GB2506575A

GB2506575A - Content delivery system

Info

Publication number: GB2506575A
Application number: GB1213491.2A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Clive Morel Fourman
Original assignee: Gaiasoft IP Ltd
Current assignee: Gaiasoft IP Ltd
Priority date: 2012-07-30
Filing date: 2012-07-30
Publication date: 2014-04-09
Also published as: GB201213491D0

Abstract

A content delivery server apparatus and interactive platform arranged to deliver content and control various interfaces relating to venues, location boundaries, public displays and buildings. The present invention relates to a content delivery system of the type that, for example, receives requests for content and sources content from a plurality of content sources. The present invention further relates to the Internet of Things, WC3 standards, smartphones, geolocation, sensors, gamification, referenceable identifier devices (like bar codes and Qr codes), smartphones, public displays and augmented reality which may be linked to customer lists, loyalty programs and large databases or so-called "big data". The personalised content delivery may be used in commerce, shopping, fashion, health, fitness, sports, education, games and any other sector or application where content may be delivered. The content delivery server apparatus comprises a processing resource, a communications interface, wherein the processing resource is configured to support an interactive platform to allow a plurality of users to participate through use of the interactive platform in order to receive, when in use, information identifying content communicated from the plurality of users, the platform has a plurality of rules of operation associated therewith and is arranged to receive a plurality of participant identifying information associated with the plurality of users, respectively, through interaction with the interactive platform, the processing resource is arranged to obtain a plurality of profile information relating to the plurality of identified participants, respectively, and the processing resource is arranged to use the plurality of participant identifying information or the plurality of profile information to generate a profile-based characterisation of the plurality of identified participants.

Description

Title: Content Delivery System The present invention relates to a content delivery system of the type that, for example, receives requests for content and sources content from a plurality of content sources. The present invention further relates to the Internet of Things, WC3 standards, smartphones, geclocation, sensors, gamification, referenceable identifier devices (like bar codes and Or codes), smartphones, public displays and augmented reality which may be linked to customer lists, loyalty programs and large databases or so-called "big data".

Backci round Venue owners wish to provide content to participants, connect people and create community. At a given venue, it is known to use TWITTERTM to enable a plurality of participants at the venue to post tweets with a shared "hashtag", for example #THISVENUE, and for so-called microblog postings or tweets commencing with this hashtag to be filtered and displayed on a large display at the venue.

TWITTERTM, and popular social networking and social discovery services, for example FACEBOOKTM and FOURSQUARETM, are also capable of delivering content relevant to an identified, logged-in, mobile device user or logged-in or tracked web browser user. Each of these systems may assist in connecting people and in building community, but the value delivered and quality of connections and community created is limited in some circumstances by the degree of relevance and privacy of content delivery.

When any of these systems are used in conjunction with an electronic bill board or venue-based display device, the display is viewed simultaneously by multiple users who are typically not the identified, logged-in, user of the public display, and so the display device does not deliver content relevant to a given user, for example a shopper or a fan.

Venue or group pages in FACEBOOKTM or FOURSQUARETM and TWITTERTM using hashtag filters can provide content related to the venue, group or hashtag and content related to sponsored links relevant to the logged-in user. However, if displayed publicly, for example by a logged-in group administrator in FACEBOOKTM, the sponsored links is likely only relate to recent activity or interests of the logged-in user, namely the owner" or logged-in administrator, and so will be irrelevant or inappropriate for public display at the venue. Furthermore, the wall, posts and status update features of FACEBOOKTM are static, whereas for use in a public place these features should be automatically updated.

Both iPhone and Android smartphones include various sensors as will be known to the skilled person from the respective programmers interface and from many apps such as the sensor monitor app version 1.0.9 of February 8th 2011 which is capable of indicating latitude, longitude, altitude, course, speed, X, Y and Z axis acceleration and gyroscope readings in radians per second, X, Y, Z, true heading, magnetic heading in addition to recognising gestures such as pinch, tap, swipe, long press, pan, rotation and various other sensor readings and derived readings.

Another deficiency of the above-mentioned systems is that it is not possible to deliver group or personally relevant content to a plurality of participants or individual participants associated with a public place, for example the venue, if required in an anonymous manner.

US patent publication no. 2007/0055564 Al entitled "System for Facilitating Management and Organisational Development Processes", relates to the concept of a hierarchy of intent or hierarchy of goals and interests that is used herein in relation to matching the life goals or interests of a content recipient. This prior art teaches organising content according to a hierarchy of goals or hierarchy of intent. It does not teach a means or method for analysing a plurality of individual profiles associated with a venue to deliver content relevant to the group or an individual associated with the venue.

US patent publication number US 2010/0180029 Al enUtled "Content Delivery System and Method of DeUvering Content' discoses in Table IV a piuraUty of table some of which are referenced hereLo.

US patent publication no. 2011/0310260 Al entitled "Augmented Reality", discloses an example of an ARDD delivering content relevant to an emblem, for example on a referenceable identifier (RID) on a finger nail. It does not teach delivery of content relevant to a plurality of profiles of participants identified by RID, or the recognition of an RID as a means of checking in or associating a participant with a venue.

US Patent publication no. 2012/0062595 Al, entitled "Method and Apparatus for Providing Augmented Reality", describes an example of an ARDD system providing content, such as links to social network information related to a recognisable object It does not deliver content relevant to a plurality of profiles associated with a venue, nor does it teach checking in or associating with a venue by means of viewing an RID for the venue.

"System and Method for Controlling a Performance Environment" by Lueth et al, Application number: 12/897,606, Publication number: US 2011/0022673 Al, Filing date: Oct 4, 2010 and subsequent continuations teach combining of data streams, for example votes, from various inputs to control an event, and teach personal identification information associated with audience inputs.

Does not teach a profile with attributes other than identification attributes such as name, IP address, telephone number.

"System and Method for Providing a Real-Time Digital Impact Virtual Audience" also by Leuth et al, Application number: 13/032,451, Publication number: US 2011/0238753 Al, Filing date: Feb 22, 2011 teaches input signals a remote audience response device transmitting a signal to a display at a live event. Neither Leuth patent teaches a content delivery system, does not teach that content from the content delivery system is selected to be relevant to the profile of a plurality of profiles of participants in the event.

In US2009197616 (Al) -2009-08-06 Lewis et al teach a public advertisement display for advertising content selected based on segmentation of an estimated population of viewers. They do not not teach any means of evidencing viewers other than through ad responses. Nor check-in or display of profile content of participants, nor upload of user generated content such as photos for display on the public advertisement display.

In U52008250054 (Al) -2008-10-09, Duchon et al teach use of Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) and Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis (PLSA) for comparing and maximizing the appropriateness of a first set of one or more data objects to a set of second data objects. Duchon does not seek to claim the known techniques of topic modelling, but rather a refinement that considers possible groupings of data objects to match a single data object. Duchon does not teach an automated machine learning process for improving the topic model based on experience, or a user interface or method for training the topic model, or repetition of a topic modelling process to account for changing data, or how to carry over learnings between generations of a topic model as data changes incrementally.

McCallum, Andrew Kachites. "MALLET: A Machine Learning for Language Toolkit." http://mallet.cs.umass.edu. 2002. According to the reference web site, MALLET provides various tools including topic modelling. MALLET includes sophisticated tools for document classification: efficient routines for converting text to "features", a wide variety of algorithms (including Naïve Bayes, Maximum Entropy, and Decision Trees), and code for evaluating classifier performance using several commonly used metrics. In addition to classification, MALLET includes tools for sequence tagging for applications such as named-entity extraction from text. Algorithms include Hidden Markov Models, Maximum Entropy Markov Models, and Conditional Random Fields. These methods are implemented in an extensible system for finite state transducers. Topic models are useful for analyzing large collections of unlabelled text. The MALLET topic modeling toolkit contains efficient, sampling-based implementations of Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Pachinko Allocation, and Hierarchical LDA. Many of the algorithms in MALLET depend on numerical optimization. MALLET includes an efficient implementation of Limited Memory BFGS, among many other optimization methods. In addition to sophisticated Machine Learning applications, MALLET includes routines for transforming text documents into numerical representations that can then be processed efficiently. This process is implemented through a flexible system of "pipes", which handle distinct tasks such as tokenizing strings, removing stopwords, and converting sequences into count vectors.

Summary of the invention

In a venue, for example, a city or a shopping centre, a person may be interested in many possible attractions, retailers, products, and services, or personal introductions to other people for business, social or dating purposes, but may be not aware of them. The present invention addresses this issue with personalised content delivery. Further, in a venue, a group of people may remain separate and isolated, or they may make meaningful one-to-one connections, or experience being part of a community, or experience themselves in relation to a community purpose. The present invention may be used to create "buzz" or social energy, to stimulate people to be participants, to talk and interact, to enable participants to create impact, or form connections that have meaning or make a difference.

Further a consumer may control for example, through opt in or opt out preferences which offers they receive, for example, but not limited to, by retailer brand or category, by product brand or category, by location, by discount percentage, or based on alignment with a plurality of elements of a hierarchy of intent associated with the consumer.

For example, if a consumer has a goal of losing weight, then offers that are likely to be adverse to or detrimental to this goal may be excluded. If the consumer wishes to get fit, then offers from sports shop suppliers, local health and fitness clubs and health stores may be favoured.

The knowledgeable consumer may prefer that as few database owners or third parties as possible are aware of the consumer's profile data, preferences, goals etc. The consumer may prefer to control what is delivered to them, rather than have third parties control what they send. The knowledgeable consumer may prefer to benefit from the power of so-called big data and predictive analytics for their convenience and achievement of life goals, without having database owners compromise their privacy, shape their behaviour and potentially undermine their personal goals.

Hence the present invention is designed to enable a consumer to control their profile data and the content delivered to them, while allowing database owners to make offers that match user preferences using the power of the best statistical and analytics tools.

Hence the present invention may include anonymous delivery of offers to users, whereby a database owner subscribes to a service to deliver content, but does not know to which specific individuals the content will be delivered.

At least one embodiment of the present invention delivers content which is further relevant to profile attributes of the recipient and content which may relate to profile matches or to action taking, such as exchange of contact details, changing level of trust, or initiating a communication, for example via chat or call.

It is thus possible to provide... The above aspects all relate to delivery of personally relevant content in venues while addressing privacy concerns. A second issue addressed by the present invention is the delivery of content, from a wide selection of sources, for example sponsored links, recommendations, offers from shop inventory or other database providers, so as to be relevant to the public place and to a person receiving the offer, without disclosing the identity of the recipient.

The present invention provides a means to reverse this vicious cycle of unhealthy choices, enabling people to opt to receive content that is consistent with their life goals and values and thereby connect with people, groups, products and services that best fit with their best interests.

The present invention further enables businesses to see and respond to a growing, addressable market for products and services that favour health, happiness, wellness and personal development.

The present invention is intended to increase human well-being and the value of places, events or experiences by improving connections of people, development of community and matching of people with information -through better content delivery The present invention addresses the need and opportunity for personalised content delivery for commerce, shopping, fashion, health, fitness, sports, education, games and any other sector or application where content may be delivered.

The present invention addresses the need of content recipients to receive information which matches their interests and the desire of content providers to provide content to individuals with defined attributes defining precise market segments. Content delivered may connect people with people, or things, or places, or venues, or merchants, or content, or with anything.

It is a purpose of at least one embodiment of the present invention to provide the hardware, software and systems basis for operating an -intention-based, developmental, affirmative, improving, values-based, principled, basis for requesting, sourcing, buying, selling, exchanging, giving, receiving including the sourcing, buying and selling of things and the exchange of payments for products and services that align to a person's life goals, intentions or any part of a hierarchy of intent.

By enabling recipients of content to opt-in or opt-out of content delivery relating to a plurality of values, at least one embodiment of the present invention may be used to provide internet content delivery services, for example, search, advertising, social networking, offers, deals, that are values based, allowing the provider of such services to directly translate a corporate or personal values statement to a set of criteria for content delivery and allowing recipients of content to opt-in or opt out of receiving such content based on the values to which the content relates.

Brief description of the drawings

At least one embodiment of the invention will now be described, by way of example only, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: Figure 1 is a schematic diagram of an environment in which a content delivery system constituting an embodiment of the invention can be used; Figure 2 is a schematic diagram of a communications-enabled device used in the system of Figure 1; Figure 3 is a schematic of the system of Figure 1 deployed in relation to a shopping centre or other venue; Figure 4 is a flow diagram of a feedback process associated with characterisation of participants and matching content delivery; Figure 5 is a schematic diagram relating to the composition of topic vectors characterising venues, participants and content items.

is a flow diagram of another feedback process associated with the content delivery request of Figure 4; Figure 6 is a schematic diagram of various information display formats supported by the content delivery system of Figure 1.

Figure 7 is a schematic diagram relating to methods of upload of content and virtual objects including using wrist flick gesture for display on a display device.

Figure 8 is a flow diagram for update of content and virtual objects using an upload button or wrist flick gesture.

Figure 9 is a schematic diagram of a content delivery system of the content delivery system of Figure 1, further indicating the local and remote storage of data.

Figure 10 is a flow diagram for relevant content delivery within media stream activity.

Figure 11 is a flow diagram of a process for operator control of the content delivery system of Figure 1.

Description of the Invention

The present invention enables content delivery through a display device in a venue where content is selected to be relevant to the profile of a plurality of participants associated with, checked-in to or attending the venue. Content is delivered based on the profile data of a plurality of participants rather than the profile of only one participant who checked-in to the venue associated with the display device. The content delivery system can record learnings incrementally based on the actions of participants. Recorded learnings can immediately impact content delivery selections.

The content delivery system can further incorporate new participant profile information and continue to make use of recorded learnings.

Throughout the following description identical reference numerals will be used to identify like parts.

Figure 1 Referring to Figure 1, a shopping centre or other venue 100 comprises merchants, shops 102, cafés 104, cinemas 106, and/or other outlets. Content can be delivered to a participant 101 through the smartphone 109. Content delivered can offer products, services, tickets, events, recommendations and other information. However, it should be understood that the number of merchants, shops, cafes, cinemas and/or other outlets located at the venue is entirely variable and dependent upon the owners of the venue 100. In this example, the merchants, shops, cafes cinemas and other outlets constitute sub-venues of the venue 100.

The venue 100, as described herein, need not be a shopping centre, but can be any physical or virtual place where people come together or are in proximity. The venue can be a home, conference, club, bar, a seminar, a workplace, a festival, shop, shopping mall, high street, neighbourhood, retail park, leisure park, car or automobile, or bus, train, boat, airplane, a rail or bus station, an airport or port, a public or private location that can be stationary or mobile, a virtual network, a community, a sporting or political location. The venue can likewise be an office building comprising offices, a school or a university or a campus comprising classrooms or a hospital comprising wards, an hotel comprising hotel rooms, or indeed any other context where people come into physical or virtual proximity as participants whether they are simply passing by, or present at a location, or participating in a planned event or activity. The participants can be people, service providers, service users or otherwise. In the example described herein, the term "merchant" can be used to refer to a specific venue which can be the responsibility of a specific merchant, for example a retailer, where the context permits, the terms venue, event or merchant can be used interchangeably. Indeed merchant, a can be the owner or operator or facilitator of a venue. Where relevant to the context, a merchant can be considered to be an event that takes place at a place during a period of time, for example, the term of a rental or leasehold agreement.

A merchant can therefore be represented as an event, or a location or by means of a Global Electronic Party Information Register (GEPIR) reference or by any other relevant identification or representation. A merchant can be any entity that can be represented through a GEPIR reference.

Each sub-venue can have content associated with it, for example inventory data, menu item data, promotional offer data, ticket data, timetable data, coupon data, deal data and/or other relevant resources or recommendations relating to, for example, products, services, property such as real estate or other assets to rent, lease, buy or use, or contact information for people or groups, or roles, or services. Services and/or related offers can relate to businesses, merchants, professions or trades, for example relating to: doctors, dentists, accountants, bookkeepers, plumbers, builders, electricians, decorators, gardeners, handymen, cleaners, or any other service provider or any other professional or other service.

In this example, the shop 102 comprises an inventory 118 including, for example an inventory item 120, such as an item of clothing. The item of clothing is stored on a hanger or shelf, or has an attached label which comprises a referenceable identifier such as a Bokode or Or code or other referenceable identifier device RID 119. Associated with the inventory item 120 is a set of attributes 121. The café 104 comprises a menu 122, which can include offers relating to set menus, for example. Similarly, the cinema 106 comprises a programme constituting an example of a screening list which can be considered to be an event list and also comprises promotional offers 124 in relation to the programme. This is a simple example of an event. However, any ad hoc, constant, timed or planned meeting, happening, gathering, appearance, ceremony, performance, debate, or activity that occurs in/at one or more venues can be considered to be an event.

Furthermore, the skilled person should appreciate that a merchant, business or retailer can be considered to be an event in that it can have a time bounded or transitory lease or ownership of, for example, real estate mentioned above.

As mentioned above, promotional offers 124 can be provided in relation to an event. In this regard, the terms "offer" and "content" can be considered as interchangeable where relevant to the context.

The term "offers" can refer to a plurality of offers and is also interchangeable with: notification of or provision of content relating to products, services, ideas, suggestions, challenges, requests, invitations, shows, events, or any other kind of communication made to the participant 101.

Communications can be provided in respect of: games, connections to people, introductions, commerce, collaboration, entertainment or any other purpose. Furthermore, offers should be understood, as the context permits, to include any other kind of communication made to the participant 101 via any means, for example by text message, electronic message, push notification, telephone, e-mail, voice call or message, billboard, push notification, picture message, email, instant message, chat, telephone call, or by any other means whereby data, for example ASCII characters, binary data or encoded words, voice, video, media, a document, or a data structure etc can be transferred or by paper-based medium, such as newspaper, magazine, or letter or by any directly or indirectly perceivable means. Any form of output from an output device can be used to communicate an offer. . Communications or offers can also be delivered via broadcast television, satellite broadcast, Internet or any other synchronous or asynchronous communication means as applicable.

In this example, the participant 101 is an example of a conscious entity involved in the content delivery system and possesses a communications device, for example a communications-enabled portable computing device, such as a smartphone 109. A participant is a conscious entity associated with a venue. As used herein, where applicable to the context, the conscious entity can be a human being or person, a user, a participant, a "thing," a system, an entity with consciousness or awareness, an organisation, a team, a community, a social network, the inhabitants of a town, the members of a society, a biological, synthetic biological or electronic, electromechanical or physical system.

Referring back to the venue 100, a number of output devices, for example display devices are located throughout the venue 100. In this regard, the venue 100 comprises a first affiliated display 110, a second affiliated display 112 and a third affiliated display 114. The first affiliated display 110 is affiliated with the shop 102, the second affiliated display 112 is affiliated with the café 104 and the third affiliated display 114 is affiliated with the cinema 106. In this example, the affiliated displays 110, 112, 114 are respectively located inside or in close proximity to the respective shop 102, the café 104, and the cinema 106 for reasons that will become evident later herein.

Additionally, the venue 100 comprises a community display 116. In this example, the community display 116 is located in an open area where is can be viewed by a large number of visitors to the venue 100. In one example, it is a large screen display in the atrium of a shopping centre. The community display 116 is another example of an output device.

As used herein, the term display device" is an example of an output device and can include any device, display or augmented reality display or transparent item which can also serve as to display information in textual and/or graphical form. A display device can include, by definition, any output or input/output device or other device, object or apparatus that can be used to display, project, or otherwise represent or present information, including for example, 2D and 3D Light Emitting Diode (LED) and Liquid Crystal Device (LCD) displays, projectors, computers, other 2D or 3D TV or video or visual display technologies and other display technologies including laser generated images and holographic displays, as well as surfaces, for example windscreens, windows, lenses, glasses, spectacles, contact lenses, or other transparent objects that can be used as a surface upon which to display information, including but not limited to so-called Augmented Reality (AR) displays, for example AR glasses, goggles, spectacles, helmets, windsereens. A display device can be public, such as a large screen affiliated display 112 in café 104, or a large screen venue display 116 in shopping centre 100, or individual such as the smartphone 109. A display device or smartphone, or computer referred to herein can comprise at least one input/output port for controlling of devices or equipment, or for receiving of signals from sensors or equipment. A display device can be a smart TV, or a wireless TV, such as a smart TV that can support internet connection and can support a program or web browser to display an HTML5 web page, or a TV that can perform as a computer monitor or high definition monitor. A display device can consist of a plurality of display elements, for example pixels in a large screen TV, or a single display element, for example a single LED element, or a plurality of display elements such as LEDs or lights, or liquid crystal display, or lights, or other output devices that have been arranged to provide at least one stimulus perceivable by at least one participant in response to receipt of a signal, such as content delivery from a content delivery server.. In one example, a plurality of LEDs or liquid crystal displays or speaker devices are associated with a respective plurality of shelves or coat hangers or labels together comprising intelligent storage 236. In one example the content delivery server 202 analyses the profiles of a plurality of participants or shoppers within a venue or shop to identify the most relevant garments or products based on analysis of the participant or shopper profiles and sends a content delivery signal to illuminate or highlight the storage locations of the most relevant products in the intelligent storage 236. In this way, the venue or shop can be dynamically adapted to respond to the profiles of the plurality of associated participants or shoppers, thereby improving the likelihood of purchase.

Another participant 126 is located at the venue 100 and possesses an Augmented Reality Display Device (ARDD) 128, in this example implemented as a pair of GOOGLE GLASSES. Although only two participants are currently described, a plurality of participants, wireless-enabled devices and indeed display devices can be, and in the case of participants and wireless-enabled devices usually are, present at the venue 100.

FigureS Turning to Figure 3, the content delivery system 200 comprises a content delivery server 202. The content delivery server 202 is operably coupled to a profile database 204, a first content database 206, a weather information database service 208 a first caching router 210 and content providers' databases 212.

The content providers' databases 212 can comprise a streaming media server (not shown) and/or a content management server (also not shown) for communication with the content delivery server 202 via a communications network, and for delivery of content and media to the participant 101 through devices, for example the smartphone 109, a cell phone, a portable computing device such as an iPod and/or iPhone made by Apple, Inc., a tablet PC, an iPad made by Apple, Inc., or a laptop, or any other suitable communications-enabled device. This device can comprise an input/output port 111 which is representative herein of a connector or hardware interface capable of receiving inputs from external processes, devices or sensors or capable of transmitting outputs to external processes, devices or control systems. These devices can employ any suitable operating system, for example: OSX, Linux, 05, Android, Windows Phone and can incorporate one or more browsers for example GOOGLE CHROME, FIREFOX, INTERNET EXPLORER or any other suitable browser or display or application or software.

The first content database 206 and each of the content providers' databases 212 each has a database owner associated therewith. In this respect, where the context permits, the database owner constitutes a broad category of beneficiaries or users of the content delivery system 200 including any provider of content. The content may comprise people or profile information, or content to be offered to such participants. For example, the database owner can be the owner, operator, user of a, typically large, database of customer data, such as a financial institution, a retailer, a Mobile Network Operator (MNO), an Internet Service Provider (ISP), a fixed line telephony service provider, or a utility provider. Such customer databases can comprise records or data stored relating to one or more of identity, name, profile, attributes, preferences, needs, history, or any profile or attribute data such as any of the attribute sets described in the Attribute Set Table, Table 1, or any transaction or history data or metadata or demographic data. Such customer databases can further comprise loyalty card data, membership data, customer lists, including, transaction or analysis data, business intelligence or analytics results, predictive analytics or market basket analysis results.

Although shown in Figure 3 as external to the content delivery server 202, the first content database 206 and the profile database can be, in one example, comprised within the content delivery server 202, for example on a hard disc drive (not shown) of the content delivery server 202. It should also be appreciated that, in this example, the content providers' databases 212 and the weather information database service 208 are "in the cloud" and remote from the venue 100. It should be understood that the venue 100 can be one of a plurality of venues supported by the same cloud-based "service".

The first caching router 210 is coupled to one or more communications networks, for example the Internet 214. In this example, the content delivery server 202 is remotely located from the venue 100. A second caching router 216 is, in this example, located at the venue 100 and is operably coupled to the Internet 214. The second caching router 216 is coupled to also supports wireless communications therewith and so comprises or connects to a Wi-Fi hotspot antenna 218. The wireless communications supported by the Wi-Fi hotspot antenna 218 enables communications with users of wireless-enabled devices, for example the sniartphone 109 of the participant 101 as well as other smartphones or wireless-enabled devices 220 of other participants 107, 108. In this respect, the smartphones 109 and the other wireless-enabled devices 220, for example iPhones and Android phones are respectively used by participants, including the participant 101. In relation to the use of an iPhone, the iPhone supports execution of an iPhone app or as referred to herein a smartphone app (not shown). In another example, the smartphone app functionality can be implemented as an HTML5 page operating within a Safari browser or equivalent supported by the iPhone. For an Android device, for example an Android phone, the Android phone supports execution of an Android app and/or access to the HTMLS web site so as to support equivalent functionality to the iPhone app and Android app. However, for the sake of simplicity and conciseness of description, references herein to the apps for providing the wireless-enabled devices 109, 220 with additional functionality should be considered as references to the alternate and functionally equivalent implementation of an HTML5 web page..

The smartphone 109 or other wireless-enabled devices or smartphones 220 support an app or access to an HTML5 web page that provide additional functionality to the respective smartphone platform. In this respect, the app supported by the smartphone 109 is a community interaction app that supports interaction between the participant 101 using the smartphone 109 and the content delivery system 200. Turning to Figure 3, the app is capable of displaying virtual buttons to provide access to content of the following exemplary types: personal preferences 300, offer listing 302, fashion recommendations 304, merchant listing 306, event listing 308, people listing 310, life goals listing 312, weather warnings 314, safety warnings 316, health advice 318, database owner recommendations 320, brand recommendations 322, virtual objects 324.

The second caching router 216 is also capable of communicating wirelessly with an administrator 224 of the content delivery system 200, for example via a wirelessly-enabled computing device, the wireless-enabled computing device supports access to a performance dashboard 226 for use by the administrator 224, for example via a web browser application (not shown) supported by the wireless-enabled computing device. In this respect, the content delivery server 202 supports the provision of management information in the form of a performance dashboard 226 for use by the administrator 224, for example a shopping centre manager. The performance dashboard 226 provides, for example, information relating to rate and cumulative value of sales, rate and cumulative check-ins, social activity, game activity, footfall, shopper density and other information relevant to the operation of the venue 100. The parameters of the performance dashboard 226 can be adjusted to show any infographic or table based on any statistical or analytical summary of any combination of the attributes of profiles of participants associated with the venue 100, including any of the attribute sets referred to in the Attribute Set Table, Table 1. The administrator 224 is able to modify dynamically adjust input variables of any building control system or venue control system and of the service provided by the content delivery server 202 in respect of the venue 100 in order to optimise the safety, commercial, social and community performance of the venue 100.

The second caching router 216 is also coupled to a computer 228, for example a Personal Computer (PC) or any other general purpose or dedicated computing device, for example a CHROMEBOOK computer or Android tablet computer, or any other suitable computing device and can even be a smartphone. The computer 228 is operably coupled to the community display device 116. However, the skilled person will appreciate that the community display device 116 and the computer 228 can be provided as a self-contained smart TV, for example based on the Android operating system. The computer 228 is further operatively coupled to the input/output port 229.

In relation to the venue display 116, with the support of the computer 228, the venue display 116 can be used to deliver content to be received by one or more participants of the system in a public manner, for example when a participant passes-by the display. In this example, the venue display 116 serves as a public bill board or TV screen visible to nearby participants and used to display content that can be personalised to one participant or relevant to a plurality of participants. For example, the venue display 116 can be used to output different media types 230, including photos and comments generated by a plurality of participants, for example photographs taken at a venue, the photographs taken being posted by participants to a shared photostream. The different types of media 230 can include video data, television broadcast data, videoconference data, teleconference data, sound data, music data, voice data, photo data, chat data and shared document data. The resulting content of the venue display 116 can be a dynamically generated video stream, similar to television comprising media content selected by any of the means described herein. The venue display 116 can display profile information 231 of participants checked in to the venue or infographic 232 or media content 234. Intelligent storage 236, can consist of coat hangers and shelves that comprise output devices such as LCDs that can deliver a stimulus to a participant 101 when the intelligent storage 236 receives content delivery from the content delivery server 202. Intelligent storage, comprising an output device together with at least one hanger or shelf can therefore be understood to be a display device that also stores real goods.

In this Figure 1 and other figures a specific configuration of servers and databases and communications links is indicated, a knowledgeable person will understand that the functional elements of the present invention may be mapped to a different configuration where the same functions are embodied in different servers or databases or cloud based servers, or web services.

For example a cloud-based implementation which maps functions to virtual servers can be used as one embodiment so as to achieve commercial and technical objectives such as increased scalability, reduced cost, increased resilience, etc. Figure 4 Figure 4 is a flow diagram of a method for delivering relevant content to participants associated with a venue through public and individual displays. Referring to Figure 3, in operation, the participant 101 and another participant are present at the venue 100, for example the shopping centre mentioned above, and are approaching the café 104. The affiliated display 112, which provides community display functionality, is located inside or adjacent to the café 104. The smartphone 109 of the participant 101, as mentioned above, supports the smartphone app 340 and the participant 101, recognising the affiliated display 112 as being used in relation to the community display system, for example by witnessing use of the community display system by a third participant, launches the smartphone app 340 on the smartphone 109.

In this example, the participant 101 and the another participant have a respective first profile and a second profile. Each profile is constructed or formed from attributes concerning each of the participants, respectively which attributes can comprise attributes from any of the attribute sets of the Attribute Set Table, Tablel.

In this respect, the attributes can relate to preferences, identity and/or validation or other aspects relating to the participants, for example as mentioned above in relation to Figure 3. The profiles associated with the participants are stored, in this example, in the profile database 204. However, the skilled person should appreciate that this data can be stored elsewhere, for example in the cloud. In this example, the profile database 204 serves to provide a repository of rights, privileges, associations, memberships, each of which can have an associated level of verification. The profile further provides a repository of other profile attributes. It should be understood that different attributes have different levels of certainty or verification, meaning that, for example, a user input profile attribute claiming that the a participant has a certain credit card does not provide the same level of certainty as a profile attribute derived from the database of a credit card company, or validated by presentation of a photo id and named credit card nor does it provide the same level of verification as a biometric check such as iris recognition. Different rights and privileges as well as level of certainty can be associated with a credit card membership, as compared with a loyalty card membership, an alumni membership, a home ownership, a business or share ownership, a passport, a driving licence, or a train season ticket. A profile can include distinct types of attributes: identifier information, such as name, email address, telephone number, IP address, passport number, biometric, etc together with associated privilege attributes and further profile attributes such as interests, brand preferences, music preferences, etc or any attribute from the attribute sets of the Attribute Set Table, Table 1.

The participant 101 and another participant can have a profile that can comprise a simple identifier with a plurality of associated attributes or attribute sets including or related to, but not limited to those listed in the Table I below.

The listed attribute sets below demonstrate the general purpose nature of the present invention by providing non-limiting examples of profile attributes a plurality of which can comprise a basis for triggering content delivery and/or a basis for matching, ranking, selecting, filtering, searching, retrieving and relevance testing content for delivery.

Attribute Set Table

Attributes Set Description

Life Goals Life Goals or aspiration can comprise: goals, objectives, or any part of a hierarchy of intent whether explicitly defined and documented, or implicit in activities of a conscious entity. Shopping lists or wish lists for example on AMAZON.COM or other wish lists, goal lists, statements of purpose, strategies, or vision, or aspiration, desire, want, can be used as a basis for profiling of conscious entity or for selection, filtering, ranking, ordering or prioritising of content to be delivered to a conscious entity.

It is an intention of at least one embodiment of the present invention to deliver content which assists a recipient in their personal fulfilment, achievement of their life goals, life goa/s, commitments, personal development, health, we//ness, wealth, happiness, or other positive, /ife affirming outcomes.

Values & Values and Preferences can comprise profiling information relating to a plurality Preferences of values and further can comprise preferences and criteria to include or exclude relating to a keyword or tag. For example, including content for an environmentally sustainable brand and excluding a brand with a reputation of using child labour. Or a user profile can select for "fair trade" and select against "tested on animals" or select for "THE BEATLES" and against "HEAVY METAL" music.

Location Location or geolocation can be a named place or venue. A location can be orGeolocation specified according to any relevant common practice or standard, or commonly Attributes used form of reference including grid reference, place name, GPS location, Global Location Number or equivalent, grid reference, or any other location which identifies a particular place which can be derived from GFS, wireless signal, cell tower identity, IP address identity or other information capable of identifying a specific location. Location should be understood to include any form of location sensing or reference supported by the iPhone 4S or Samsung Galaxy S3 smartphone.

Financial and Attributes in a profile can relate to financial or demographic information or including without limitation credit rating, credit scores, home ownership, net Demographic worth, assets value, income, periodic expenditure, disposable income, or any Attributes information that can be determined as a basis for assessing ability to pay or spend or be granted credit. Demographic attributes or any attribute that can be used in market research, segmentation, advertising or targeting of products and services. For example GAOl's ACORN system, NRS's ABCl social grade' demographics profiling system or Insight Social Value Group or any other profiling or demographic system.

Weather and Herein weather includes meteorological information and other natural systems Natural World and related information, including without limitation weather condition attributes such as sun, snow, rain, rainfall, temperature, temperature range, pollen count, pollution index, wind speed, humidity, or any other meteorological measure or attribute, tidal movement, water levels. Herein the term weather can be extended, where the context permits to include weather warnings, earth quake or tsunami information or warnings, flood or drought information or warnings, tornado or hurricane warnings. Weather attributes enable delivery of weather relevant content, for example, selling sleds when it is snowing or about to snow, or expected to snow, or selling umbrella's when it rains, or sun screen when it is sunny and masks when pollen count or pollution is high, or delivering warnings when a flood or tsunami or earth quake or tornado or hurricane is expected.

The weather attribute at a location or a change in a weather attribute can be used as a basis to trigger or stimulate the server of the present invention to deliver relevant content.

Emotion A user input rating of mood can include a user rating of bored, relaxed, calm, attributes angry, happy, tense, neutral, happy, excited or any other emotion or well-being measure, attribute or descriptor. The present invention can therefore be used in content delivery for sports training, business, professional and personal coaching, personal development and development of health and well-being, dieting, weight loss, fitness for example in medicine, preventive medicine, well-being, mental health, social care and prisoner rehabilitation.

Security and The present invention can also be used as a safety and security companion or Safety assistant or advisor, whereby content delivered to the user can comprise notification of risks or threats or recommended actions to mitigate or prevent risks or resolve security issues or emergencies. Risk and security notifications can include notification of risks of crime or danger or threat related to a location or can comprise requests for vigilance or reporting of possible risks or dangers.

The present invention can therefore act to broadcast or personalise security warnings to people in a manner that can reduce their risk. Further, the present invention can be used to request or "crowd source" information for use by security or emergency services. It should be noted that the capture of input, subsequent analysis, visualisation and display aspects of the present invention can be used to deliver information and insight and improve understanding to improve individual and collective safety and security.

Fitness and Any keyword, attribute, label, measure of health, strength, wellness or fitness, Activities for example as used in sports, sports science and training, body building, Attributes nutrition science, weight loss and dieting. Also any product, supplement, exercise, activity such as athletics, running, cycling, walking, hiking, swimming, scuba diving, snorkelling, yoga, aerobics, dance, ZUMBA, or any activity or hobby or category of activity or hobby that can be practiced in a gym or sports or fitness or health or wellness program, project, group, club or team including all activities and sports included in the 2012 Olympics and Winter Olympics, in national and international athletics tournaments, in professional or amateur sports. Any associated products, services, brand names, equipment names, activity names, categorisations, sports team names can also comprise attributes.

Retail Any of the following attributes can be identified by an appropriate attribute of the Purchase GSI standard or other naming or referencing system. Retail purchase attributes Attributes attributes can indicate past, present, future, likely or predicted, or intended retail, purchasing, shopping, or economic or buying, or selling, or bidding, or brokering, or bartering, or exchanging, or giving, or receiving, or content delivery activity. And can further comprise: brands or brand names, product names, product categories, Global Product Classification (GPC) codes, Universal Product Code (UPC), Global Trade Item Number (GTIN), or other referenceable identities, for example, product bar codes or URI references (for example ISBN numbers for books) include or equivalent. Retail purchase attributes can further retail destinations, outlets, shopping malls, businesses or organisations or locations (which can be identified by Global Location Number (GLN) or Global Electronic Party Information Register (GEPIR)), retailers, merchants, venues, leisure destinations, business premises, offices, or any other venue with which a person or conscious entity can be associated. Or membership for store card, loyalty card, membership card, airline frequent flier program, discount card, mailing list, web site, credit card, alumni card or other memberships or supplier customer relationships such as customers of a bank, telecoms or Internet supplier, mobile operator or utility. Membership of any group or affiliation with any label or tag or attribute, or semantic web value that might indicate interest in or relevance of content.

Social The SNPA can comprise attributes including without limitation, the profile fields Network and associated identifiers supported by social and professional networks such Profile as FACEBOOK and LINKEDIN. A person knowledgeable in the art will know Attributes that, for example, associated with the FACEBOOK Activities profile field is a list (SNPA) of keywords defining distinct activities. The reference to any of the profile fields of a FACEBOOK or more generally a social network should therefore be understand to include any of the distinct attribute values associated with a named profile field. Social network fields including, for example, name, gender, relationship status, interest in gender, profession, past and present organisation employment and affiliations, clubs, network, site and group memberships, age, demographic, university, college and school names, activities, interests, experiences, music, books, movies, TV shows, games, groups and, places.

Online Activity A profile can comprise data or metadata derived from search, data input, email, Attributes text, telephone, or other communication or interaction or any online profile explicit or derivable from data that can be available in databases including but not limited to public records and private databases or any database of a Database Owner.

Example Symptoms and medical conditions, Children names, identities, Significant other profile name, identity, Languages spoken, Psycho demographic profile: Mindset, attributes from world-view, value system, conscious development, Cultural background, Table IV of Principal (family) Religion, Religious Approach, Secondary (lived) Religion, US Religious Approach, Enneagram Personality Type, Ethnicity, Learning Style, 2010/0180029 Demographic Group, (Hewitt Engagement), Myers Briggs (MBTI), Astrology Al Sign (Character), Astrology North Node (Purpose), Astrology Rising Sign (Emotion), Numerology Birthpath (Purpose), Numerology Destiny, Professional (1, 2, 3), Organisation Name, Business Unit, Title, Role, Function, Security Clearance Level, Preferred Advertiser Attributes, Preferred Advertiser Names, Current, Product interest, Access control groups, Hierarchy of Intent HOl = Purpose, Vision, Life Areas, Intentions, Measures, Actions, Personal HOI, Career HOI, Organisation HOI, Community memberships, Demographic membership, Mailing list membership, Other membership, Access Control (Permissions and Masks), Trusted Certificates, Location, Location (Applications), Location (OS), Location (mobile cell location and name), Bluetooth Location, Location (based on IP address), Location based on mast serving the cell, Location based on satellite and optionally fixed mast, aircraft, airship, serving cell, Current Context, Current activity context (eg at a concert, or on this web site), Current focus (eg cursor on this page, this word), Internet Behaviour, Preferred Devices

Table I

Any of the above attributes can be used, as applicable, to generate a profile of a person or conscious entity or a profile of content to be delivered or in the triggering of content delivery events and other actions described herein in relation to a participant. Furthermore, the same attributes associated with a friend of a user or friend of a friend of a user in a social network at any number of degrees of separation, or of a group or segment to which a user belongs, can be used as a basis for matching content delivery to the user or to a group of users through a display, such as the venue display 116 or the affiliated display 112 or through the display of smartphone 109.

Topic modelling The algorithmic techniques of topic modelling, described below, enable one example of this invention and can be used to segment or group profiled conscious entities in "topics" such as grouping participants so as to usefully predict the content delivery relevance to at least one participant, based on the content delivery requests of others in the same topic group. Further content for delivery can be profiled according to the same or a second topic model and used to algorithmically predict relevance without the requirement of information about prior behaviour of participants. In practice and in one example, a combination of these two approaches can be used: 1. topic-based prediction of relevance through matching of topic vectors of a group of participants and content items and 2. learning based on the choices of members of a topic group to predict the relevance of content to other members of the same topic group.

Content can be delivered in response to various triggers, for example a request of a user, a schedule or impetus from the content delivery server 202 and/or in response to a trigger event such as a change in user profile. The change in user profile that constitutes a trigger event can be an explicit change to data in the profile database 204, or it can be an implicit change in context, for example, due to a sensor in a device, or an update, for example based on ambient weather condition according to the weather information database service 208, or an update on news or events, for example a soccer team scoring a goal, a train arriving, an airplane boarding, a show starting, or any other time threshold of relevance to a user and available from a database, application, web service, web site, communication service or from any other source or means of communication. The trigger event can be based on today's date or an upcoming date, for example, a birthday, mothers' day, or other holiday, national holiday or festival or celebration, or saint's day, for example International Women's Day. Or the change can relate to any of the above for a friend, friend of a friend (FoaF) in a social network such as FACEBOOK or a change in the profile of other related person.

Any change in a profile of a participant or of a plurality of participants, whether related to an action of the participant, for example a check-in or answering a question, movement, for example entering the venue 100, location, or a particular store, or entering the geofence or boundary 130 of the shopping centre venue 100 or an individual outlet, such as the café 104, or relating to the weather or other ambient condition, or relating to a result of an external analysis, for example, recognising the birthday of a life partner, a date (for example a birthday, Valentine's day) or the likely need to replenish a household product, airtime credit, or pay a bill, or relating to the fact that the participant or a contact just started an education course, leading to the recommendation of a relevant books in the book store. A trigger can be based on any of the attributes listed in the Attribute Set Table, Table 1. In the event of a detected change in meteorological conditions, the content delivery server 202 can identify offers for an umbrella when it is raining ora sledge when it is snowing. In each case content delivery can be to a public display and/or individual display and selected content can be selected based on a plurality of profiles associated with the venue or based on an individual profile.

The smartphone app 340 supports, in this example, a number of functions including the ability to receive content from a content delivery server 202 or to upload content to the server 202 or another server.

Figure 4 [4100] Referring to Figure 4 and to step 4000, in this example, participants are added to the profile database 204. These participants may be added to an empty profile database 204 or to an existing, populated database 204 comprising a plurality of participant profiles.

[4050] [4040] In step 4050, the participants in profile database 204 are characterised. In one example, a topic model is created from the participant profiles in profile database 204. If there is an existing topic model, the new topic model can be an intelligent update that takes into account the prior version of the topic model.

[4100] Referring to step 4100, a subset of participants is identified. In one example, the content delivery system 200 also supports a so-called check-in" function, which associates an identified profiled participant with a venue, for example the café 104. The smartphone app 340 also supports participant activity [4200], for example a function to allow content such as messages, media content and virtual objects to be uploaded to the content delivery server 202 and the content delivery server 202 supports receipt of such content and the affiliated display 112 supports display of uploaded media and content from the content delivery server 202. A plurality of participants can check-in to the venue by different means, for example, using smartphones or using contactless smartcards such as the smartcard 238 in association with the smartcard reader 240, membership cards, RFID or other devices.

In this example, as intimated above, the affiliated display 112 is affiliated with the café 104. As such, the computer 228, in this example the CHROMEBOOK, is located at the café 104, principally for operation of a CHROME browser supporting an HTML5 application using Ajax, Javascript and CSS to provide an animated display which is both displayed on the screen of computer 228 and on the affiliated display 112. The affiliated display 112, as part of the content delivery system 200, also serves to support the delivery of content to the participant 101. In relation to the affiliated display 112, the content delivery system 200 is arranged to be capable of presenting content, advertisements or offers or other information, for example information about participants that have checked-into the content delivery system 200 in respect of the café 104.

Although in this example, the participant 101 specifically checks-in to the content delivery system in respect of the café 104, the participant can, in other examples, be checked-in based on the proximity of the participant 101 to the café 104. The proximity of the participant can be used by the content delivery server 202 to associate the participant with a venue, hub venue or sub venue, resulting in delivery of relevant content.

The check-in status of participant 101 can be recorded in or associated with the profile of the participant 101 as stored on sniartphone 109 and/or on the profile of the participant stored by the profile database 204. For the purposes of this example, the act of checking-in should be understood to apply to the broadest possible interpretation as the context permits, including check-in based on an act of the participant, check-in based on proximity of the participant to a venue or location, or inclusion of the user profile in a demographic or group. Proximity can be based on a participant entering a defined "geofence" or digital real-estate boundary, or geographical boundary, such as based on the location in respect of a boundary indicated by a GFS position. Information relating to the check-in can be transmitted from the smartphone app 340 of the smartphone 109 to the content delivery server 202 and can be received by the content delivery server 202 from the smarlphone 109.

Once the participant 101 has checked-in to the content delivery system 200 in respect of the café 104, the smartphone 109 comniunicates with the content delivery server 202, which provides a visual styling service from which the app or HTMLS application of the smartphone 109 can obtain visual styling data, for example CSS stylesheet data, to set the visual styling of the interface presented by the app or the HTML5 application, as well as available functions. The visual styling data can depend on proximity, for example, distance from the café 104. Similarly, upon entering or approaching the venue 100, the content delivery server 202 can provide the visual styling data in respect of the nearest shopping centre and/or venue that is recognised by the visual styling service or is a paying customer of the visual styling service. In this respect, the shopping centre or other venue can pay a fee to claim, lease, rent or purchase the right to determine the content of the user experience content delivery for a plurality of devices. The right to determine user experience of smartphone users within a real estate boundary is one aspect of owning digital real estate." In one preferred embodiment, the shopping centre or venue 100, or merchant pays a fee for the right to determine the content of the user experience for all participants using the smartphone app within the real estate boundaries associated with their physical venue or real estate or within a greater area. The Digital Real Estate boundaries of the shopping centre or venue 100 are indicated schematically by a boundary 130 (Figure 1). It should be noted that this is a charging model distinct from pay-per-click, or other known charging models associated with on-line content delivery.

Consequently, content delivery can be used to change user experience enabling the smartphone app to be restyled, including changing graphical attributes defined by the CSS stylesheet or equivalent, and/or changing the available functions. A person knowledgeable in the art will recognise that the withdrawal of or addition of functions to a user interface can be achieved by hiding and or showing user interface elements or by downloading scripts or interpretable program code to the smartphone 109 for execution by the smartphone app 340.

[4200] Referring again to the flow diagram of Figure 4, step 4200, the participants can perform activities such as participating in games, making comments or uploading photos or media clips, or using a wrist flick gesture or throwing virtual objects, or introducing avatars for display on the affiliated display 112. Examples of screen displays on the affiliated display are shown in the schematic diagrams of Figure 6 described below.

Referring to box 4250, each item of content can have a set of trigger conditions for content delivery whereby content available for delivery can be filtered to match a current trigger condition: Trigger conditions can comprise location, geographical area, region, city, neighbourhood, venue, display within venue, time of day, day of week, date of year, season, weather, temperature, participation metric, venue metric such as measures of number of participants, rate or number of check-ins or other activity, or aggregate measures of profile, or presence of demographic groups, or composition of the plurality of participants, or values of participants, or any statistic derived from the profile attributes of participants, including any of the attributes of Table 1 and/or from any analysis of activity of participants.

[4300] Having received notification of a plurality of check-ins to the café 104 and any other participant activity of checked-in participants, such as comments or media or object uploads, the content delivery server 202 recognises a plurality of participants and any content associated with the venue. In response to a new check-in or check-out or a new activity associated with the café 104, or in response to an external trigger (4250), or as a repeated, timed or scheduled event on the content delivery server 202 or in the smartphone app 340, the content delivery server 202 analyses the profiles and any activity associated with participants to identify relevant content categories or content types or search criteria or matching or filtering criteria for use as a basis for selection of content relevant to the plurality of participants associated with the venue 100. Profiles analysed can include profiles of participants associated with the café 104 which can include users of nearby wireless-enabled devices, NFC devices, smartcards, or other recognisable identifiers such as biometric readings based on, for example, iris scan or face recognition. The result of analysing the plurality of participant profiles can be considered to be an aggregate profile of the participants currently associated with the venue, as for example indicated in respect of Figure 5 below.

Delivery of each content item can have associated with it a price or payment for delivery from the content provider to the operator of the content delivery server 202. In one example, an item for delivery is selected to increase or maximise the resulting revenues to the operator of the content delivery server 202. For example, if a MERCEDES sponsored content item such as an advertisement for a local test drive offer is one of a number of content items matching the profiles of participants and there is a high economic value attached to delivering this content, then a content item can be delivered to the affiliated display 112. Hence the content delivery server 202 can take into account both the economic value of delivering a content item and the relevance of the content item to at least one profile of the plurality of participants associated with the café 104.

A skilled person will understand that relevance can be selected based on a variety of criteria, including the amount that a content provider is willing to pay for delivery of content, or the degree to which content delivery will benefit the safety, health, education, or personal development of participants.

The content delivery server 202 mines, or selects from, or searches, or looks-up, or queries one or a plurality of content databases such as content database 206 and/or content providers' databases 212 which can include advertising networks, store inventories, product catalogues, service directories, to identify at least one content item that is relevant to the plurality of profiles of participants currently associated with the venue and/or relevant to any activities and/or relevant to any other factors. Note that the content delivery server 202 is able to select a most relevant content item for delivery, even when this can match the profile or interests of only one participant; it can still be selected on the basis of profiles of a plurality of participants. Other factors can include weather, venue activities, relevant news, dates, times, calendar events, timetables, festivals, etc. In one example, the profiles of participants currently associated with the venue and the text of messages and other factors can be analysed using relational database or semantic web query (for example using SPARQL) or using text analytics or in one example using a topic modelling technique. In each case such algorithms can be used to match one or more content items to be relevant, to match or best match the plurality of profiles and/or content uploads and/or messages of participants associated with the café 104. In a further refinement, the content to be delivered can be filtered, for example by relational query, based on match to other factors and/or trigger conditions. For example, if the trigger condition is the weather condition rain" content delivered can be filtered to match this condition, before or after matching. Further if other factors include a soccer game underway, then soccer related advertising content can be delivered. Further, any profile attribute of an attribute set of Table 1 can be used as a filter for content delivery.

In one example of content delivery relevant to the profile of one or more participants, the identity of the one or more of the participants for which profile related information is provided can be unidentifiable with a particular user. For example, a content delivery server such as the content delivery server 206 can be provided with information based on a plurality of profiles, without identifying to which participants the profile information relates. Further the contents of a profile of a participant, for example, access control or privacy settings, can determine which elements of the respective participant profile can be disclosed, for example to the content database 206 or in a checkin wall screen 6400 (Figure 6). Further content can be delivered to match the profile of a plurality of users and can also be dependent, for example by filtering, or weighting, upon at least one profile attribute of the plurality of participants and also dependent upon a trigger condition.

In one example an aggregate profile for participants associated with the café 104 has been created for example through topic modelling and the aggregate profile can be used by the content delivery server 202 to identify content matching, relevant or potentially of interest to the checked-in participants. In this respect, relevant content can be or relate to any offer, deal, product, service, or identifiable object, or thing, including any "thing" with a URI associated therewith, for example a book with an ISBN, or anything identified by any GS1 standard identifier, for example a commercially available product with associated GPC or UPC or bar code or item with a GTIN, a business with a GEPIR entry, or an object identified by a Or code, or an item with a stock code or NFC identification or other referenceable identifier. The relevant content can be information provided for free or for a fee under contractual terms or without contract, publicly or to logged in or identified users.

Figure 5 Referring to Figure 5 and where applicable to Figure 4, in the current example, the content delivery system 200 is operating with a plurality of checked-in participants, which includes the participant 101. The profile database 204 comprises profiles that can be added progressively by repetition of step 4000. The content delivery server 202 accesses the profile database 204 in order to characterise the profiles associated with all participants. A subset can be identified [step 4100], for example made up of checked in participants and the subset is characterised [step 4300]. In one example, the analysis can be performed using topic modelling as described in more detail below.

Referring to Figure 5, topic modelling is used for analysis and relevant content delivery for example using Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA), Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis (PSLA) or Latent Direchlic Analysis (LDA). In one example, the topic modelling or other analysis can be implemented using any of the algorithms, methods or tools provided by MALLET or other available algorithms.

A person knowledgeable in the art will understand that one benefit of the use of topic modelling is that hidden or latent patterns can be algorithmically discovered that can result in improved delivery of content. Topic modelling can be used to project a set of complex, inconsistent or incomplete participant profiles and or content and respective profiles onto a topic space and can result in a simple, consistent representation of a conscious entity or content as a respective topic vector.

Projecting profiles of conscious entities, groups and content onto a topic space can provide insightful clustering of profiles and content, enabling, for example, that a content item that is of interest to one member of a topic group will likely be of interest to another member of the same topic group and the more similar two profiles are in topic space, the more relevant the choices of one profile owner are likely to be to the owner of the other profile. Similarity can be computed using a similarity metric, including in one example, the similarity metrics detailed below.

The following steps can be used to implement the current invention using topic modelling software such as MALLET by a person knowledgeable in the MALLET toolset and the relevant mathematics and the relevant art. 5100

A topic model can be created from the plurality of participants' profiles resulting in a set of topics characterising each profile and the plurality of profiles. . Participants represented in the profile database 204 and content in the content database 206 or the other content providers databases 212 can also be included in creation of the topic model. In one "participant-profile-focussed" example, the content database content is only profiled according to the topic model after the model has been created, so that the topic choices are shaped by the well characterised participant profiles and not by the less well characterised content itenis. In another "content-profile-focussed" example, where the participants are not well characterised by detailed, accurate profiles and the content items are well characterised by detailed profiles and/or by their content or associated documents, the topic model can be developed initially based on the content items in place of the participant profiles. In another example, the topic model can be developed using both participant profiles and content in equal or weighted proportion.

Returning to the participant-profile-focussed example, the number of topics to be created "1' is defined as a parameter of the respective algorithm. The resulting topic model constitutes a set of "t" topics with a weighting for the strength of representation of each topic in the profiles of the profile database 204. This process can be referred to as projecting the database onto a topic space of dimension t. Each participant or content item is then characterised by a vector of dimension t, where each of the t elements of the vector relates to the strength of a topic in characterising the participant or content. The all profile topic vector 5100 resulting from creating a topic model for all the participant profiles in profile database 204 is indicated in Figure 5 by the bar graph in which each bar represents a unique topic and the length of the bar represents the strength of representation of that topic in the plurality of profiles of the profile database 204. The topic model process takes as input the plurality of profiles of profile database 204 and can also take as input a plurality of content items that can derived from sonie or all of the content of content database 206 and/or other content providers database 212. The topic modelling process maps each individual participant profile and each individual content item onto topic space resulting in a topic vector of dimension! characterising each participant. Each topic vector comprises one scalar value for each topic oft topics of a topic set associated with a topic space of dimension t.

The venue 100 topic vector 5200 indicates the distribution of topic strengths based on the participants associated with the venue 100 and the café 104 topic vector indicates the distribution of topic strengths for the participants associated with the café 104.

Each topic bar of the bar graph representing café 104 topic vector 5300 is made up of the sum of the contributions of each of the profiles of the participants associated with café 104. In this example, there are 3 participants associated with the café 104, namely participants 101, 107, 108 for which the respective profile topic vectors 5340, 5342, 5344 are represented by respective bar graphs. As one representative example, a bar representing a health-related topic 5305 of the café 104 topic vector 5300 is made up of the sum of the respective contributions of the respective health-related topic value for each of three participants 101 107, 108.

Aggregate of associated profile data is represented by the profile database 204 aggregate profile 5110, the venue 100 aggregate profile 5120 and the café 104 aggregate profile 5310. Respective current conditions are represented by the respective current conditions 5120, 5220, 5320.

The profile attribute set examples set forth in Table 1 above can, in this example, be used by the content delivery system 200 in order to create a topic model. As will be described below [4500], the content delivery system 200 serves to output information, for example content, that is relevant or potentially of interest to one or more participants associated with the café 104 based on the profiles of a plurality of participants associated with the café 104.

In one example, content in the content database 206 and/or in the other content providers' databases 212 can also be analysed in generation of or after generation of the topic model for generation of the all profile topic vector 5100. In this exaniple, each such content item can also be characterised by the topic model process resulting in a respective vector in topic space comprising t scalar values.

A similarity metric can be used as a means for determining the similarity or match between two entities characterised by a topic model, such as two participant profiles, or a participant profile and a content item, or two content items. In one example, matching for similarity of a content vector in topic space represented by the café 104 topic vector 5300 can be performed by use of the cosine between the two vectors as the measure of similarity. In another example, matching for similarity can be computed as the sum of differences (or squared differences) between a first topic vector and a second topic vector, for example content item topic vector 5352. By analysing the plurality of profiles of the profile database 204 and at least some content items, the content delivery server 202 can generate topic vectors for each participant profile, for each plurality of participants associated with a venue or for each content item. By applying a similarity metric to available content items, the content delivery server 202 can rank content so as to identify matching content which is the most similar and hence the most relevant for delivery to a respective participant or plurality of participants [4400]. The content delivery system 200 can then delivery matching content [4500].

As a person knowledgeable and experienced with topic modelling will understand: in one example, the profile data is cleansed in advance of processing through a topic model, for example, by removal of fields and attributes, for example, such as email address, or zip code or identity information that can reveal the identity of a user or that can be considered irrelevant in generation of a topic model. Further, after generation of a topic model, it can be discovered in operation that certain elements of the topic vectors, relating to dimensions of the topic vector space, can be found by examination or by algorithm to be irrelevant to delivery of relevant content and these can be removed by elimination or exclusion of topics after model generation. Individual profile attributes or attribute sets, or other profile information, or information comprising a content item or its profile, or individual profiles or groups of profiles can be weighted to have a greater or lesser impact on the topic model generated.

A learning system [4750] One of the benefits of topic modelling is to reveal latent patterns in a data set. It can be expected that participants whose topic vectors are close or which closely match, as measured by a similarity metric, are likely to be interested in similar content and that content for which the topic vector closely matches the topic vector of a profile is likely to be of interest to the respective participant. In one example, the content delivery system can be a learning system, by improving the accuracy of content delivery based on each time a participant reacts [4700] to a content item.

As one example, when a participant 101 reacts to a content item 5350, for example, purchasing an offer made via the affiliated display 212 or via the smartphone 109. The content delivery system 200 and the content delivery server 202 can learn from this experience and record learning [4750].

This can be implemented by means of a Bayesian learning algorithm that calculates the probability that a participant is interested given a topic, from the probability of a topic given the participant is interested. A topic vector or topic vectors of participants or venues or content items can then be updated accordingly.

Learning topic vectors In another simple and fast implementation the content topic vector 5352 relating to the content item 5350 can be updated to record learning [4750] from having been selected when a participant reacts [4700] such as the participant 101. In one example, the topic vector 5352 is updated where CV2(5352) is the final value of the content item topic vector 5352 and CV1(5352) is the initial value of the content item topic vector 5352 before learning and PV1 (5340) is the initial value of the topic vector 5340 relating to participant 101. As one example of an implementation CV2 can be calculated as a weighted vector average of CV1 and PV1. For example: CV2(5352) = CV1(5352)xO.9 -I-PV1(5340)xO.1 In this example, the content item topic vector 5352 has been updated to reflect a tendency to be selected by participants of profile 5340. Each subsequent selection of the content item 5350 by a profiled participant will further dilute and the original value of the content topic vector.

This can be described as a "participant-profile-focussed" example which is more relevant where the topic vector 5340 is more accurately characterised than the content topic vector 5352. If the content topic vector is more accurately characterised then a content-profile-focussed approach can be used where the participant topic vector 5340 can be updated based on the content item profile vector instead.

In general a topic model generated content topic vector 5352 can be "diluted" by addition of a proportion of the profile of the participant or group that responded positively. In the example, each participant or group selection of a content item can dilute the current topic vector value by 10%.

Learning profiles In another example, the profile of a content item 5350 can be updated as a result of selection by an individual participant 101 or group so as to comprise some or all of the anonymised profile attributes of the individual or group, such that a subsequent topic model generation process can take account of the appended profile elements in generation of a topic vector for the content item 5350. The contribution of each such added profile can be weighted in its impact on the topic model generation in respect of the other information associated with the content item. The result is that the matching of content to profiles can be improved overtime, based on profile owner activity and res u Its.

In one example, a Bayesian algorithm can be used to achieve probable improvement of topic vector or profiles of participants and/or content items based on learning from each time a participant reacts [4700].

Learning when topic model changes over time In respect of the current example, the number of profiles in profile database 204 and the respective profile attributes can change when new participants are added 4000. Also the number and information content of content items, for example from the content database 206 can change with time. The topic model for the plurality of profiles can be re-calculated to characterise participants [4050] on a regular basis. A person knowledgeable in the art will appreciate that when a topic model is generated repeatedly, the composition of each topic can change as a result of changes in the profiles and content items used to generate the model. In practice, with the incremental changes to profiles and content items of this example, the definition of the largest topics in the topic model can be usefully assumed to be substantially stable.

For the purpose of enabling machine learning of the content delivery system 200 and the content delivery server 202, it is important to be able to make use of experience of users with earlier revisions of the topic model. It can therefore be useful to correlate between the topics of a newly generated topic model and an earlier generated version. In one example, this can be done by characterising each topic of each version as a vector with each element reflecting a word which can result in characteristic vectors of thousands of elements to represent all topics. A similarity metric can then be used to identify the topic of the older generation which is closest to each successive topic of the newer generation. In one example, to reduce required computation while retaining acceptable accuracy, a much simpler and faster solution is to build a vector of the m most represented words of the older and newer generation topic models. In one example, setting the variable m to be 100 can reduce computation significantly. In one example, this can be achieved by identifying a subset of the union of the characterising words of the older generation topic model and the characterising words of the newer topic model generation and using these words as defining the dimensions of a vector space G. Each topic within each of the two topic models is then represented by a characteristic vector within this vector space G. In one simple example, each topic of the first topic model can, starting with that of greatest strength, then be matched with the best matching unmatched topic of the second topic model, so matching each topic in turn.

The matching of each successive generation of topic model with the previous means that learning gathered during use of a prior topic model can be retained to inform use of a later topic model. In one example, as explained above, the topic vector 5352 of a content item 5350 can be diluted in response to each successive selection of the content item by a participant. A new topic model characterisation of the topic vector 5352, denoted 5352(new) can be combined with any weighted combination of the previous generation content item topic vector 5352 value and the topic vector values of participants such as participant 101 or groups that have selected the content 5350 so as to provide a further improved topic vector to characterise content item 5352 which balances current topic model results, earlier topic model results and learning from past participant reactions.

Profile attribute data used in generating a topic model can comprise any information associated with an identified profile owner from any other database, or based on the profile owner's activities in respect of the content delivery system 200, or the smartphone 109, or in respect of web sites, or search behaviour, of application usage, or credit cards, mobile device use, or transaction or account histories, or any other information associated with the identified profile owner.

In another example, multiple topic models can be generated based on different subsets of profile data and/or data associated with profiles, with each topic model having a different similarity metric, and an aggregate similarity derived from the multiple topic models can be the sum, average, maximum, minimum or other statistical value derived from the multiple similarity metrics. 4500

[4500] Referring again to Figure 4, after matching content has been identified in step 4400, in step 4500, in the example of café 104, the content delivery server 202 delivers matching content to affiliated display 112 and/or to the individual displays of participants' smartphones such as the smartphone 109 of participant 101. It should be noted that an individual display can be any display device associated with a profiled participant and/or a participant associated with the café 104 at the time of delivery. In this respect, a table in the café 104 or any part of the building or furniture or a plate or other crockery, or a place mat can incorporate a display device and therefore be suitable for use as a display. In another example, where the venue is an airplane, rather than a café for example, the affiliated display can be a shared display visible to passengers or the individual display can be a seat back display made available for the individual use of a passenger. The content delivery server 202 is capable of delivering content relevant to a plurality of profiles of participants to a public display such as venue display 116 or to an individual display of the smartphone 109 through the sniartphone app 340.

The content delivery server 202 can communicate with other content providers' databases 212 in order to receive information or other content for delivery to one or a plurality of participants.

Matching content can be selected based on match to the profile of participant 101 and delivered to the smartphone 109 or selected based on match to the aggregate of profiles of the plurality of participants 101, 107, 108 associated with the café 104 and delivered either to the smartphone 109 or to the affiliated display 112. The content to be delivered can be obtained either by mining or querying the content database 206 or by mining or querying the content providers' databases 212, in either case using a similarity metric using one of the bases described above. The analysis of profiles and content to determine similarity metrics and thereby identify relevant content can be performed by reference to any authorised third party, including access to "big data" databases and using "predictive analytics" methods other than topic modelling, including using queries, services, processes and systems capable of using any algorithm or program, apparatus or method to determine what a group of participants or an individual participant is most likely to respond to or value, or purchase, or act upon to deliver the most economic benefit and/or benefit to participants and/or other benefit defined by the operator of the content delivery server 202.

The content delivery system 200 comprises safeguards to preserve confidentiality and privacy of conscious entities the profiles of which are held in the profile database 204. The content delivery server 202 enables a given conscious entity such as participant 101 to determine which third parties can use which, if any, of the profile data or discrete profile attributes associated with the conscious entity in order to select content of relevance for delivery to the conscious entity.

To this end, a number of the attributes of the profiles are provided with opt-in or opt-out options, selectable by a participant to determine which can be used to inform analysis and content delivery.

The user can also opt-in or opt-out of any content delivery source, for example, by selecting which suppliers of content are permitted or not permitted to deliver content to the participant.

In one embodiment, a potential content recipient, for example the participant 101, can opt in or out of receiving content similar to a specific example or opt out of any category of content, or content tagged with any attribute. A simple example of this general approach is that the user can opt out of receiving offers from providers that are not fair trade, or do not subscribe to the Global Compact, or do not have a full refund policy. This profile information can be used to filter in or out content that matches/does not match a specific condition. In general terms, any attribute based upon which a business, individual or other conscious entity can prefer, select, or deselect a source, supplier or intermediary for content, products, or services, can be included in the profile of content or the profile of the source of content, enabling opt-in or opt-out based on profile attributes. The participant 101 can thereby control who is able to interact with, contact, inform, provide or sell to them and what content they are able to deliver. Opt-in and opt-out can also be used to improve profiles and/or topic vectors of the content delivery system 200 by enabling a participant to opt-in or opt-out of specific content examples. The opt-in and opt-out selections can be used to improve the users profile and/or improve the profile of respective content items to which the participant opts in or opts out. In one implementation, this can be achieved by diluting a participant topic vector with addition of a proportion of the topic vector of opted-in content or with subtraction of a proportion of the opted-out content topic vector. Alternately, the profile of the participant can be adapted by adding or subtracting a proportion of the profile of the opted-in or opted-out content. In this example, a participant can rapidly train the learning algorithms of the content delivery system 200 and the content delivery server 202. As any participant trains their profile, they can also improve the profiles and/or topic vectors for items of content, so improving the likely accuracy of content delivery to other participants.

In one example, (as indicated in Figure 2) a user can select from various listings and view a list of content examples, for example offer listing 302 and select or deselect content items or their respective categories in any manner so as to define further profile attributes by opting in and opting out. For example, a user can: 1 Identify a piece of content as a favourite", 2. Identify any category of content as a "favourite", 3. Ignore -leave this content in the list, 4. Remove this content from the list, 5. Remove all content of a category from the list, identify content as never requiring presentation to the user again, and/or identify a category of content that never needs to be presented to the user again. The content delivery server 202 can use selections and de-selections, for example the latter two, to favour or exclude brands, products, services, database sources, either by setting filter conditions on content to be displayed to the participant 101. In another example, the opt-ins and opt-outs can be used to improve the profile and/or topic vector characterising the participant and/or the respective content. In one example, this is achieved by dilution of existing content and/or profile topic vectors and/or by adding a weighted contribution to a respective participant or content profile.

Referring to Figure 2, the selection and de-selection of content can be performed by the user by browsing with the touch screen an offer listing 302 comprising offers that have been delivered directly to the smartphone 109. In this way, a participant 101 can train the content delivery system 200 to improve their profile without the necessity of making a purchase and thereby enable delivery of more relevant content and less unwanted content. In one example, this training of profiles through a plurality of smartphones improves the profile data available for analysis such as topic modelling and/or evaluation of similarity metrics by content delivery server 202. The use of smartphone interface by participants thereby provides a basis for learning by the content delivery system 200 and the content delivery server 202 and thereby improves the accuracy or quality of match of content delivery to the affiliated display 112 or to an individual device such as the smartphone 109. By combining the manual input and choices of a plurality of participants through a plurality of devices with the analysis of topic modelling, a multiplier effect is achieved so that every participant benefits from the training efforts of each other participant.

In one example, the profiles of participants are further improved based on data from content providers' databases 212 and other databases with information pertaining to one or more participants. For each database provider of the content providers' databases 212, a set of profile metadata can be extracted for each participant and added to profile attributes for that participant.

For example, analysis of store card or credit card data can provide demographic information on expenditure and preferred product purchase categories. Attributes from other content providers databases 212 can be used in computing a/the topic model for the plurality of profiles of the profile database 204 and/or such attributes can define filter conditions for content delivery to participants for example as additional attributes of the participant for use in filtering of content and/or for adding attributes to respective profiles, and/or weighting of topics in respective topic vectors. As a demonstration of this, in one example only AMEX gold card members can receive certain filtered content, whereas vegetarians can in one example be assumed to wish to filter out meat related food offers.

[4500] Taking into account the above restrictions and/or preferences specified by users in relation to their respective profiles, the analysis of the profiles of checked-in participants or participants associated with café 104 is performed as described above and the relevant databases mined in order to obtain content for delivery via the affiliated display 112. For example, matching between the aggregate café 104 topic vector 5300 and available content for delivery from the content database 202 identifies a content item 5350 offering a health club trial from the content database 206. The content item 5350 is communicated by the content delivery server 202 to the computer 228 operably coupled to the affiliated display 112. The computer 228 then displays the content received from the content delivery server 202 in a window on the affiliated display 112. The content can occupy the entirety or a substantial part of the affiliated display 112 or a portion only.

The above is just one example of content that can be delivered. The processing of profile information can be used to provide access to content relating to anything, for example anything with a URI, such as a book or a product with a barcode or Qr code, or anything of the Internet of Things whether a person, conscious entity, device, object, information, data structure, place. The participant is, however, able to filter and reduce the content delivered to leave only what is of value, of relevance or of interest and to control and train content delivery for example, through a smartphone touch screen interface to match one or more preference of the participant. Content delivery to an individual device such as smartphone 109 or a public display such as the affiliated display 112 can be restricted according to the identity or a group membership of a user or group of users. For example, an alumni offer for accommodation in a university can be only made available to those that are photo id verified to be the alumnus claimed in a profile, but can never be made available on a public display. Another offer can be made available only when the public display has greater than 50% alumni amongst associated participants.

[4600] A charge can be made to a provider of content for delivery of content to a public or individual display, for example by deduction of payment from a credit or debit account of the provider of content with the operator of the content delivery server 202.

The price paid by the advertiser for the delivery of content can be conditionally set based on factors including venue identity, venue location, the profiles and/or names of participants associated with the venue, the time at which display takes place, the amount of time for which the display is visible on the affiliated display, the level of activity at the venue, or any statistical summary or performance indicator derived from the profiles of participants associated with the venue.

4700 As indicated above, participant 101 can use their smartphone to select, react to or make a purchase of a content item such as a real or virtual item displayed on the public affiliated display 112 or on a private display of the smartphone 109.

4750 Note that a detailed description of some aspects of learning is provided with reference to Figure 5 above. The profile of the participant 101 and/or the profile of the real or virtual item can be updated to record learning of the content delivery system 200 that can result in a change to the profile database 204 and/or the content database 206 and/or the other database providers' databases 212. In one example, the result is that the content delivery system 200, or the profile database 204, or the content database 206, or the other content providers' databases 212 or the smartphone app 340 can learn from the participation of the participant 101. A result of this machine learning can be that future content delivery to another participant similar to participant 101 can be improved to better match the profile of the another participant. Aspects of learning in one example implementation using topic modelling and MALLET toolkit are described in more detail above with reference to Figure 5.

The connecting line 4775 of Figure 4 indicates a learning feedback loop, whereby recorded learnings from an older generation topic model are fed back into the source data for creation of a newer generation topic model. This can be by means of changes to source profile data or associated information for participant profiles or for content items or it can be by means of topic vector values representing learning that can be added to the topic vectors resulting from generation of a newer topic model.4800 4800 The participant reaction of step 4700 can be a financial transaction and can be recorded on the content delivery server 202 or a related payment service server such as PAYPAL, or the platform of a mobile payment service provider (not shown) and or on the smartphone 109 of the participant 101.

4900 The account of the participant 101 can be debited by the respective payment service provider.

4950 There can be a further charge to the content provider to recompense the operator of the content delivery server 202 for sale of the real or virtual item purchased item. In another example, the operator of the content delivery server 202 can provide a commission or wholesale cost on sale of the real or virtual item when purchased.

As summarised above, the smartphone 109 of the participant 101 can receive content concerning special offers available from the café 104 from the content delivery server 202 [4500]. Individual offers have been entered by the administrator associated with the café 104. These offers can be made available as relevant content to a participant associated with the café 104 such as participant 101 via the smartphone 109 or via the affiliated display 112. A subset of relevant content available to the content delivery server 202 can be replicated onto the smartphone 109 when the app 340 of the smartphone 109 interacts with the content delivery server 202. In one example, the content delivery server 202 maintains a database of content comprising offers and references to content in other databases and servers. In one example, when the smartphone app 340 on the smartphone 109 makes an initialisation or update or refresh request via a web service call to the content delivery server 202, a list of unique identifiers of the most relevant content items to participant 101 is delivered to the smartphone 109. The smartphone app 340 then compares this list with the list of content currently stored in the subset database on the smartphone 109. The smartphone app 340 then requests the full document for all missing content items including content items that are out of date. The content delivery server 202 then returns the full data for each missing or out of date content item. In one example, content delivery server 202 additionally sources content IDs and content for delivery from content database 206 or from the content providers' databases 212.

In one example, the participant 101 is offered, via the smartphone 109, the opportunity of buying a coupon for a healthy meal offered by the café 104 and makes a purchase [4700]. In one example, the affiliated display 212 comprises a smart TV or android tablet running an app of similar local storage of content functionality to the smartphone app described above and the content delivered is delivered to a public display device, not to an individual display device. In another example, as described in more detail below, the affiliated display 212 displays an HTML5 web page that in turn displays content received from smartphone devices, such as the smartphone 109 as well as from the content delivery server 202 and/or content from other content providers' databases 212.

In one example, the topic model-based implementation of the current invention can include weighting or filtering content to maximise an economic goal of the operator of the service, or of a content provider, or of a venue owner, or to maximise match to one or more topics. For example, an administrator of the content delivery service representing a health and fitness club can prioritise matches to health-related topic 5305 relating to health and fitness. A university or school can prioritise matches to a topic relating to education. In one example, this can be implemented by weighting the contribution of a particular topic vector dimension in the computation of a similarity metric. The ability to optimise for goals other than financial is further demonstrated in the steps 4310-4330 below.

4310-4330 [4310-4330] The labelled steps of Figure 4 from 4310-4330 and 4410 relate to one alternate example algorithmic implementation of steps 4300 and 4400. This alternate example is provided to demonstrate the generality of the process of Figure 4 independent of MALLET, LSA, PLSA, LDA, etc. This example uses a very simple, easy to understand and implement example of the novel process detailed in Figure 4. 4310 processes a selected subset of the profile attributes of the plurality of participants associated with café 104 to produce a word or tag cloud characterising the subset based on the full text or a subset of the full text of the respective profiles. A further reduced subset of words is selected to exclude tags that are meaningless in respect of content delivery matching. A person knowledgeable in the art will know that there are many simple algorithms and freely available programs for achieving the step of producing a word or tag cloud. In one example, words such as "and", "the", "but", and numerous other words are excluded as insignificant. The output of this step can be a vector comprising a COUNT of how many times each significant word or tag was found in the data set of profile attributes for all of the participant profiles in the identified subset.

Step 4320 assesses the relevance of each tag in respect of a plurality of goals of content delivery such as maximising display advertising revenue, or maximising relevance to a purpose of a participant such as good health, family, entertainment or education or fair trade. Tags are then ranked accordingly. To support this function, the content delivery server 202 maintains at least one table of keywords comprising respective weighting values for each keyword in respect of a plurality of content delivery goals. In one example, each keyword has a weighting value for a plurality of goals. For example a weighting in respect of a goal to maximise display advertising revenue or commissions on offer uptake, together with a weighting in respect of good health, family, entertainment, education or fair trade. This table can associate an advertising display value or an offer uptake value to each tag in respect of each of the plurality of goals. This is similar in principle to GOOGLE AD WORDS which places a value on a click through for each keyword. GOOGLE advertisers bid to place ads related to particular keywords. With GOOGLE ADWORDS an ad associated with the keyword "online MBA" can cost $20 which is more per click through than an ad associated with the keyword "burger" which can cost $0.05. In the current example, an economic value or another goal value can be assigned to a keyword, for example weighting keywords on how much they relate to personal development, health, education, entertainment or "the arts" or any area of interest or life goal, or economic or social or community purpose. The "online MBA" keyword can be weighted low or zero for entertainment, whereas a "live comedy" keyword can be rated 20 points. In the case of a health-related goal, keywords related to fitness can be weighted high and keywords related to so called "junk food" can be rated low or zero. The assigned value for a keyword can vary depending on the venue such as the affiliated display 112 of the café 104.

The value for display of a content item matching a keyword can comprise a cost per display, independent of the number of participants, or a cost per participant or a combination of these. A cost per participant can in another example be a cost per active participant or a cost per checked-in participant who has for example recently interacted with the content delivery system. The cost or value for display can vary with time of day or day or calendar date or other conditions such as weather. For example, the value for evening delivery to a popular evening venue such as the café 104 can be greater than the value for day time delivery. The value for display in Times Square at 6pm before evening shows begin is likely to be greater than the value at 4am the next morning.

The value can be set by content providers placing requests for content delivery in respect of specific keywords with associated criteria (such as venue time, date, level of activity).

[4330] In one example, the analysis of the content delivery server 202 multiplies the count of occurrences for each tag by a respective weighting based on the goal value of maximising display advertising revenue or by a weighting based on another goal for example a health-related goal or by a combination of a financial goal and another non-financial goal. The tags are then ranked according to the weighted values.

[4410] The step 4410 is an alternate implementation of the general step of 4400. In step 4410, one or more content items can be identified to match at least one highest ranking tag. The resulting content can then be delivered to the affiliated display 112 or the smartphone 109 of the participant 101. The result can be to deliver ad content to the affiliated display 112 that generates the most revenue for display or that has the best match with a non financial goal such as a health-related goal, or the result can be to deliver content based on a weighted influence of financial and non-financial goals. In this example tag vectors are used to characterise participants or groups of participants. The matching of content can be based on one or more tags and based on one or more goals. In step 4700, a participant reacts to a content item. In step 4750, the learning of the content delivery system 200 and the content delivery server 202 can be recorded for example, by strengthening a health related tag of the tag vector for a participant, each time a health related content item is selected, or by strengthening a health related tag of a content item, each time it is selected by a participant with a profile reflecting a strong interest in health [4750]. The feedback 4775 reflects the use of updated participant profiles and/or content profiles in subsequent characterisations of the data set of profiles in profile database 204 and content in the content database 205. The content delivery system continues to learn as new generations of tag cloud characterisations are created (4050).

This example is a very basic implementation of machine learning by improving the characterisation of participants or groups of participants or content items based on the selections or input of a participant 101 in response to display on a smartphone 109 or a affiliated display 212 of a content entry.

Content for places and contexts and aftributes The following are examples of profile attributes that can be used as a basis for selection or categorisation, or ranking, or analysis of content for delivery to the affiliated display 112 or to the smartphone 109. Content can be selected for delivery based on matching any profile attribute from the profile attribute table, or for any location attribute, for example related to a plurality of any of cities, places, shopping centres, high streets, merchants, brands, identified products, identified services, categories of product.

Figure 6 Figure 6 is a schematic diagram of various additional display screen options for the venue display 116 or the affiliated display 112 implemented. Implemented in one example, as an HTML5 page using parameterised CSS, JavaScript and Ajax to provide rapid customisation, animation and responsive display of infographics, each display screen option can be derived from analysing one or more profile fields of a plurality of participants. Figure 6 shows a home town screen 6100 which uses a ranked bar chart infographic stylesheet and the "home town" field as a parameter, a gender and relationship screen 6200 which uses a clustered bar chart infographic stylesheet and parameters comprising the "gender" and the "relationship status" fields, a social energy screen 6300 and a checkin wall screen 6400. In practice, in one example, each of these screens is an example of an infographic display implemented as an HTML5 web page comprising parameterised CSS and JavaScript and using Ajax, allowing simple substitution of compatible profile field names, such as substituting the field parameter "home town" in the home town screen 6100 for the "favourite band", "hobbies," or "favourite movie" so as to display different data in the infographic format of the home town screen 6100.

In the example of the home town field, 6100, the value of the home town profile field is derived from the respective profile field of FACEBOOK. In practice, an administrator of the content delivery server 202 can use the admin settings screen 7330 to choose any compatible, keyword based FACEBOOK profile attribute, or any compatible profile attribute from the profile Attribute Set Table, Table 1 for display through the infographic of 6100. In practice, each of the infographics of Figure 6 is implemented as a re-usable, parameterised style sheet that can be used to display the results of analysing one or more profile fields of a plurality of participants associated with the cafe 104 to be displayed on the affiliated displayl 12.

The home town screen 6200 provides an infographic based on analysis of the home town profile element of the profiles of participants associated with the venue 104. The home towns screen 6200 displays a ranked bar chart, based on a Pareto chart; with popular home towns 621-listed at the top followed by the second most popular, etc to the fifth. Less popular home towns are represented by the other home towns bar 6220. The screen title 6230 is "Home Towns." It should be noted that this is one example of an infographic based on ranking and summarising the value of one multi-value keyword attribute from the profiles of a plurality of participants associated with the venue 104.

The gender and relationship screen 6200, displays an infographic summary of the men and women currently associated with the venue, for example through checkin. The gender and relationship screen uses a horizontal clustered bar chart template with the gender and relationship fields as parameters. As parameterised and displayed here, the infographic shows an upper cluster of bars relating to women 6200 and a lower cluster of bars 6220 relating to men. The screen title 6230 is Gender and Relationship." The shaded bar 6240 represents the number of single women. The white bar 6250 represents the number of women in a relationship. The cluster of bars for men is colour coded similarly. In one example, the advertisement FF260 displays content that has been selected by the server 202 to be most relevant based on the profiles of a plurality of participants associated with or checked-in to the café 104. Note that the gender and relationship status values are derived from FACEBOOK profile data. Data from participants for whom the required field value is marked as private can be excluded from the analysis used to derive the infographic or can be displayed as "unknown." Notethatthedisplayed infographics hometown screen 6100, genderand relationship screen 6200 and social energy screen 6300 are effectively anonymous for groups comprising many more participants than there are categories in that in most circumstances it is not obvious to which participant profiles a summary value relates.

The social energy screen 63000 uses an infographic template comprising a number of dials, each dial representing the aggregate value derived from the profile fields and activities of participants associated with the café 104 displayed on the affiliated display 112 which in this example comprises an input/output port 115. The first dial 6310 indicates the rate at which points are being earned by participants associated with the café 104. The second dial 6320 indicates the rate of activity of participants, such as check-ins and/or photo uploads, and/or comments.

The third dial 6340 indicates a current statistical summary of one element of the topic vectors of a plurality of the participants associated with the café 104, a measure of one element of the café 104 topic vector 5300. For example, the third dial 6340 can be the average value for the health-related topic 5305 (FigureS) in the café 104, hence indicating the probable interest of participants in health related conversation and content and in health related offers and specials.

The fourth dial 6350 shows the rate of check-ins at the venue or in another example, the total number of participants checked in. A person skilled in the art will appreciate that a dial can show any statistic or value derivable from the profile data accessible to the content delivery server 202, including any of the attributes indicated in the Attribute Set Table, Table 1 and that rates measured in number per hour, for example, can be replaced by absolute values in total to date for example, and that any dial can be replaced by any widget or dial commonly used in dashboards, game consoles, exercise equipment, fitness, medical care, education or security applications. In one example, a dial can display the value of any statistic or strength of representation of any topic or element of a topic vector amongst the participants associated with the venue.

The checkin wall screen 6400 shows summary profile information from a plurality of checked in participants or participants associated with the café 104. The information displayed in the checkin wall screen 6400 can include for each checked-in participant, a checkin summary 6410 which can comprise a profile photo 6420 or media, a profile attribute 6340, a response to a checkin question, or comment such as an ice-breaker comment 6350, mood information, a relationship status 6360, a message, an answer to a question, a selection from a plurality of options, or response to any question to users either delivered to users via smartphones such as smartphone 109 and/or as applicable via the affiliated displayl 12.

It is important to note that profile information displayed in any of the above described infographics or in the checkin wall screen 6400 can be derived from FACEBOOK via the FACEBOOK application programmers interface. Infographics and display screens such as the checkin wall 6400 can also display an analysis of life goals, values, emotional states, activities or interests, or any of the profile attributes of the Attribute Set Table Table 1.

The content delivery server 202 or the computer 228 or any other server or servers can support a social networking account or other platform that can be accessed by any number of participants in order to capture and store profile information and provide content to be presented by the affiliated displayl 12 or on the smartphone 109. In one example, authentication to use the content delivery system is by means of FACEBOOK authentication of a user which provides access to a plurality of

FACEBOOK profile fields of the user.

The information displayed in respect of a given participant can be drawn from any element of the profile of the participant or input from the participant. Furthermore, the information displayed can be based upon an aggregation of multiple profiles of participants in order to provide aggregate statistics. The information displayed as advertising content, such as advertisement 6260 can be selected to be most relevant to the plurality of participants associated with the venue, based on a statistical analysis of the profiles of such participants.

Figure 7 Figure 7 is a schematic diagram of part of the content delivery system of Figure 1 supporting upload of content and constituting another embodiment of the invention. In this example, the content delivery system 200 supports participatory activities and/or community games when used in conjunction with the first and second smartphones 109, 209 and appropriate apps or smartphone operated software.

Figure 8 is a flow diagram of a method of uploading content to the content delivery system of Figure 7.

In one embodiment, (Figures 7), the venue display 116 and computer 228 are used to support participatory games. Any suitable known technique to permit locational and motion awareness of the first smartphone 109 can be employed. In this example, with wireless information transfer between the smartphone 109 and the computer 228, the smartphone 109 can serve, for example, as a game console controller and the computer 228 together with the venue display 116 serving as a game console and display. The smartphone app 340 then provides calculation of relative movement of the smartphone 109 with respect to the venue display 116. Similar motion and position sensing and calculation of relative movement of smartphone 109 in respect of smartphone 209 can also be achieved to allow the simulated transfer of virtual objects described below.

In this example, the content delivery system 200 comprises the first smartphone 109 and the second smartphone 209. The first and second smartphones 109, 209 are iPhone 4Ss comprising a camera 7125, an input/output port 111 and 211, a microphone (not shown), a speaker 7150 and X, Y, Z accelerometers, location and motion sensors as well as other sensors known to be provided with such devices. Although the first and second smartphones 109, 209 are, in this example, APPLE iPhones, the skilled person will appreciate that any suitably equipped wireless-enabled communications devices can be employed, for example a device supported by the ANDROID operating system, for example a SAMSUNG GALAXY 3 smartphone, or a smartphone supporting a WINDOWS operating system. Each of the first and second smartphones 109, 209 supports a software application and is capable of communicating via a wireless communications network 7140 to the computer 228. The computer 228 is further coupled to the venue display 116 via a wireless or wired display signal connection 7310. The computer 228 is further coupled via a wired or wireless communications link 7350 to the second caching router 216 and thereby to the Internet 214 via a connection 7360.

The smartphone app 340 executing on the first smartphone 109 supports presentation of a photo 7130, buy button 7240 and an upload button 7120. The app executing on the second smartphone 209 additionally or alternatively supports representation of a virtual object 7220 and dynamically configured game control buttons 7210, the buy button 7270 and the select button 7280.

The computer 228 supports execution of an HTML5 web application running in a G000LE CHROME browser. The computer 228 comprises an input/output port, a liquid crystal display 7320, which can alternately display the venue display activity content 7325, an admin settings screen 7330 or a dashboard screen 7340.

In another example, any other suitable computing device can be employed, for example a GOOGLE CHROMEBOOK or a tablet or other slate computing device supported by the ANDROID or other operating system and capable of providing the wireless network connection 7140 and comprising or capable of operating the venue display 116. In a further example, the computer 228 can be a Personal Computer running an APACHE server software and is hence able to receive, store and serve files such as a file relating to the photo 7130 when uploaded from the first smartphone 109. The computer 228 can serve as a web server for receiving, storing and making available locally generated content, for example movies, music, photos, comments and documents.

In this example the venue display 116 comprises a visual display, together with a speaker, a vibrator or rumble device 7410, an input/output port 117 and displays the webpage of the HTML5 application running in CHROME browser mentioned above. The HTML5 webpage comprising virtual objects, for example an animated photo 7420, an animated virtual object 7430, an animated avatar or character 7440, a photostream collage 7450, and advertising content 7460. The skilled person will appreciate that the webpage need not necessarily comprise all of these virtual objects and the webpage can comprise a subset of the virtual objects mentioned above or a representation of any set of content deliverable in any manner described or implied herein.

In operation (Figure 8), an administrator (not shown) uses the admin settings screen 7330, which is in this example is another HTML5 webpage being executed by the computer 228 (after providing an administrator login name and password for authentication purposes), to select the required functionality of at least part of the content delivery system 200, for example activities supported by the computer 228 and displayed in conjunction with the venue display 116. The admin settings screen 7330 comprises selectable activities and timings therefor. In this example, the administrator has set the computer 228 to operate a photostream activity during the present time period. The computer 228 or the content delivery server 202 or the first content database 206 is then able to receive photos and/or virtual objects and/or other content from the first and second smartphones 109, 209 and the HTML5 application running in the CHROME browser on the computer 228 is able access the uploaded photos and to animate their display on the liquid crystal display 7320 and on the venue display 116. In this example, existing photos in the photostream are shown as the photostream collage 7450. An animated temporal progression of the size and position on the venue display 116 of the photo 7130 subsequent to upload from the smartphone 109 is indicated by the first image, 7416, a second image 7418 and a third image which Is the third position of animated photo 7420. In this respect, the photostream activity is implemented as part of the HTML5 application mentioned above, incorporating java script and CSSs. The computer 228 supports implementation of the HTML5 application via the CHROME browser mentioned above. In this example, the HTMLS application is downloaded from the content delivery server 202, whereas the photos for the photostream can be accessed from any of the computer 228, one of the first and second caching routers 210 or 216, or the content database 206.

In this example, the first and second smartphones 109, 209 are running the smartphone app 340 that supports dynamic download of user interface controls for interaction with the computer 228 and/or the content delivery server 202.

The participant 101 associated with the first smartphone 109 is known to the content delivery system 200 and is able to browse a scrollable list comprising nearby venues and sub-venues in the merchant listing 306 including the venue 100 (Figure 3) on the first smartphone 109. The participant 101 selects the virtual button, from the list, associated with the venue 100 to display a venue page comprising name, venue image, address, opening times, web address and phone number, together with buttons for further details, a map and directions and checking-in.

The participant 101 then clicks a check-in button (not shown) to check-in with respect to the venue 100. A sequence of screens (not shown) enables the participant 101, in this example, to indicate a current mood and to answer an ice-breaker question. The status of the participant 101 as checked-in, the user mood and ice-breaker question answer are passed to the content delivery server 202. Thereafter, information relevant to the participant 101's profile, location and current context is downloaded (Step 8100) to the first smartphone 109 from the content delivery server 202 and/or the computer 228.

The current context can comprise information derived from any of the profile attributes sets set forth above in respect of the participant 101 or from other participants currently associated with the venue 100. The context can further comprise weather information, or information from the activity of participants associated with the venue 100 including check-in status, mood, comment, photos or any other information derived from the activity or profiles of the participants.

In one example, the content delivery system 200 enables the algorithmic processing of profile attributes to provide a content delivery that can control environmental attributes such as temperature, lighting intensity and other factors through an appropriate input/output port 229, 117, 111, so as to meet the needs of participants. As defined herein, a lighting, temperature control or other environmental control device can be considered to be an output device or can constitute or be comprised within a display such as the venue display 116 or the affiliated display 112.

The information downloaded to the first smartphone 109 comprises information for configuration of a required iPhone user interface to participate in the photostream activity. The first sniartphone 109 then displays the downloaded interface for participation in the photostream activity. The downloaded interface permits various options including selection of a photo from a picture library of the first smartphone 109. Another mode of operation of the smartphone when operating the smartphone app 340 is represented by the user interface shown in relation to the second smartphone 209. The user interface employed in relation to the second smartphone 209 enables selection of photos or other virtual objects, such as a ball virtual object 7220. Other options include selection of a character or avatar or other virtual object.

In relation to the first smartphone 109 and second smartphone 209, selection (Step 8150) of a photo 7130 or other virtual object can be initiated by a user touching a representation of the object on the respective smartphone touch screen or the select button 7290. In one example implementation, the buy button 7240 can be used as well or instead of the select button 7290 indicating that the user is agreeing to pay for and will be charged for purchase, ownership or manipulation of the virtual object.

In response to selection by the participant 101 of the photo 7130 or the virtual object 7220, for example from a scrolling list or gallery of photos and/or other virtual objects, the selected object, in this example the photo 7130, is then shown (Step 8200) on the display of the first smartphone 109.

Upload of the photo 7130 to the computer 228 or the content delivery server 202 can then be initiated by touching the upload button 7120 (Step 8250).

In another example, upload is initiated from the second sniartphone 209 by way of a gesture involving motion, which can include acceleration, for example a wrist flick gesture 7230 as described hereinafter. Other examples of gestures can include eye gaze movements, facial expressions, head movements, hand movements or other body movements in the visual field of the camera 7125, or perceptible activities such as sounds in the sensory field of one or more sensors of a smartphone device, or in the sensory field or range of sensors that can provide a signal for use by the content delivery system 200.

In this respect, the virtual object selected, for example the photo 7130 or the ball virtual object 7220 or a character or avatar, is displayed by the display of the second smartphone 209 and can be perceivable as an animated, visual or audible object and can have a mass property 7260 equivalent to mass of a real instantiation of such an object and can thereby be manipulated by the participant 101 "intuitively" in accordance with, or approximately in accordance with, one or more of Newton's laws of motion. The virtual object 7220 can also have an escape threshold property 7250 associated therewith for determining behaviour of the virtual object 7220, which is used in this example to determine whether the virtual object should return to a former location when an upload gesture, for example the wrist flick gesture 7230, is made with insufficient emphasis (Step 8400).

The emphasis of an upload gesture can be measured using one or more physical parameters, for example: force, speed, velocity, acceleration, or any other value derivable from or perceivable by one or more sensors of a smartphone. In this example, the smartphone app 340 operating on the second smartphone 209 is programmed to recognise that the virtual ball object 7220 has the mass property 7260 and to emulate momentum based on the mass property 7260 and sensor outputs of the accelerometers (not shown) of the second smartphone 209. In this respect, when the second smartphone 209, using outputs from the accelerometers or other sensors, determines that the participant 101 has imparted sufficient "virtual" momentum to the virtual object by accelerating the second smartphone 209 such that the virtual momentum of the virtual object exceeds the escape threshold property 7250 so as not to be virtually decelerated by deceleration of the second smartphone 209. Hence, a wrist flick gesture 7230 of sufficient emphasis is recognised (Step 8400).

The escape threshold property 7250 defines the minimum magnitude of gesture for the gesture to result in release of a virtual object from a smartphone device. The escape threshold property can be modelled for example as an elastic connection between the object and a resting place thereof depicted on the display of the second smartphone 209. The behaviour of a virtual object when subjected to a rapid acceleration or deceleration algorithmically mimicks or approximates to a local potential energy minimum, whereby the virtual object will return to the smartphone display if it is not flicked with sufficient emphasis, amplitude or magnitude, (Step 8450). In the case of a wrist flick, the escape threshold property 7250 can be measured as a minimum force in Newtons required to release the virtual object. In one embodiment, the mass property 7260 of the virtual object 7220 is fixed, so the escape threshold property defines the speed of deceleration of a virtual object for the virtual object to be released A person skilled in the art will understand that for each possible class of gesture, whether facial gesture, hand gesture, eye gaze gesture or any other type of gesture perceptible using the sensors associated with a smartphone, an escape threshold property 7250 indicates an emphasis for example through amplitude that must be exceeded for the gesture to succeed in projecting or releasing the virtual object. For example, a flick of the head of displacement 1cm can have insufficient emphasis to exceed an escape threshold displacement of 2cm, whereas a flick of the head of displacement 4cm can result in escape the virtual object.

A physical gesture on the second smartphone 209, for example the flick of the wrist can be used to create acceleration followed by rapid deceleration of the smartphone, meaning that the simulated momentum of the virtual object will propel it forward. A wrist flick of the second smartphone 209 can therefore be used to "release", direct" or "propel" the virtual object 7220 displayed by the second smartphone 209 in a direction so as to maintain the simulated momentum of the virtual object at the point when it escapes so long as the escape threshold property is exceeded. The wrist flick gesture 7230 is preferably used to propel a virtual object towards a receiving device as determined, for example by the geolocation or GFS positions of the two devices, or in the embodiment of Figure 7 towards the venue display 116. It should be understood that any action by the participant which may be perceived through the sensors of the smartphone device 109 or 209 or by external sensors directly or indirectly coupled thereto, for example via the input/output port 211, may be used to manipulate or direct, or propel or project the virtual object in accordance with some or all of Newton's laws.

Alternately, in one example, the smartphone 209 may be wrist flicked so as to create a resulting momentum 7240 of the virtual mass of the ball virtual object 7220. Both the ball virtual object 7220 or the photo 7130 have virtual mass indicated by the mass property 7260 and the smartphone app 340 responds to a rapid deceleration of the second smartphone 209 by maintaining the virtual momentum as indicated by the momentum property 7240 of the virtual object 7220 which "propels" the virtual object 7220 to be ejected from the display of the second smartphone 209.

By assigning mass and hence momentum to the virtual object 7220, when the second smartphone 209 is subjected to the wrist flick gesture 7230 the virtual object behaviour can be simulated, using Newton's first, second and/or third laws of physics, or by laws of fluid mechanics or by other known algorithmic techniques depending on the solid or liquid properties of an object displayed. To improve the user experience, a virtual object can also be simulated to have stickiness and/or an elastic bond and/or a degree of attraction or gravitation or friction to the smartphone surface indicated by the escape threshold property 7250, thereby requiring that the flick has sufficient rate of change of velocity for the virtual object to achieve the escape threshold 7250 when projected from the smartphone surface.

Consequently, in response to execution of the wrist flick gesture 7230, whilst pointing the second smartphone 209, in the direction of the venue display 116, the smartphone app 340 executing on the second smartphone 209 initiates upload and uploads the file associated with the virtual object 7220 to be displayed on the venue display 116. The photo 7130 can similarly be uploaded as a virtual object. Any virtual object can be flicked or thrown in order to indicate displeasure, or thrown to indicate positive feedback, or a coloured paint can be wrist flicked to splash paint on a screen according to a simulation of the appropriate physical laws for fluids, or a virtual character or avatar can be wrist flicked in order to enter a displayed activity, game, field of play or battle field on the venue display 116. 8350

[8350] In one preferred embodiment, if the escape threshold property 7250 is not exceeded, this is indicated by an animated sensory, visual or audible spring back of virtual object 7220, resulting in the visual representation of the object returning to the display of the device and reaching equilibrium, for example through simulated damped oscillation. 8500

[8500] If the simulated deceleration of the virtual object 7220 exceeds the escape threshold 7250, then the virtual object 7220 can be simulated to be launched from the second smartphone 209.

Returning to the photo 7130 for which a file upload was initiated in Step 8300 by touching the upload button 7120, the progress of upload or transfer of the data and/or file associated with the photo 7130 or the data and/or file associated with the virtual object 7220 can be indicated by an animated sensory, visual or audible departure of the photo 7130 from the display of the first smartphone 109 preferably in the direction of the venue display 116.

[8600] The respective transfer of data and/or file(s) associated with the photo 7130 or the virtual object 7220 can be made via wireless communication network 7140 from the respective first smartphone 109 or the second smartphone 209 to the computer 228 and/or to the content delivery server 202.

[8700] The venue display 116 shows an animated sensory, visual or audible display to indicate arrival of the photo 7130 or virtual object 7220 on the venue display 116 from the mobile device.

Optionally payment is deducted from an account of the mobile device user for delivery of the virtual object content to the venue display 116. In one example, recognising the breadth of definition of a display device such as the venue display 116, a paid wrist flick at a concert can result in throwing a virtual fire cracker which can in an explosion or firework on stage.

An application associated with the second device, in one example an application running on the content delivery server 202, processes receipt of the virtual object 7220 or the photo 7130 and reacts accordingly referring to properties or methods of the virtual object 7220 or the photo 7130 as applicable.

8800 The application associated with the second device optionally deducts payment from an account of the user associated with the mobile device.

Shortly after the start of the respective transfer, a sound can be emitted from the speaker and vibrator or rumble device 7410 associated with the venue display 116 to indicate that the respective photo 7130 or virtual object 7220 is simulated to be travelling towards the venue display 116. The combined sound from the smartphone 109 transferring the photo 7130 and the venue display 116 can cause an auditory perception of movement from the first smartphone 109 to the venue display 116. Shortly after the visible departure from the first smartphone 109 screen of the photo 7130, a part of the outline of the photo can become visible as an animation on the venue display 116 indicated by animated photo 7420 which is shown schematically as rotating and expanding in progression from a first image 7416 to a second image 7418 to the position of the third image which is the position of animated photo 7420. The animation continues until the photo outline is fully visible on the venue display 116. During this time, an image of the photo 7130 can be rendered within the photo outline on the venue display 116. Where sufficient photo transfer speed is available, the photo appears at all times as the outline becomes visible on the venue display 116.

Where bandwidth and speed are limited, a representation of the photo 7130-can be displayed progressively within the outline of the animated photo 7420 as the photo file transfer from the first smartphone 109. The design is intended to make the best use of available transfer speed to provide a user experience of near instant upload.

In another example, the participant using the second smartphone 209 sees a photo uploaded from S the first smartphone 109 on the venue display 116 and wishes to throw a virtual object 7220 at the venue display 116. The user of the second smartphone 209 touches the select button 7290 or buy button 7240 to retrieve a 3D rendered image of a ball on the display of the second smartphone 209. In one example, the user can optionally add a caption to the virtual object 7220 and then use a wrist flick gesture 7230 or other gesture to throw the virtual object 7220 at a photo 7420 currently displayed on the venue display 116. The virtual object 7220 is seen to arrive on the venue display 116, hit the animated photo 7420 and stick to the screen. In one example, activities are made more exciting and engaging by incorporating more human senses and experiences by activating or controlling output devices, for example comprised in one of the smartphones, in the computer 228, the venue display 116 or any other equipment in the vicinity of the venue by means of the inputloutput ports 229, 117, 111,211 comprised in the computer 228, the venue display 116 and the smartphones 109, 209 respectively. In one example, such activation or control via the input/ouput ports 229, 117, 111, 211 or otherwise can result in output such as sound, vibration, rumble, lighting, visual effects, fireworks, smoke, temperature or other media output or changes to environmental conditions or building control functions within or around the venue 100 or the venue display 116. Options presented to a user or content delivered to a user can be responsive to multiple sensor inputs including location, direction, gravity or motion sensors, for example temperature, humidity or other sensor readings from the mobile device or the second smartphone 209 or another device whose readings are accessible to the content delivery server 202, the computer 228 or the input/output ports 229, 117, 111, 211 or to a smartphone 109, 209, the second device or to the content delivery server 202 or to the computer 228 or any part of the content delivery system 200.

8800 The software operating on the computer 228 or the content delivery server 202 or another associated server or service optionally deducts payment for delivery of the photo 7130 or the virtual object 7220 from an account of the participant associated with the first smartphone 109 or the second smartphone 209 respectively. Depending on the action of the respective smartphone user the content delivery server can deliver a coupon or credit or virtual goods or points to the user account or mobile device after deduction of payment from the user.

8900 Content such as advertising content 7460 can be delivered to the second device to match at least one profile attribute of a participant associated with the venue. In this example, the content delivery server 202 accesses information from the FACEBOOK profiles of the owners of the first smartphone 109 and the second smartphone 209. Relevant content is selected based on at least one attribute of at least two profiles. In this case both participants' profiles indicate that they have an interest in studying for an MBA. The content delivery server 202 selects an advertisement for a local business school and delivers the advertisement as content to the venue display 116. A third party provider, such as in this case the business school responsible for the advertising content 7460 can be charged, or their account debited for content delivery of the advertising content 7460 to the second device in this case the venue display 116. The cost for delivery can be dependent on the identity of the venue, the location of the venue, the time of delivery, the number of participants or mobile devices currently associated with the venue, the profile of the participants or with the number or frequency of mobile device interactions, such as uploads, with the venue display 116.

In another example, the content delivery system 200 supports other participatory activities and/or community games when used in conjunction with the first and second smartphones 109, 209 and appropriate apps or smartphone operated software.

Although descriptions herein refer to the affiliated display 112 or to the venue display 116, analogous configurations can be used comprising any of the other output devices described herein.

It should be appreciated that although the above examples have been described in the context of the content delivery system of Figure 3 and Figure 7, some or all of the content delivery servers and databases shown in Figure 3 need not be employed. In particular, certain server functions can be provided by the content delivery server 202, profile database 204, content database 206, databases of content providers 212 or by the computer 228 in different embodiments.

Generality of checkin A checkin or checkout can be achieved by a click of a button, for example a checkin button by a participant or by other means, such as a sensor in a venue identifying a participant entering, leaving or being present in a venue, including by means of a tap to checkin using RFID (Radio Frequency Identifier), using NFC (Near Field Communication) or other technologies used in contactless smartcards or smartcards such as smartcard 238 in association with smartcard reader 240, or by means used in "tap to pay" services or tap to pay security or admission cards. A checkin can result from a sensor in the venue recognising a RID such as a bokode or bar code associated with the participant incorporated in jewellery, or a garment, or a credit card, or membership card, or payment card, or by means of any biometric identification such as eye or face recognition. In one example, the venue 100 can be comprised within a London Underground station and the participant 101 can be a passenger entering the venue boundary 130 by swiping an OYSTER CARD. In this example, the swipe action results in a checkin and the content delivery system 200 recognises the passengers entering the station as participants and analyses their profiles to identify the most relevant content for delivery to electronic bill boards on the escalators and in the concourses of the station. In a further example, the London Underground system is a venue and the stations or escalators and concourses within stations are discrete sub venues each with one or more venue displays. Passengers can be participants and their profiles can comprise information on frequent journey routes or stations visited. Bill boards can display content relevant to the expected or predicted destinations of passengers. A passenger, namely the participant 101 can receive content on their smartphone 109 relevant to their checked in status at a particular station and their predicted destination and also relevant to the profiles of a plurality of participants in the station.

Figure 3 Caching Router Returning to Figure 3, in another example, where the venue 100 is a large concert, festival, conference, or venue, the person knowledgeable in the art will be aware that significant internet traffic can be generated by thousands of participants accessing the service and, for example, uploading tens of thousands of photos. To reduce the loading on the content delivery server 202 and the bandwidth required for the connection to the Internet 214, in one example, the content delivery system 200 can cache content for delivery, as indicated in Figure 3, on a plurality of caching routers such as a second caching router 216 at the venue 100, or on the infrastructure of the ISP or Mobile Network Operator providing Internet services to the venue. In another example the first caching router 210 is situated between the server of the content delivery server 202 and the Internet 214.

In these examples the content delivery system 200 makes use of caching to improve reliability, speed and performance and to reduce cost of delivery. Caching can be provided in practice as a service from a CDN or Content Delivery Network, for example, the service provider AKAMAI. The service of CDN's can be used to improve performance and reduce demands on application servers by caching and re-using data close to multiple points of use.

Other examples comprise use of caching routers associated with the venue 100, or with a collection of venues or at a base station or at an up-stream internet node serving one or more venues. In one embodiment, the cache is maintained by caching the results of repeated access of users to content without the server "pushing" content to the cache.

Another example embodiment includes pushing venue relevant content to the cache associated with a venue, for example, pushing all the offers and deals associated with a shopping centre such as the venue 100. This pushing of content can be timed, for example, with updates every 30 minutes, or it may be batched, with a full refresh each night when network traffic is low, or it can be triggered, whereby an update is forced when content has been updated or changed.

The benefits of caching at a venue, or associating a plurality of caches with a venue include: Reduced cost of bandwidth to the venue; Improved speed/reduced latency for users; Improved resilience of service to fluctuations of Internet connection or bandwidth to the venue; Ability to operate even when the Internet connection is down, so long as the IP network within the venue is working; Ability of real estate owners and tenants to improve the user experience and content delivery, for example associated with their venue, without having to incur bandwidth costs or improve the Internet as a whole.

Taking one practical example. The 2012 Olympics expects hundreds of thousands of visitors.

Thousands of London businesses may benefit by profiling their venues and offers to Olympic visitors. By caching profiles of London merchants and their deals local to main venues and stadia, thousands of people can experience fast, reliable access to London's merchants and deals. This caching approach is highly beneficial for content that originates from outside the venue and is used repeatedly within the venue, for example for content from the content delivery server 202, from the content database 206 or from the other content providers' databases 212. However, the media stream and photostream activities supported by the content delivery system 200 have the potential to generate thousands of photos for example from the venue 100 and associated sub-venues such as the café 104. It is wasteful of bandwidth to upload these photos to the content delivery server 202 or to the content database 206.

Figure 9 & Figure 10 In one example, locally generated files or media such as photos can be cached locally as is explained in relation to Figure 9 and Figure 10. Figure 9 is a schematic diagram of one embodiment of the content delivery system 200. Figure 10 is a flowchart of the process by which content can be delivered from smartphone via local storage 9100 to the venue display 116 through the following steps.

[10100] Referring to the schematic diagram of Figure 9, the flow diagram of Figure 10 and Figure 3, a merchant administrator 224 for venue 100 logs in to the computer 228 and authenticates to access the content delivery server 202 by means of the computer 228 and thereby to initiate a photostream activity for participants in the venue 100 associated with the venue display 116. Note that the role of the first and second caching routers 210 and 216 has been omitted from this

description for simplicity.

Login enables the administrator 224 to edit configuration parameters of the content delivery system as it relates to the venue 100. The administrator opts for the content delivery system 200 to use local media file storage for photos and media generated by participants at the venue 100 and sub-venues such as the café 104. The administrator sets the "media storage URL parameter" to define the location of local media. In one example, this URL can be: http:/1192.1 68.0,1 04:8080/appfhtml/ The logged in administrator 224 can also set input variables including those listed in Table 2 below, so as to enhance and direct the dynamic process of participation. The administrator 224 is also able to schedule what activities will be supported by the content delivery system 200 and at what times, by input of settings to the admin settings screen 7330. Which settings in turn determine what can be displayed on the venue display 116 and what user interface functions can be used by participants through the first smartphone 109 and the second smartphone 209. The computer 228 is operatively coupled to the venue display 116 by the display connector 7310 and to the Internet 214 via a fixed or wireless Internet Connection 7370 and to the first smartphone 109 via the wireless communication network 7140. In one example, the computer 228 runs an APACHE server and incorporates Wi-Fi hotspot antenna within the computer 228 or in another example, as shown in Figure 9, the computer 228 is connected to the Wi-Fi hotspot antenna 7500. The computer 228 accesses local storage 9100. In another example the computer 228 and Wi-Fi hotspot antenna 7500 functions and the local storage 9100 are provided by a tethered ANDROID device which accesses the Internet 214 via a wireless signal. Alternately, the required functions can be provided by any device or configuration of devices capable of providing the above web serving, storage, display, connecting and/or other required functions. In one embodiment the computer 228 supports a GOOGLE CHROME browser and displays an HTML5 web page. Any known browser equivalent or HTML or software equivalent can be used to provide the functionality described including a dedicated, interpreted or compiled software program.

[10200] The smartphone app 340 supported by the first smartphone 109 connects via a wireless connection (not shown) to the Internet 214 and thereby to the content delivery server 202 which authenticates the first smartphone 109 to access the service of the content delivery system 200.

The smartphone app 340 receives the media storage URL parameter from the server 202, the value of which is http://192.168.0.104:8080/app/html/" The media upload function of the smartphone app 340 is made available to the user of the first smartphone 109, participant 101. In one example, the participant 101 uses FACEBOOK login to access the smartphone app, enabling the smartphone app to access a plurality of the FACEBOOK profile attributes of the participant including, for example, home town, gender, relationship status, favourite movies, interests, etc. Subject to permission granted by the participant 101 through input to the smartphone 109, the FACEBOOK web server enables the smartphone app and thereby the server of the present invention to receive and store a plurality of FACEBOOK profile attributes. These profile attributes can be used by the server to analyse profiles of checked-in users to select the most relevant content as described in 10400 below.

The upload function of the smartphone app 340 of the first smartphone 109 is made available on the now authorised device, the first smartphone 109.

[10300] Upload of the file associated with the photo 7130 from the first smartphone 109 is initiated by clicking the upload button 7120 or by means of an appropriate wrist flick gesture 7230 or other gesture. In one example, the file associated with the photo 7130 is stored on local storage 9100.

The smartphone app 340 begins to upload the jpeg file associated with the photo 7130 named for explanation purposes mediafilel.JPG. The URL for the upload location is defined by the concatenation of the media storage URL parameter with the file name associated with the photo 7130. The resulting upload address is: http://1 92.168.0.1 04:8080/app/html/mediafilel.jpg Note that if the computer 228 does not have the facilities required to act as a web server, or to store and serve files from a local storage 9100 device associated with the venue, photos and other media content can be directed to remote storage 9200. In this case, the upload attempt will time out after 30 seconds and the smartphone app 340 will upload the file under the same file name, to a location on the remote storage 9200.

[10400] The content delivery server 202 analyses the identities and profiles of a plurality of participants associated with the venue to identify relevant content to match the profiles of a plurality of participants associated with the venue, for example in the manner described with respect to Figure 4 and FigureS.

[10500] The media stream page 7470 comprising representations or displays of uploaded content and displayed on the venue display 116 refreshes retrieving display list including media file references and references to relevant content from a remote content database. In one example, the remote content comprises advertisements or sponsored pages and is served from the content delivery server 202 or the content database 206.

In one example, the display list for the photostream can be received by the smartphone app 340 by connecting to the content delivery server 202 to retrieve a list of references to content to be displayed.

The media file reference used to access the file uploaded to local storage 9100 of computer 228 is: http://1 92.168.0.1 04:8080/app/html/mediafilel jpg A person knowledgeable in the art will understand that there are many possible expressions for referencing a media file from within an HTML page script, web page or application.

The present invention may also be operated in an offline mode where the display list is derived by making a query of the files available on the local storage 9100 and displaying a list of most recent photo files from a designated directory. This removes the necessity of referring to the content delivery server 202 for a display list of media file references.

[10600] The media stream page 7470 is updated to retrieve media files from the local storage 9100 and relevant content such as advertisements, offers, deals, coupons, advice, recommendations, games, or other content and displays on the liquid crystal display 7320 of the computer 228 and on venue display 116. The update can be achieved refreshing of a static or animated HTML5 page.

In the current example Ajax is used to enhance speed and appearance. Javascript code contacts the content delivery server and the local file store and the display is updated with new media content without having to reload the HTML page.

It is important to note that the content delivered need not be chosen to match the profile of the merchant administrator. The information displayed is personalised to the participants' profiles, ensuring that they see the most relevant content.

[10700] The content delivery server 202 can record a charge to be paid by a Content Provider in payment for delivery of content.

[10800] The participant 101, can, by input to the first smartphone 109 indicate their desire to purchase a real or virtual product offered on the venue display 116 and or delivered and displayed to the first smartphone 109.

[10900] A record of the transaction for purchase of real or virtual goods can be transferred to the content delivery server 202 [10950] The account of participant 101 or the first smartphone 109 can then be updated on content delivery server 202 Content such as the advertising content 7460 may be selected for display to match the current content of the venue display 116, the time, location, venue or context, etc and the charge or cost to the content provider for delivery can depend on any or all of the above criteria together with the time duration for which the content is displayed and the frequency of display.

Figure 11 Referring to Figure 11 and Table 2 below, the content delivery system 200 of the present invention provides a means for increasing participation. The activities, incentives and offers available to participants affects the level of participation and the economic and other benefits of providing the service in a venue such as the café 104. Participation can be stimulated and managed by means of feedback and adjustment of parameters by an operator intervention. Figure 11 is a flow chart indicating continuous feedback and adjustment of system parameters. REWARD INPUT VARIABLES, FINANCIAL INPUT VARIABLES, ACHIEVEMENT INPUT VARIABLES AND TIMING INPUT VARIABLES provide non-limiting examples of system input variables. Referring to the steps of Figure 11, step 11510 indicates the setting of any or all system input variables. Step 11520 indicates operation of the system with the current input variable values. Step 11530 indicates output variable observation as exemplified in Table 2 below. Step 11540 indicates an automated test or a decision by an operator. If the operator does not intervene, then the outputs are considered to be OK and the system continues to operate. If not, then the operator can select to update the system input variables. Referring to Table 2 below, system input variables include for example the following: REWARD INPUT VARIABLES determine, for example, how many points a user is rewarded with, when using the system. ACHIEVEMENT INPUT VARIABLES determine how many points a user must have achieved in order to unlock functions of the system.

Table 2. Exemplary System Input and System Output Variables

REWARD INPUT VARIABLES ACHIEVEMENT INPUT VARIABLES

LIKE = 1 POINT DISPLAY CHECKIN >40 POINTS DISLIKE = 1 POINT DISPLAY PHOTOS> 100 POINTS LIFE GOAL = 5 POINTS INSTIGATE GAME >500 POINTS LIFE GOAL HOW = 10 POINTS DEFINE GAME >1000 POINTS ENTER VENUE = 3 POINTS TIMING INPUT VARIABLES CHECKIN VENUE = S POINTS GAME TRANSIENT TIME = SMINS SHARE CONTACT = 10 POINTS VARIABLES UPDATE INTERVAL = 2MINS INITIATE GAME = 20 POINTS OUPUT VARIABLES PLAY GAME = 10 POINTS USER PROFILE DEMOGRAPHICS, DISPLAY VIEW CONTENT = 1 POINT HISTORY) FOOTFALL SPEND, LINGER TIME MAKE PURCHASE = 50 POINTS CHECKIN RATE, GAME ENGAGEMENT

FINANCIAL INPUT VARIABLES VIRTUAL GOODS PURCHASE RATE

CHECKIN MOOD SETS = 200 POINTS ACTUAL GOODS PURCHASE RATE PLAY MUSIC TRACK = 200 POINTS PARTICIPANT MOOD POINTS = $1 INTEREST RATE = -1% PER DAY While much of the above describes photostream and media stream activities as venue based activities. In one example content can be delivered from a streaming media server, to deliver dynamically selected media clips to a venue display so as to match the aggregate profile of associated participants. The clips can be delivered as contiguous program and advertising content. In this example, the present invention enables dynamic entertainment and/or edutainment and/or advertising either to a physical display device such as venue display 116 in venue 100, or to a plurality of display devices, such as TVs used by remote participants. The media stream content can comprise video and media clips to comprise a dynamically generated TV program. The operator of the process described in Figure 11 can dynamically adjust parameters for construction of the media stream.

Available functions can be organised into "levels" within a game experience. Purchase or accumulation of reward points unlocks successive levels. FINANCIAL INPUT VARIABLES are input variables which determine the price of items sold through the system and exchange rate from points to dollars. INTEREST RATE sets the interest/depreciation of currency in the system and GAME TRANSIENT TIME enables the operator to set the time delay between changes of game activity, for example, from check-in and instant dating, to a photostream and captioning competition. VARIABLES UPDATE INTERVAL is the interval for update of system input variables by an operator. For example, in Figure 1, at an event taking place at café 104, the administrator can offer a premium reward for check-ins until there is lively activity on the affiliated displayl 12, thereafter reducing rewards with subsequent system input variable updates.

Claims

Claims: 1. A content delivery server apparatus comprising: a processing resource; a communications interface; wherein the processing resource is configured to support an interactive platform to allow a plurality of users to participate through use of the interactive platform in order to receive, when in use, information identifying content communicated from the plurality of users; the platform has a plurality of rules of operation associated therewith and is arranged to receive a plurality of participant identifying information associated with the plurality of users, respectively, participating through interaction with the interactive platform; the processing resource is arranged to obtain a plurality of profile information relating to the plurality of identified participants, respectively; and the processing resource is arranged to use the plurality of participant identifying information or the plurality of profile information to generate a profile-based characterisation of the plurality of identified participants.
2. An apparatus as claimed in Claim 1, wherein the processing resource is arranged to serve or request serving of content selected based upon the profile-based characterisation.
3. An apparatus as claimed in Claim 1 or Claim 2, wherein the rules of operation relate to an activity.
4. An apparatus as claimed in Claim 3, wherein the activity is a game.
5. An apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein a venue is associated with the platform to encourage the plurality of users to interact.
6. An apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the platform is arranged to support an activity.
7. An apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the platform is arranged to support a meter to represent the processed result derived from the at least part of the content received.
8. An apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the presentation of the at least part of the content received or the processing result derived therefrom comprises the provision of photo, video, or media data.
9. An apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, further comprising an environmental control or building control interface.
10. An apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the processing resource is arranged to support a streaming media server.
11. A content delivery system comprising: the content delivery apparatus as claimed in any one of the preceding claims; and a display device operably coupled to the output port.
12. A system as claimed in Claim 11, wherein the display device is a public display.
13. A system as claimed in Claim 12, wherein the plurality of users has a plurality of wireless communications devices capable of communicating the content to the processing resource via the communications interface.
14. A system as claimed in Claim 13, wherein a wireless communication device of the plurality of wireless communications devices is configured to enable interaction between a user of the wireless communications device and the processing resource.
15. A system as claimed in Claim 13, wherein the wireless communications device is arranged to initiate a user interaction session so as to use the platform, the processing resource is arranged to communicate customisation data to the wireless communications device in response to the initiation of the user interaction session.
16. A system as claimed in Claim 13, wherein the wireless communications device is arranged to configure the user interface of the wireless communications device using the customisation data.
17. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the venue has a boundary associated therewith.
18. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the venue has a sub-boundary associated therewith, the sub-boundary being associated with an area within which the right to deliver content is purchased.
19. A system as claimed in any one of claims 11 to 18, wherein the plurality of users has a plurality of profiles associated therewith.
20. A system as claimed in Claim 19, when dependent upon Claim 9, wherein the processing resource is arranged to analyse at least part of the plurality of profiles and generate an environmental control signal at the environmental control interface.
21. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the processing resource is arranged to analyse at least part of the plurality of profiles in order to identify a most relevant content for delivery to the wireless communications devices of at least part of the plurality of users associated with the analysis result.
22. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, further comprising: a remote processing facility capable of communicating with the processing resource; wherein the remote processing facility is arranged to analyse at least part of the plurality of profiles in order to identify a most relevant content for delivery to the wireless communications devices of at least part of the plurality of users associated with the analysis result; and communicate or identify to the processing resource the most relevant content or communicate the most relevant content directly to the wireless communications devices of the at least part of the plurality of users.
23. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the plurality of profiles each has attributes that are selectable for consideration during analysis by the processing resource or the remote processing facility.
24. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the plurality of profiles each has attributes that are selectable for display in an infographic as in FIGURE 6.
25. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the processing resource or the remote processing facility is arranged to use the selected attributes of the plurality of profiles to identify the most relevant content.
26. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the wireless communications device is configured to receive information about the user associated therewith, the information being communicated to the processing resource and/or remote processing facility subject to privacy restrictions set by the user in order to assist in the selection of the most relevant content.
27. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the remote processing facility comprises a content provision server comprising profile-related information about one or more of the users and the remote processing facility is arranged to use or provide the profile-related information about one or more of the users to the processing resource.
28. A system as claimed in any of the preceding claims wherein the identity of the one or more of the users for which profile related information is provided is not identifiable with a particular user.
29. A system as claimed in any of the preceding claims wherein the contents of a profile of a user can determine which elements of the respective profile can be disclosed to which recipients.
30. A system as claimed in any of the preceding claims wherein the content delivered to match the profile of a plurality of users is dependent upon at least one profile attribute of a plurality of users and also dependent on a trigger condition.
31. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the content delivery apparatus has an administrative user associated therewith, the platform supporting prioritisation by the administrative user of a type of content to be delivered.
32. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the content to be delivered is, at least in part, generated by the processing resource, the content generated by the processing resource comprising summary profile information associated with the plurality of users.
33. A system as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, further comprising: a user content server arranged to store the content identified by the information identifying content.