Country | Link |
---|---|
EP (1) | EP1114401A1 (en) |
JP (1) | JP2002525765A (en) |
CN (1) | CN1326576A (en) |
CA (1) | CA2343763A1 (en) |
MX (1) | MXPA01002870A (en) |
WO (1) | WO2000017824A1 (en) |
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WO2006101415A1 (en) * | 2005-03-24 | 2006-09-28 | Federalny Tsentr Informatizatsii Pri Tsentralnoy Izbiratelnoy Komissii Rossiyskoy Federatsii | Method for preparing and running vote process with the aid of an automated system |
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Also Published As
Publication number | Publication date |
---|---|
EP1114401A1 (en) | 2001-07-11 |
MXPA01002870A (en) | 2002-04-08 |
JP2002525765A (en) | 2002-08-13 |
CA2343763A1 (en) | 2000-03-30 |
WO2000017824A8 (en) | 2000-09-28 |
CN1326576A (en) | 2001-12-12 |
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