Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or cost/price determination inventions 08/06

20060195331 - Computerized method and system for generating a display having a physical information item and an electronic information item: Methods and systems for generating a display, for instance, on an integrated message board, the display having at least one physical information item and at least one electronic information item are provided. The physical information item may include, by way of example only, a tagged physical object, hand-written data, and/or...

20060195325 - Data retrieval system: A browsing process is driven by user interaction. The user is presented with a selection of items 511, 512, . . . etc from a range. The user can give inputs representing interest in one or other of the items displayed. The inputs represent rewards, which are distributed to attribute...

20060195326 - Database employment and transitional housing program for ex-offenders: A database/software program containing information on ex-offenders, employers willing and able to hire them, and housing to the offenders for a period upon their release from prison. Employers use the information contained in the software to decide which individuals best suit their employment situation. Ex-offenders use the software to search...

20060195337 - Direct passthrough system for financial contributions: A system for direct donation utilizes an Internet-connected server accessible by potential donors using an Internet browser and a data store accessible to the server and storing information about potential recipients pre-qualified for donations. A software suite executing on the server has at least a first facility enabling a potential...

20060195329 - Dynamic credit amount and salary information display during flexible benefit enrollment: A method for updating a benefit program with a plurality of plans receives an input from an individual indicating a change to the benefit program, and updates the benefit program and the salary information of the individual consistent with the input. The individual is presented with a summary of the...

20060195328 - Enhancing web experiences using behavioral biometric data: A computerized method that provides a Web page having control structures for gathering behavioral biometrics. The method can receive behavioral biometric data in accordance with the control structures and in accordance with interactions of a user with the Web page. Additionally, the method can compare the received behavioral biometric data...

20060195334 - Integrated environmental emission reduction data management system and method: A system for tracking environmental performance of a producer of environmental emissions and of associating individual environmental emission reductions to the producer, to a variety of collected data, or both includes selecting a production practice of the producer and an appropriate protocol for converting the production practice to a measure...

20060195330 - Method and computer program product for enabling dynamic and adaptive business processes through an ontological data model: A method, computer program product, and a data processing system for selecting services of a business process for execution is provided. Ontological data is read from a data store, and an ontological model representative of the ontological data is then generated. The ontological model is mapped to a business process...

20060195332 - Method and computer program product for generating a lightweight ontological data model: A method, computer program product, and a data processing system for representing service relationships of a business process. A plurality of services are read, and first and second services of the plurality of services are selected. An output and effect of the first service is compared with an input and...

20060195327 - Method and system for reporting and processing information relating to railroad assets: Method, system, and computer program product are provided for reporting and processing information relating to railroad assets to user entities that form part of a railroad transportation network. The entities may comprise a plurality of entity groups performing distinct functions relative to the railroad assets, such as forming, operating, maintaining...

20060195336 - Methods and systems for dynamic parallel processing: Systems and methods are disclosed for dynamic parallel processing of a plurality of subprocesses of a process initiated by a parallel processing framework. The plurality of subprocesses may include processing of one or more data objects in a computer system including a plurality of servers for processing the plurality of...

20060195333 - Registry/repository based private market generator: A method for creating an electronic marketplace includes receiving from a first client a request to create an electronic marketplace and receiving information about a product associated with the marketplace. The information includes at least one of first product information and a reference to second product information. The method also...

20060195335 - System and method for career development: A computer system and method is disclosed that aids in career development. Several client workstations and servers are coupled together over a communications network. A web server provides access to a career development web site to client computers. The web server provides various career development modules, such as an information...

20060195338 - Web-based customer prospects harvester system: A web-based customer lead harvesting system. The system is based on an application service model, with the programming for the system being accessible to users of the system via web browsers and the Internet. The users, who are typically business enterprises, may access the system to search unstructured Internet data...

20060195339 - Multiple resource planning system: A system for managing remote doctor medical request workflow may include a workflow module that optimizes assignments of medical requests to remote doctors based on parameterized doctor and scheduling information and may further include a forecasting module that predicts the hospital credentials, state licenses or doctors needed to fulfill a...

20060195340 - System and method for restoring health data in a database: A system and method for restoring health data stored in a database includes storing the healthcare data in a database located in a central server connected to a community of independent sources of the healthcare data for a first plurality of patients; replicating at least a portion of the database...

20060195343 - Method and program-encoded medium for computerized synchronization of distributed radiology system: Inconsistencies between the local data sets of a distributed radiology system are detected and corrected centrally. The corrections are communicated to the affected actors of the radiology system. The data sets of the affected actors are synchronized by incorporation of the corrections. Wrong associations and losses of x-ray images are...

20060195341 - Method and system for creating a conveniently accessible medical history: A method and system for creating a conveniently accessible medical history. An information-input node receives medical information and transmits it through an information-transmission connection to a record-creating node, which is remote from the information-input node. The record-creating node is for receiving the information through the information-transmission connection, for configuring it...

20060195342 - Method and system for providing medical healthcare services: A method is provided for ordering over a network one or more tests for a medical condition for a patient, the method including the steps of providing to the user over the network one or more tests for the patient that can be selected, allowing a user to select over...

20060195344 - Online reservation processing system and method with daylight saving time function: An online reservation processing system, which has a daylight saving time function, comprises a receiving module and a modulating module. The receiving module receives a set of reserving application data. The set of reserving application data at least comprises date information and time information. The modulating module modulates the time...

20060195346 - Labor market information analyzer for researchers, employers, staff and others: A computerized information system for analyzing labor market information consisting of a server having a plurality of categorizing and processing services for researchers, employers, staff and the like, a database of standard and proprietary format data and optional stored procedures operatively coupled with the server, and a plurality of input/output...

20060195345 - Selective merchandise price optimization: An interface that enables a user to determine optimum prices of products for sale. The interface includes a scenario/results processor through which the user prescribes an optimization scenario, and through which optimum prices are presented to the user. The optimum prices are determined by execution of the optimization scenario, where...

20060195350 - Design review, progress check information transmission method and apparatus: A design review, progress check information transmission method includes: a monitor condition selection and setup step (S15) of selecting and setting a plurality of desired monitor conditions based on a project name, check items, unique codes, a scheduled job start date and end date, an actual job start date and...

20060195347 - Distributed workflow techniques: Techniques for distributed workflow processing are presented. A first workflow system and a second workflow system process actions of a workflow. The workflow is coordinated through one or more identity services. The identity services also establish trusted and secure communications between the first and second workflow systems....

20060195351 - Internet-based system and method for leasing rental property to a prospective tenant based on criminal history: System and method for landlord analysis of the suitability of a prospective tenant based on the tenant's criminal history. Landlord predetermines via web-based interface various parameters under which an “accept” or “decline” report is issued. Landlord analysis is automated and provided via web-based interface....

20060195348 - Transportation planning with drop trailer arrangements: Systems, methodologies, media, and other embodiments associated with transportation planning in light of drop trailer arrangements are described. One exemplary computer-implemented method embodiment includes receiving orders that describe items to be delivered to facilities as controlled by order requirements. The method may also include accessing a transportation planning model that...

20060195349 - Weight estimating system and method for products of orders: A weight estimating system and a weight estimating method are proposed for products of orders. The weight estimating system includes an order database for storing order related data for clients; a pallet database for storing pallet weights and product quantities per pallet; a declaration product list database for storing data...

20060195352 - Method and system for demand pricing of leads: A method of demand dependent lead generation includes receiving a question from a consumer and forwarding the question to one or more subscribers. Preferably, the subscribers may review the question(s) from the consumers and individually determine whether to respond to one or more of the received questions. The subscribers are...

20060195353 - Lead generation method and system: A method of lead generation includes receiving a question from a consumer and forwarding the question to one or more subscribers to the system. One or more of the subscribers may respond to the question. The subscribers may review the questions from the consumers and decide whether to respond to...

20060195355 - Method and apparatus for preventing oligopoly collusion: A method and apparatus for reducing incentives for oligopolistic collusion comprises making managerial compensation dependent on relative profits rather than absolute profits. Since the managers of the firms in the industry are thereby placed in a zero-sum game, their compensation will be totally insensitive to gains in absolute profits resulting...

20060195354 - Method of scoring the performance of attendees at a meeting: A method of scoring the performance of attendees at a meeting based upon a predetermined desired performance criteria set by a meeting organizer or sponsor. All attendees at the meeting wear electronic tags where goals for the tag-wearer's meeting performance, such as session attendance, survey completion, conversing with certain people,...

20060195358 - Automated coupon distribution system: The present invention resides in a process for distributing product entitlements to frequent shopper program members. The process includes communicating with a central retailer server having product purchase histories of frequent shopper program members through a computer network. The frequent shopper program member data, including individual account numbers and related...

20060195359 - Combined rewards system and process: A system and process that awards rewards currency, e.g. cash back rebate or rewards points, for credit card and check card purchases and that provides rewards for a customer's enterprise relationship is provided. Further provided is a methodology for enrollment into the combined rewards program or the relationship rewards program....

20060195360 - Electronic coupon system, contribution level calculation method, electronic coupon processing device, and electronic coupon processing program: An electronic coupon system adds identification information for specifying users to electronic coupons every time electronic coupons are distributed among users, and when the electronic coupons are used, the identification information added to the electronic coupons are acquired as a distribution history of the electronic coupons distributed among the users....

20060195356 - Entertainment venue data analysis system and method: A system and method for analyzing entertainment venue data for improved venue management, comprising conventional computer hardware and including compatible software application for compiling and manipulating event consumer and sales data as well as third party consumer demographic data, including classification of event data into a plurality of event-type clusters,...

20060195361 - Location-based demographic profiling system and method of use: A location-based demographic profiling system and method is disclosed that enables users to access information about physical establishments indicating the demographic makeup of the patrons currently located within the establishment. In one embodiment, a location-based demographic profiling method is employed that includes receiving, over a network, a profile request from...

20060195357 - Providing and communicating synergies between absorbent articles and disposable wipes: A method and system for communicating a synergy between at least one absorbent articles product and at least one wipes product. Said method and system capable of directing a consumer to select a particular combination of absorbent articles product and wipes product. Said method and system including at least one...

20060195362 - Recommendation system: A computer-implemented service analyzes purchase histories and/or other types of behavioral data of users on an aggregated basis to detect and quantify associations between particular items represented in an electronic catalog. The detected associations are stored in a mapping structure that maps items to related items, and is used to...

20060195364 - Buyer-initiated shipping system: A system and method in which a buyer registers for a buyer's shipping account and uses the shipping account to pay shipping costs associated with purchases made over the Internet. When a buyer purchases merchandise over the Internet from either a retailer's website or from an individual through an online...

20060195366 - Granting greater rights to stored content: In a method for granting relatively greater rights to stored content, a target device is disconnected from a content service, content is played on the target device, and a purchase selection of the content is detected. In addition, an entry of the content purchase selection is logged and a characteristic...

20060195367 - Payment system and method for use in an electronic commerce system: A method and system of payment of goods and services in an electronic commerce system, reduces the transfer and processing costs for each purchase made by a customer from a merchant; using a customer agent, a merchant agent, an account manager associated with the agents for administration of customer accounts...

20060195363 - Persistent object for online activities: A persistent object for online activities is described. In an implementation, a method is described in which a persistent object is created which references a plurality of clients for participation in an online activity over a network. The persistent object is stored to be callable by at least one of...

20060195365 - System and method for scheduling location-specific services: A system for scheduling a location-specific service appointment, the system comprising a communication network, a target service location, a desired service type, a service provider grouping, and an availability calendar. The communication network interconnects data input devices, data output devices, and a central processing unit (CPU). The CPU unit comprises...

20060195368 - System and process for local acquisition of products priced online: A system and process for establishing prices for products on line and for allowing acquisition of those products from retailers that honor such prices. The system and process involve a customer having a credit card account, a computer terminal configured to access a network, and a central authority coupled to...

20060195369 - Color selection, coordination, purchase and delivery system: A system embodied as a website including a first, second and third pluralities of display screens, the first enabling an at-home user to select a first color which coordinates with a second selected color, the second enabling the user to select for purchase one or more of a plurality of...

20060195370 - Inventory management method, system, and computer program: A method for identifying on-shelf availability of inventory items is provided. The method can comprise: collecting sales information comprising a Stock Keeping Unit (SKU), a sale date, and a sale quantity, from one or more sources; aggregating the sales information by calculating two or more measures comprising at least an...

20060195371 - Method and system of communication for automated inventory systems: Various embodiments of this invention are directed towards the communication infrastructure of an automated inventory system, on which the necessary communication between a dispensing unit and an administrative unit of the system occurs. To facilitate the integration of the automated inventory system into the client's computer network, the infrastructure is...

20060195372 - Automatic transfer of balance between balance sheet accounts: A method of recording financial data is provided. The method includes establishing a first balance sheet account having a balance. The first balance sheet account is associated with a second balance sheet account. The method further includes automatically transferring the balance on the first balance sheet account to the second...

20060195379 - Attention economy for attention to messages, tasks and resources: A centrally tracked artificial currency is provided within the context of an enterprise. This currency serves as a unit of account, medium of exchange, and store of value in a corporate “attention economy.” Users (typically coworkers) in the enterprise are allotted a base number of currency units, which they can...

20060195376 - Compensation techniques for virtual credit transactions: A method and system provides for the use of credit arrangements in simulated environments. A user can participate in credit transactions involving purchases of virtual products, virtual services, and virtual items of value. Feedback is provided to the user regarding results of the credit transactions. In some embodiments multiple users...

20060195381 - Electronic apparatus, charging system and method, charge processing device, storage medium, and prepaid card: An apparatus of the invention comprises an operation inputting element for designating one of a plurality of functions; a function executing element for executing the function designated by the operating inputting element; a measuring element for measuring the time during which each of the functions has been executed by the...

20060195373 - Enterprise portfolio analysis using finite state markov decision process: This invention introduces a method, system and computer readable media that enables a computer system or computer networked system to perform enterprise portfolio transition optimization. The invention considers several key factors that are traditionally treated informally. The invention provides a sequential decision model for enterprise portfolio transition management of computer...

20060195377 - Financial ventures based on virtual credit: A method and system provides for the use of credit arrangements in simulated environments. A user can participate in credit transactions involving purchases of virtual products, virtual services, and virtual items of value. Feedback is provided to the user regarding results of the credit transactions. In some embodiments multiple users...

20060195378 - Hybrid charge account for virtual world credit: A method and system provides for the use of credit arrangements in simulated environments. A user can participate in credit transactions involving purchases of virtual products, virtual services, and virtual items of value. Feedback is provided to the user regarding results of the credit transactions. In some embodiments multiple users...

20060195375 - System and method of evaluating credit instruments: Systems and methods for analyzing and evaluating credit instruments are disclosed. The systems and methods generate a residual value, including the market's view of loss given default for the credit instrument, based on market pricing information for the credit instrument. The residual value, referred to as iLGD, is indicative of...

20060195380 - Systemic investment data analysis: A system and method for outputting hypothetical investment defining data (411) are provided by the present invention. The system comprises a plurality of networked terminals (101 to 104), each of which is configured with at least processing means (208), memory means (209), networking means (211, 212) and visual display means...

20060195374 - Wealth replacement rider: A method for determining a death benefit with respect to a charitable gift annuity contract, the method determining the death benefit funded on an after-tax basis of the charitable gift annuity. The method comprises determining if a wealth replacement rider has been selected; and if the wealth replacement rider has...

20060195388 - Click based trading with intuitive grid display of market depth: A method and system for reducing the time it takes for a trader to place a trade when electronically trading on an exchange, thus increasing the likelihood that the trader will have orders filled at desirable prices and quantities. The “Mercury” display and trading method of the present invention ensure...

20060195387 - Click based trading with intuitive grid display of market depth and price consolidation: A method and system for reducing the time it takes for a trader to place a trade when electronically trading on an exchange, thus increasing the likelihood that the trader will have orders filled at desirable prices and quantities. The “Mercury” display and trading method of the present invention ensure...

20060195389 - Click based trading with market depth display: A method and system for reducing the time it takes for a trader to place a trade when electronically trading commodities on an exchange, thus increasing the likelihood that the trader will have orders filled at desirable prices and quantities. Click based trading, as described herein and specifically the “Click”...

20060195386 - Global trading network: Methods, systems, and computer readable media for facilitating trading two items (L,Q) from the group of items comprising commodities and financial instruments. At least two agents (2) want to trade the items (L,Q). There is a trading channel (3) between the two agents (2) allowing for the execution of trades....

20060195382 - Method for providing auction service via the internet and a system thereof: Disclosed herein is a method and apparatus for providing an auction service via the Internet. The auction service providing method includes the step of maintaining a commodity information database (DB). Thereafter, a bid information DB is maintained. Bid request data including specific bid price information is received from bidders. The...

20060195383 - Method of generating and displayjing stock index: An arithmetic operation for calculating a value of a Masuda ratio (Mratio) or a value substantially equivalent to the Masuda ratio (Mratio) on the basis of the stock price information on a database is executed. The Masuda ratio (Mratio) is represented by a formula Mratio={(B−E)/SUM}×100, where SUM is a total...

20060195385 - System and method for exchanging sales leads: A subscriber-based sales leads exchange system and method for efficiently maximizing revenue to lead sellers and for providing high quality, temporally relevant sales leads to lead buyers based on a transaction between a lead seller and a customer of said lead seller....

20060195384 - Systems and methods for determining vehicle salvage value: An exemplary system for determining vehicle salvage value includes a valuation subsystem configured to communicate with one or more access devices over a data communication network. The valuation subsystem includes a bid module and a valuation module. The bid module is configured to solicit bids for a vehicle over the...

20060195390 - Administration of dual component financial instruments: Methods and systems for administering a dual component financial instrument (DCFI) are described. The DCFI includes a revolving loan component and one or more installment loans. A holder of the DCFI account can use the revolving loan to pay for expenses, e.g., educational expenses. At predetermined intervals, e.g., annually on...

20060195392 - Method and system for enabling a life insurance premium loan: A loan is secured by insurance policy collateral between a lender, borrower with the insurance policy, and an intermediary. The intermediary establishes a securities account and holds the insurance policy, which designates the borrower as the beneficial owner and the intermediary as the record owner. The borrower disburses the loan...

20060195391 - Modeling loss in a term structured financial portfolio: In accordance with the principles of the present invention, an apparatus, simulation method, and system for modeling loss in a term structured financial portfolio are provided. An historical date range, time unit specification, maturity duration, evaluation horizon, random effects specification, and set of portfolio covariates are selected. Historical data is...

20060195393 - Creation of recurring transactions: A computer implemented method for recording financial information is provided. The method includes identifying a transaction as recurring. A recurring transaction occurs multiple times according to a frequency value. The method also includes creating two or more transactions from the recurring transaction according to the frequency value....

20060195394 - Payment options for virtual credit: A method and system provides for the use of credit arrangements in simulated environments. A user can participate in credit transactions involving purchases of virtual products, virtual services, and virtual items of value. Feedback is provided to the user regarding results of the credit transactions. In some embodiments multiple users...

20060195396 - Centralized customer care for electronic payments and other transactions via a wide area communications network: Customer care is provided via a wide area communications network to a user who has previously requested payment of a bill of a biller on the user's behalf by a bill payment service provider. The communications network has multiple different network sites including a first network site associated with a...

20060195397 - Centralized electronic bill presentment: To make bill information available for presentation to a user entity, a first network site receives a request of the user entity for bill information, from a third network site associated with the user entity. In response, bill information representing a bill of a biller entity for the user entity...

20060195400 - Controlling access to electronic content: A computer-implemented method of controlling access to electronic content includes receiving electronic content and producing a file that includes the electronic content and instructions for collecting and transmitting payment information. The method further includes receiving a reply to the transmitted message and selectively providing access to the electronic content based...

20060195395 - Facilitating electronic payment on behalf of a customer of electronic presented bills: To facilitate electronic presentment of a bill of a biller for a customer and payment of the presented bill on behalf of the customer via a communications network, a first network site associated with a bill payment entity receives a request for billing information from a second network site associated...

20060195398 - Method and apparatus for processing payment requests: A request is received from a user to register to use a payment system. Further received is identification of a user bank account to which received payments are to be deposited. An email address is also received along with an amount from the user. A request for payment is generated...

20060195399 - System and method for interrelating and storing advertisements, tearsheets, and invoices: A website including a search web page configured to search for invoices and to display a web page with at least one found invoice summary. There is a link between the at least one found invoice summary and an invoice which, when activated, displays a web page with an invoice...

20060195402 - Secure data transmission using undiscoverable or black data: Methods and systems of encrypting data. One method includes establishing data that includes discoverable or “white” data and undiscoverable or “black” data. Black data is generally unrecognizable. For example, it may be random data. White data generally has recognizable content or is transmitted in a recognizable format. A first key...

20060195401 - Systems for selectively enabling and disabling access to software applications over a network and methods for using same: The present invention provides systems and methods for controlling access to networked applications. An embodiment of the invention discloses using developer and access keys to validate and control user access to one or more network applications. The network access and licensing system disclosed includes a customer computer, one or more...

20060195403 - System and method for improved portable media file retention: A method of acquiring rights to content to be burned to a CD, comprising defining a first content set; defining a second content set comprised of content selected from the first content set whose content attributes match those selected by a user; identifying as a third content set that content...

20060195404 - System and method for providing grace licensing to disconnected network license users: A method and/or system for providing grace licensing to disconnected network license users provides a server with a grace enabled license having a grace criteria, provides a client computer with an application operable with the grace enabled license, provides the grace enabled license from the server to the client computer...

20060195405 - Digital content distribution system: The content distribution system according to the present invention is comprised of: a server device and a terminal device, the server device providing the terminal device with a license for using a content based on transaction processes, each including receiving of a request message, sending of a response message, and...

20060190274 - Cooperative product promotion system and method: Computer-implemented systems and methods for presenting personalized custom product designs to the customers of a second company. Email content promoting customizable products and containing images of product designs is prepared by the product vendor and supplied to a second company. The second company creates and sends an email containing the...

20060190289 - Detecting test fraud and theft from the analysis of test event and response data: The principles of the present invention provide for detecting anomalous test event and response data indicative of test fraud and/or test theft for numerous administered tests. A computing system accesses test event and response data for one or more administered instances of the test either during “real-time” or following the...

20060190286 - Electronic systems and methods for information process automation: Systems and methods of the embodiments of the inventive subject matter provide for automation of information service work, for example the work of financial advisors and for enforcing and facilitating the adherence of such information workers to regulatory requirements....

20060190287 - Fraudulent address database: One embodiment of the present invention provides a system and method to collect information about potentially suspect addresses across many members of a commerce platform or a fraudulent address database system, thus reducing the chance of exposure to fraudulent charges for merchants providing services as members....

20060190275 - Intellectual property management system: The present invention provides a system for managing and maintaining information related to unique and limited edition products, including graphics and “cartoon” characters used on those products as well as the issuing and tracking of certificates of authenticity for those products. The system also maintains legal rights information such as...

20060190280 - Method and apparatus for management for use in fleet service and logistics: An apparatus and a method for managing a fleet of assets and their associated logistics are disclosed. The apparatus includes an Autonomic Product Support (“APS”) system, a simulator, and fleet data including logistical data. A user can interact with the fleet data to make management decisions both in maintenance and...

20060190285 - Method and apparatus for storage and distribution of real estate related data: Systems, methods, and software for storage and distribution of real estate related data. Some embodiments include a database of data representing three-dimensional topographic views of geographic areas and a computer system adapted to present a topographic view of a geographic area based on a query by a user for information...

20060190271 - Method for forming rate compatible code using high dimensional product codes: Provided is a method for forming a rate compatible code using high dimensional product codes and a computer-readable recording medium for recording a program that implements the program. The rate compatible code, which can provide various encoding rates, is formed by discriminating parity blocks and determining a punctured pattern for...

20060190272 - Method for the estate transaction by network of member store: Since conventional real estate portal sites are one-directionally provided by real estate portal site operators, wrong information may be provided. Also, since a large amount of real estate information must be frequently provided and changed, material and human resources must borne. Also, customers must visit corresponding real estate agents in...

20060190273 - Method, system, and storage medium for implementing transaction-based data exchange: A method for implementing transaction-based data exchange. The method includes transferring information relating to a product via a transmission means selected by an individual at a computing device requesting the information. The information includes at least one of warranty information, accounting information, pricing information, and product details. The method further...

20060190278 - Online real estate transaction system: An apparatus, method and program product to provide an online marketplace to enable real estate sellers, passive, real estate investors, and master lessees and sponsors of TIC transactions to contract regarding fractional and other real estate interests, including TIC property, remainder interest, estate for years, subordinated fee interest and sale-leaseback...

20060190277 - Online transaction system for fractional interests in real estate: An apparatus, method and program product to provide an online marketplace to enable real estate sellers, passive, real estate investors, and master lessees and sponsors of TIC transactions to contract regarding fractional and other real estate interests, including TIC property, remainder interest, estate for years, subordinated fee interest and sale-leaseback...

20060190283 - Participating in risk mitigation in a virtual world: Embodiments include an apparatus, device, system, computer-program product, and method. In an embodiment, a system includes a computing device couplable to a virtual world via a public network, and instructions. The instructions when executed on the computing device cause the computing device to activate a virtual character that represents a...

20060190282 - Providing risk mitigation in a virtual world: Embodiments include an apparatus, device, system, computer-program product, and method. In an embodiment, a method includes operating a protection entity associated with a virtual world configured to interact with a participant via a network, participating in a risk management arrangement with the participant, and saving a record of the arrangement....

20060190284 - Reporting a participant loss in a virtual world: Embodiments include an apparatus, device, system, computer-program product, and method. In an embodiment, the system includes a covered-loss detection module operable to identify an occurrence of a defined loss in a virtual world suffered by a participant of at least two participants (hereafter referred to as “the participant”) that participate...

20060190293 - Responding to requests for data: A user information item is associated with a data set selected by a user for delivery over an electronic network. The user's present and previous data selections are analyzed to identify a user information category related to at least one of these data selections, and the user information item is...

20060190288 - System and method for allocating prescriptions to non-reporting outlets: A method for predicting market information for a plurality of pharmaceutical outlets includes the steps of receiving first data representing purchases and sales of at least one pharmaceutical product from at least one pharmaceutical outlet over a time period in the past, calculating the amount of prescriptions that are not...

20060190279 - System and method for marketing and managing real property: A system and method for marketing and managing real property including a transaction server managed by a system administrator and a data manager that may be placed in communication with a remote terminal or client computer via a network communication line such as the Internet. The transaction server preferably provides...

20060190276 - System and method for reserving ground transportation: An inventory of ground transportation vehicles is stored at a server. The inventory includes information about each ground transportation vehicle including fees for travel in a respective ground transportation vehicle as a function of geographical zones to be traveled. A request is made by an end user from a remote...

20060190290 - Systems and methods for distributing electronic files: An electronic content exchange system according to various embodiments of the invention is configured for super distribution of digital media data such as music, movies, games, software, and other copyrighted materials from content owners to consumers, while enabling content owners to retain control of their digital media assets. In certain...

20060190292 - Systems and methods for evaluating the appearance of a gemstone: Of the “four C's,” cut has historically been the most complex to understand and assess. This application presents a three-dimensional mathematical model o study the interaction of light with a fully faceted, colorless, symmetrical round-brilliant-cut diamond. With this model, one can analyze how various appearance factors (brilliance, fire, and scintillation)...

20060190281 - Systems and methods to facilitate self regulation of social networks through trading and gift exchange: The subject invention provides a unique system and method that facilitates self-regulation of a social network system based at least in part on user behavior, and in particular on good or desirable user behavior. The system and method involve monitoring user behavior such as user activity and user interactions with...

20060190291 - Time phased configured product reutilization sales model: A time-phased reutilization of configured products is provided. Partially configured products are detected. Each partially configured product is analyzed to determine if the partially configured product is a valid partially configured product, suitable for being modified into other configurations. A time phased management process is applied to the valid partially...

20060190299 - Active agent delivery method: A method for active agent delivery is provided which includes orchestrating focus groups and clinical studies and the distribution of educational materials and guidelines for counseling patients with regard to what the patients need to know and what the patients must do in order to both avoid adverse side effects...

20060190294 - Medispatch: a concept for secure medical communication: Medispatch is a proposal for a service to provide an unmet medical need for secure universal communication between patients and their health care providers or facilities. The features of the service are security through encryption, authentication of the sender and receiver of information, and non-repudiation of the information. Through a...

20060190296 - Method and system for referring healthcare professionals in compliance with various transaction constraints: Techniques for providing public access to a predetermined class of healthcare providers using a plurality of electronic communications systems and in compliance with a predetermined set of regulatory criteria governing the provision of healthcare. The method and system establish an electronic healthcare provider database of regulatory requirements associated with public...

20060190297 - Portable charge capture and inventory management: Portable charge capture/inventory management systems and methods include a system comprising at least one server at a first location. The server of an embodiment includes inventory data and patient data. The inventory data includes information of drugs and supplies of a facility that is a patient treatment facility. The patient...

20060190300 - Post payment provider agreement process: A method and business technique for reviewing medical service provider bills, recalculating and providing payment recommendation to a paying party for the bills. The method includes analyzing medical bills and determining erroneous and inappropriate charges on bills. The method provides a payment recommendation using multiple databases and sophisticated mathematical modeling...

20060190295 - Systems and methods for assessing and optimizing healthcare administration: A comprehensive patient data assessment system and method for use in generating, tracking and analyzing medical data related to healthcare administered by a group of physicians to a specified patient population. The system is operative to track data related to the claims history, case management, pharmacy data, and lab tests/results...

20060190298 - Systems and methods for coordinating the flow of events in a health care setting using a workflow module: A method and system of coordinating events that occur between a time that a person enters a health care setting and a time that the person is discharged from the health care setting by generating and operating a health care setting specific workflow module that includes receiving a selection of...

20060190303 - Coordinated health and human services delivery system and process: A system (200) and method (500) is provided for a coordinated health care service delivery program. The method can include providing services to clients at high risk for chronic disease including co-morbidities and consequent disabilities associated with the chronic disease, linking community and vocational services (130) for facilitating community inclusion...

20060190301 - Method and apparatus for automated generation of a patient treatment plan: A method and apparatus for generating a patient treatment plan includes processing that begins by providing a list of health care services to a patient and/or care provider. The processing continues by prompting for input of digital information regarding the patient when health care services applicable to addressing the patient's...

20060190302 - System and method for managing patient care: The present invention is directed to a system and method for providing care to a patient, comprising a patient care device having a number of configuration databases stored in a memory in the device. Each configuration database preferably includes protocols, operating limits, rule sets and/or operating features that collectively define...

20060190304 - Casualty insurance service system for computers and related equipments: A casualty insurance service system for a specific computer and related equipment is provided, in which a maintenance contract regarding the computer or related equipment is adopted as an insurance contract, and service for the insurance contract is at least broken down to a client insurance service offered on a...

20060190305 - Method and system for providing insurance: A system and method for providing insurance to an individual who has deposited a body tissue or organ in a depository of such organs or tissues, for example, umbilical cord-blood or blood from another source, foreskin or other skin, lymph, fetal stem cells, adult stem cells, lymph or sperm, involves...

20060190307 - Automated fulfillment system for optimizing web-based transactions: In a method and system for providing travel fulfillment, a plurality of criteria for the travel fulfillment is received by a client from a user. Continual searches for the published prices fulfilling the plurality of prices are conducted concurrently during a time interval by the client and a server coupled...

20060190306 - Guest room assigning system, guest room assigning program: A server computer (P2) is configured to allot to a user a guest room to be provided for the user from plural guest rooms, the server computer (P2) including: guest room information storage means (2B) configured to store guest room condition information on the guest rooms as to whether each...

20060190308 - Method and apparatus for dynamic information connection engine: A method and apparatus are provided for a dynamic information connection engine. User actions are detected on at least one client system. In response, a determination is made whether the user is searching for supported information. When the user is searching for supported information, information is extracted electronically from third...

20060190309 - Method and system for reservation and management of recreational activities: A reservation and management system for recreational activities offered by a plurality of activity operators, comprises a database for storing information regarding a plurality of recreational activities, including inventory information and a financial record containing financial information, for reservation transactions carried out for said activity and profile information for a...

20060190312 - Method for assembly of projects and system for practicing method: The present invention teaches a method and system for assembling projects. The method comprises the steps of 1) gathering and assembling expert knowledge; 2) identifying relevant parameters and defining rules; 3) programming key parameters into a core system; and 4) providing a computer based medium for users to input information,...

20060190310 - System and method for designing effective business policies via business rules analysis: Methods and systems are provided for analyzing the business rules, business metrics, and decision parameters for a firm or organization, processing a subset of such data to form output, and offering access to selective views of such output including evaluation and comparative data regarding execution of such business rules, information...

20060190311 - System and method for product level projections of pharmacy prescriptions within product therapy classes: Systems and methods for product level projections of pharmacy prescriptions within product therapy classes are provided. Average wholesale dollar sales amounts are obtained or estimated at channel/outlet/product-therapy levels. All of the average wholesale dollar sales amounts are converted to prescription data at channel/outlet/product-therapy levels using a correlation function. The correlation...

20060190313 - Calendar overlays: Implementing an electronic calendar can include accessing a first electronic calendar owned by a first party, accessing a second electronic calendar owned by a second party, and presenting a view that combines at least one existing entry from within each of the first and second electronic calendars. Source information for...

20060190316 - Computer based system and method for gathering and processing scientific project data: An apparatus and method for automating credit-eligibility determination (such as tax credits) of scientific or research projects are provided. The apparatus includes a general purpose computing device that is operable to determine a set of weightings to be applied to responses that are received for a predefined set of questions....

20060190314 - Method and system for testing of policies to determine cost savings: Method and system for testing policies to determine cost savings, which in one embodiment comprises receiving identities of a set of one or more persons associated within an organization, the one or more person's travel related expenditures are to be governed by at least a first and second policy; from...

20060190315 - Method and system for unused ticket management: A method and system for unused ticket management, that identifying travel data related to one of future or past travel data for one or more travelers; identifying one or more unused travel purchase; generating a value for the unused travel purchase, the value corresponding to the one or more travelers,...

20060190317 - Tow claims system for secondary tow and salvage management: A method and system for unified secondary management of tow claims and salvage tow data, and specifically for simplifying the workflow of attending insurers, towers, and a manager (operator of an application service provider). The system is implemented in software form and includes an Insurance Company Module for allowing Clients...

20060190319 - Realtime, structured, paperless research methodology for focus groups: A methodology for realtime paperless research in focus group generating valid actionable feedback and data before, during or within a very short period of the session. The methodology includes collection, processing mapping, analyzing and recognizing patterns of data points using multiple iterations in order to generate and output the valid...

20060190318 - System and method for identifying and measuring performance discrepancies among sales territories: A system for measuring performance discrepancies (101). The system (includes a display). (102), such as a monitor, which permits a user to view data, to interact with the process and to view the results of the process. The system includes a system processor (103), for processing data according to instructions...

20060190326 - Advertisement-purpose recordable optical disk, advertisement image forming method, and optical disk recording apparatus: In an optical disk, while restricting a program area which has been defined as to the normal disk and on which a user can record arbitrary information, a remaining area located outside this restricted program area is previously secured as an advertisement area where an advertisement-purpose visible image is formed....

20060190334 - Automated system and method for discounting medical bills of self-pay patients: A system and method for consistently, reliably and equitably discounting medical bills of self-pay patients includes a networked discounting engine operably coupled to a plurality of databases. The discounting engine is adapted to receive patient account data from one or more patient registration systems. Based upon the patient account data...

20060190328 - Automatic flight management in an online marketplace: A database search system includes a database of search terms, each search term associated with a bid amount payable by an advertiser of a plurality of advertisers and a search engine responsive to search queries from searchers for searching the database. A flight management agent is responsive to advertiser-specified parameters...

20060190333 - Brand monitoring and marketing system: A brand management system for providing marketing and monitoring services for brands or products over the global computer networks. The brand management system can include a bot used to automatically monitor certain web sites and web postings for specific keywords. The keywords may be related to particular brands or products....

20060190323 - Consumer education and loyalty reward system: A system and method for educating and rewarding a consumer of a prescribed pharmaceutical or intervention is provided. The system includes a means for enrolling the consumer in a consumer loyalty rewards program, a means for providing the consumer with information relating to the intervention, a means for tracking purchases...

20060190320 - Content distribution systems, distribution method, content processing device, and processing method: The present invention provided a contents delivery system (11) that can deliver contents by way of the Internet. In the system, a browser (23) requests a contents server (75) to delivery a startup file. The contents server (75) transmits the startup file to the browser (23). The startup file describes...

20060190330 - Delivering targeted advertising to mobile devices: A method for loading a layout with advertising item data is provided. Layout header data is parsed. A layout item object is then built. Global layout variables are replaced with values. Local layout variables are replaced with data from content objects. Displayed data is then created....

20060190331 - Delivering targeted advertising to mobile devices: A method of delivering advertising items to a client at a portable device is provided. A client ID is sent to a host server. A downloaded advertising item is produced relative to a product or service from the host server. The downloaded advertising item is parsed and stored. In response...

20060190335 - Method and apparatus for defining routing of customers between merchants: A server or Internet service provider computer selects a soliciting merchant and an outputting merchant based on various factors. In one embodiment, the soliciting merchant is selected is its activity rate (e.g. sales rate) is low. The outputting merchant provides offers for bonuses to customers on behalf of the soliciting...

20060190327 - Method and apparatus for encouraged visitation web advertising: A method for advertising over the Internet by first sending a notice to a product. A receiver integrated in the product receives the signal and an indication is presented to a user. The user then responds to the indication by visiting a web site....

20060190321 - Method and computing system for games, lottery and/or advertising campaign events using sms or multimedia messages: This invention concerns a method and computing system for game, lottery and advertising campaign events in order to encourage the use of chained SMS or Multimedia messages where the sender, responsible for supporting all associated costs, becomes eligible for winning randomly awarded prizes set according to predetermined rules, using the...

20060190332 - Method and device for dispensing and purchasing customized gift cards: A system, method and processor-readable storage medium for purchasing a gift card are disclosed. Information may be received identifying an amount and a merchant for a gift card. The purchaser of the gift card may provide payment information. The information identifying the amount and the merchant for the gift card...

20060190322 - Method and system for managing an incentive fund: A sponsor or another establishes a pool of incentive funds to be used by designated merchants to fund sponsored incentive programs for at least one of a sale and a lease of a product. An amount of each incentive fund is allocated for a designated merchant. One or more credit...

20060190324 - Method for providing reduced cost imaging to customers: A method for reducing a cost of imaging to a customer includes determining a rate of consumption of imaging substance from a supply item; and, based on the rate of consumption, offering to the customer an imaging reward....

20060190325 - No-fee, internet, marketing system with new-member, introducer identification: Methods, systems, and computer program products are provided for various embodiments directed to a novel network marketing system. In one embodiment of the present invention, the network marketing method is free to join and rewards participants with real money based on recommended product purchases. Rules are provided in various embodiments...

20060190329 - System and method for facilitating product placement advertising: According to one aspect of the present invention, there is provided a computer-implemented system for facilitating product placement advertising. The system may include a user registration module including an account type selection component for allowing a user to select one of a buyer account and a seller account, wherein a...

20060190336 - System and method for pay for performance advertising in general media: A method for providing advertising services in general media using a pay for performance model is provided. A service provider defines at least one biddable advertisement for presentation in advertising media. A bid amount chargeable to a participating advertiser upon a response to the at least one biddable advertisement is...

20060190337 - System and method of point-of-sale manufacturer rebate program: A manufacturer rebate-processing program uses a program administrator to implement the rebate program. A rebate program card is issued to consumers to identify the rebate-qualifying product. The consumer presents the card to the merchant when making a purchase. The purchase transaction information from the merchant is forwarded to the rebate...

20060190338 - Sales planning support system, sales planning support method, and computer product: A managing computer adds a bulk-sales negotiation ID to a bulk-sales negotiation to distinguish the bulk sales negotiation from a normal sales negotiation. An amount of scheduled shipment and completed shipment for the bulk sales negotiation is managed by a bulk-sales-negotiation managing unit based on the bulk-sales negotiation ID. The...

20060190339 - Policy-based store catalog synchronization: A method, system and program product for policy-based navigational catalog synchronization. A method for policy-based store catalog synchronization can include applying inclusion rules to a node filter during a synchronization process between a store catalog and a navigational catalog. The applying step can include reading store-level product and category inclusion...

20060190340 - Find it fast, locate an item in a store or facility: This invention comprises the processes, methods and systems for a customer or company associate to locate an item in a store or facility based solely on the name of the item or a part of the item name. To enter an item name, the customer or company associate utilizes an...

20060190353 - Method and apparatus for vending and delivering telephone services: A method and apparatus for providing electronically mailable call credits and call connections to be charged thereto are purchased by a customer for a recipient through the Internet and sent via email to the recipient. The recipient requests a call by activating an icon associated with the email. An application...

20060190352 - Method for providing history data to sellers about internet auction and marketplaces: The present invention provides a method and apparatus to allow sellers at online auctions to optimize the way they sell items and get the best possible price for the items. The invention provides a method for searching a database for data on previous sales of similar items at online auction...

20060190343 - Method of marketing memberships in a consumer group: An organization is presented that includes members of a consumer group. A facilitator coordinates and issues memberships in the organization. The facilitator negotiates with suppliers for favorable deals for members of the organization. The memberships are sold primarily by existing members. For each membership sold, a facilitator fee is paid...

20060190341 - On-line planogram system: A retail system for implementing planograms includes a communications network, a central computing system, and a plurality of retail computing systems. The central computing system is configured to receive and to transmit a plurality of planograms, each planogram being associated with one retail store of a plurality of retail stores...

20060190346 - Order file processing using order variables from two sources and authentication: Methods for purchasing of goods or services over the internet. A customer has a customer account set up at a bank with associated account information. The account information includes verification information for verification parameters, such as authorized computer identification, authorized delivery addresses, authorized user identification, authorized telephone caller identification, and/or...

20060190349 - Order support system, server, method, and program: At access from the orderer terminal, an order support server sends to the orderer terminal an order input form to order a concealing item to conceal a radio base station of cellulars. Upon receipt of order information from the orderer terminal, the information including the order input form containing at...

20060190342 - Parts supersession system: The present invention provides a system and method for identifying replacement parts. Replacement parts may be identified although they do not correlate to obsolete parts on a one-to-one basis. Both replaced parts and their substitutes may be tracked by, for example, associating an identifier with the part. Each identifier may...

20060190348 - System and method for computerized ordering: The present invention discloses a method and system for computerized ordering at least one product being a part of a final shopping list. The system comprises a first computerized trolley configured to facilitate a user to select at least one product among products being offered by one or more shops...

20060190351 - System and method for controlling financial transactions over a wireless network: A system and method for controlling financial transactions is disclosed. A customer, using a wireless device, identifies a point of sale and the amount of a transaction at that point of sale is first communicated to a central service and then transmitted to the wireless device for display at the...

20060190354 - System and method for enabling multi-element bidding for influencinga position on a search result list generated by a computer network search engine: A system and method for enabling information providers using a computer network such as the Internet to influence a position for a search listing within a search result list generated by an Internet search engine. A database stores accounts for the network information providers. Each account contains contact and billing...

20060190344 - System and method for interactively delivering expert information to remote outlets: A networked interactive expert system is disclosed for selectively providing relevant expertise when a user requires such assistance. System provides a set of networked facilities for determining an expertise needed by a customer based on a location. Such location can be either physical or logical. A physical “location” corresponds, for...

20060190347 - System and process for sales, validation, rewards and delivery of prepaid debit cards: Systems and Processes allow for sales, validation, rewards and dispense of prepaid debit cards and the like, which may have multiple personalities and may be offer and market under a vast plurality of names. Said prepaid debit card is prepaid with the monetary value loaded on the card on fixed...

20060190350 - Systems and methods for finding, presenting and selling compatible goods: An system for finding, presenting and selling compatible products includes: a pricing guide module, an affiliates module, a marketplace listing module, a trade-in website module, a transaction processing module, an inventory handling module, a database, and compatibility reference files. The compatibility input module is used to receive and store compatibility...

20060190345 - Vending equipment: An electromechanical vending machine is adapted to dispense physical products and digital information content to a user. The machine includes a payment unit for processing a payment from the user; a user input device for enabling user selection of one or more items to be dispensed; a physical product dispensing...

20060190358 - Content distribution system for generating content streams to suit different users and facilitating e-commerce transactions using broadcast content metadata: A content distribution system is provided to facilitate e-commerce transactions for products and services associated with distributed content. A content stream comprising content blocks, reference content blocks and floating reference content blocks uses metadata to identify products and services associated with content blocks. The metadata and floating reference content blocks...

20060190357 - Method for displaying display information: A method for displaying display information (DI) via a start up screen (StS) and/or via a shut down screen (ShS) of a display means (DM) of a customer device (CD) is provided wherein a step of providing primary information data (PID) is realized by said customer device (CD) by passively...

20060190355 - System and method for designing and operating an electronic store: Methods and systems for operating an electronic store permit a merchant to organize and advertise descriptions of product inventory over the Internet....

20060190356 - System and method for quality assurance: A quality assurance method is disclosed in which individual packages are selected and grouped together according to what is to be sent to a specific receiver; the method includes providing a group of individual packages at least a plurality of which have visual identifiers thereon; a Pick List in the...

20060190359 - Consignment inventory management and reconciliation system: A consignment inventory management and reconciliation method and system that tracks and reconciles on-hand quality which represents consignment items that were placed at the consignment location and are physically located at the consignment location at a given time; unbilled quantity which represents consignment items which were placed at the consignment...

20060190362 - Enhanced method and computer program product for providing supply chain execution processes in an outsourced manufacturing environment: A method and computer program product for facilitating supply chain processes in an outsourced manufacturing environment is provided. The method includes a customer focus team system providing logistical administrative services for a contract manufacturer on behalf of a manufacturing enterprise. The customer focus team is assigned to the contract manufacturer...

20060190363 - Managing home inventory: In accordance with the present invention, a storage area is provided within a particular home for storing food-related items. A database of intended food-related inventory items for the storage area is adjusted by a controller according to food-related inventory preferences received at the controller. The controller updates the database of...

20060190361 - Method and system for managing inventory for a migration using forecast/inventory displays: The invention provides one or more displays to assist a user in managing inventory for one or more migration components in a migration. In particular, forecast data for each migration component is generated based on migration data for one or more targets and a plurality of time frames. One or...

20060190360 - System and method for controlling the transport of articles: A system and method for controlling the transport of articles comprises in one embodiment one or more communication devices for receiving and transmitting data, at least one primary server in communication with the primary server for allocating couriers for the collection and delivery of articles, a program for controlling the...

20060190364 - Method and system for improved bill of material creation and maintenance: A central information processing system and method create and maintain a bill of materials (BOM) for design and manufacture of a product linking by receiving a BOM, assembled to a predefined point of completion adequate for processing by a reviewing party, automatically communicating feedback to the reviewing party indicating the...

20060190365 - Electronically assisted enterprise journal system: A method for processing accounting data of an enterprise is provided. The method includes entering accounting data entries associated with one or more accounts in memory of an interactive system, the interactive system capable of communicating with a batch system. At least some of the accounting data entries are copied...

20060190366 - Preview period-end closing: An accounting system is disclosed that provides support for an ability to preview a period-end closing process. When a preview option is activated, the system is configured to provide a view of transactions that would be generated if the period-end closing process were to be carried out. During the preview,...

20060190367 - Process for determining object level profitability: A process for determining object level profitability includes the steps of (1) preparing information to be accessed electronically, (2) establishing rules for processing the prepared information, (3) calculating at least one marginal value of profit using established rules as applied to a selected set of prepared information, (4) calculating a...

20060190376 - Charged-off accounts receivable lease program: Certain embodiments of the present invention provide Credit Grantors with an alternative to warehousing or the selling of aged accounts receivables. Certain embodiments of the present invention provide Creditors immediate cash for their accounts receivables placed on lease, shifts the cost, liabilities and collection efforts to a third party and...

20060190373 - Computer-system control related to standard application in islamic compliant financing: A computer-aided system of illustrating, the system including: specifying, to a computer system, a private constant-dollar instrument, including defining a respective claim division on cash flow and an asset; entering data including actual cash flow datum and actual asset datum; calculating, with the computer system, respective values for each of...

20060190374 - Electronic bill pay and bill presentment account number treatment system and method: A technique is provided that transforms account number data received from the consumer into one or more forms based on use by specific processes. Further provided is a technique for establishing payees using these account numbers such that remittances can be routed via the most cost effective means, e.g. which...

20060190380 - Electronic transaction processing server with automated transaction evaluation: An electronic transaction processing server receives and evaluates invoice transaction files. The server comprises a network circuit for communicating over a frame switched network with each of a plurality of participating systems. The participating systems comprising at least one customer workstation and at least one vendor workstation. A session management...

20060190377 - Method and apparatus for pricing and administering a credit transaction: Systems and methods are provided to administer and price credit transactions...

20060190372 - Method and system for computing path dependent probabilities of attaining financial goals: A method and system for computing the probability of attaining one or multiple financial goals is disclosed. Each goal is analyzed and reduced to a series of cash flows. A threshold criterion of success is established. A plurality of paths are generated. Each path is checked on the basis of...

20060190371 - Method and system for portfolio optimization from ordering information: A method of optimizing a portfolio includes selecting an investment universe with a finite number of assets, forming a belief matrix based on one or more homogeneous inequality relationships among the expected returns of assets in the universe, selecting those asset returns that are consistent with the belief matrix to...

20060190369 - Predicting risk and return for a portfolio of entertainment projects: A portfolio of entertainment projects is selected such that the risk and return available to investors is attractive compared to other investments. Risk and return for a portfolio of entertainment projects is predicted based on the historical performance of past “similar” projects. In one implementation, characteristics that are predictive of...

20060190379 - Price grabber: Systems and methods for automatic price monitoring of an online marketplace. The online marketplace is a virtual store (e.g., web-based) for buyers and sellers to exchange goods or products. A system includes a price monitoring module coupled to a market server, and buyer and seller devices. The price monitoring module...

20060190378 - Process for verifiably communicating risk characteristics of an investment portfolio: In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the invention, there is disclosed a process for verifiably communicating risk characteristics of an investment portfolio to an investor without disclosing the exact composition of the portfolio comprising: A procedure for the investment manager to describe acceptable characteristics of an investment portfolio within...

20060190368 - System and method for determining the financial impact of an event: The present invention provides a computer-based system, method and computer program product for inventorying assets and quickly determining the financial costs of an event impacting the location where such assets are located. A user is able to enter impact location identifiers and one or more asset impact variables using a...

20060190370 - System and method for evaluating and managing participatory real estate investments and transactions: An automated System and method for evaluating real estate Candidate Transactions for participatory funding by Investment Criteria based Managed Investment Funds; and, then managing the funded Candidate Transactions from purchase and/or construction to completion and/or sale. Complex, secured, real estate based participatory funding transactions, are evaluated, funded and transacted from...

20060190375 - Systemic investment data analysis: A system for outputting investment defining data (411) is provided, which comprises a plurality of networked terminals (101 to 104), each of which is configured with processing means (208), memory means (209), networking means (211, 212) and visual display means (202), said memory means (209) storing at least one data...

20060190386 - Automated order protection trading system: Methods and systems for trading financial or commodity assets are presented. In particular, the invention relates to a trading system and method that operates with third party data and a Third Party Inside Market to promote fair and orderly transactions. In some embodiments, a client order or client bid/offer is...

20060190382 - Calculator apparatus: A calculator is provided that includes an input pad that includes a sales tax button and a currency pad, which includes a change due button and a number of currency keys. The currency keys can be depressed in order to enter numeric values associated with currency. The change due button...

20060190381 - Collective purchase model for medical products: A procurement method for the collective purchase of products, including medical products such as cardiology implant devices, for use by members of a consortium. The members of the consortium can be physicians such as cardiologists. An advisory panel composed of consortium members first reviews available products in a relevant product...

20060190389 - Compound buy-buy auctions: Methods, systems and data structures are described for conducting buy-buy auctions. A method includes participating in a compound buy-buy auction having contingent bidding on a plurality of heterogeneous items substantially simultaneously contingent on buying one or more other items in another auction. A composite reverse auction, defined by a bid...

20060190390 - Compound buy-sell auctions: Methods, systems and data structures are described for conducting buy-sell auctions. A method includes participating in a compound buy-sell auction having contingent bidding on a plurality of heterogeneous items substantially simultaneously contingent on selling one or more other items in another auction. A composite reverse auction, defined by a bid...

20060190385 - Dynamic bidding, acquisition and tracking of e-commerce procurement channels for advertising and promotional spaces on wireless electronic devices: The present invention assists the critical real-time decision making required to make important decision on bidding on various customer procurement commodities in a wireless display advertising markets. The invention provides dynamic pricing as a function of the criteria of the wireless advertising criteria, such as exposures, type of advertisers and...

20060190387 - Normalized synthetic continuous double auctions: Methods, systems and data structures are described for conducting normalized synthetic continuous double auctions. A method includes participating in a normalized auction having contingent bidding on a plurality of heterogeneous item auctions. Contingent bidding includes price normalization as a function of at least one attribute. A composite reverse auction, defined...

20060190391 - Project work change in plan/scope administrative and business information synergy system and method: A project-work administrative management method includes receiving, from a buyer, project-administration configurations, storing transactional project work data relating to project work to be performed for the buyer by a supplier, receiving, from the buyer, configuration of project statement-of-work (SOW) records, processing a project change in plan/scope record set of the...

20060190388 - Synthetic continuous double auctions: Methods, systems and data structures are described for conducting synthetic continuous double auctions. A method includes participating in a synthetic continuous double auction having contingent bidding on a plurality of heterogeneous item auctions. A composite reverse auction, defined by a bid set including a first contingent bid on a first...

20060190384 - System and method for promoting internet auction listings in public & private venues: According to an embodiment of the invention, a method of promoting an auction item has been provided that includes providing a venue promotion option to a user. The venue promotion option includes a list of venues where information concerning auction listings can be displayed. Instructions are received from the user,...

20060190383 - Systems for risk portfolio management: A switch engine module enables anonymous switches between a first trader and a plurality of second traders. The switch engine module receives interest rate risk portfolios from a plurality of traders, and for each prospective trader, provides available switches based on positions in other counterparty portfolios that offset the viewing...

20060190393 - Trade finance automation system: A trade finance automation system includes an accounts receivable database receiving and storing invoices issued by one or more prescribed vendors for sales made to specified buyers. A credit limits database contains various credit limits applicable to buyers invoices that are subject to existing third party financing, the credit limits...

20060190392 - Tradechess: a game formatted trading environment: A game-formatted trade environment where unlimited number of sellers and unlimited number of buyers interact for the purpose of exchanging goods for money in a format that presents a limited (known) risk to both buyers and sellers, along with the opportunity for unlimited high-price for sellers, and the opportunity for...

20060190394 - Interactive mortgage and loan information and real-time trading system: The invention provides a method and system for trading loans in real time. Loan applications, such as home mortgage loan applications, are made available electronically to receive bids from a plurality of potential lenders. A transaction server maintains a database of pending loan applications and their statuses, which is accessible...

20060190395 - Method for entity risk management and accumulating assets for a secure retirement: A method for entity risk management and for accumulating assets for a secure retirement is provided in which a non-MEC life insurance policy that is not considered a single premium insurance policy is purchased and funded over time by an owner of a business through proceeds from a loan made...

20060190396 - Real estate sales/financing plan: A business method provides for the sale of real estate to persons ineligible for credit from typical financial institutions. A real estate financial entity purchases real estate and sells it to a buyer via a sales contract comprising scheduled monthly payments wherein title is transferred upon completion of all scheduled...

20060190397 - Utilizing supporting dimensions to further define transaction entities in a computerized financial/accounting system: A computer-implemented financial system that allows for account modules to be set up, and transaction data to be entered, stored and retrieved as transaction entities, with each transaction entity including an amount, is provided. The financial system further allows for supporting dimensions (dimensions that are entered and saved to the...

20060190399 - Data processing technique for providing a cash rebate in a loan program: A method provides a cash rebate in a loan program of a financial institution using a computer having a memory device. The method includes maintaining, in the memory device of the computer, for a borrower, a borrower information file, including a contractual loan payback schedule based on an interest rate...

20060190398 - Method of reversing an erroneous invoice: A method of reversing a plurality of erroneous invoices proffered by a plurality of vendors/suppliers. The method comprises providing a master database for inputting a plurality of vendor invoices, storing a cancellation request for each of the plurality of erroneous invoices in a response database, executing an agent to extract...

20060190400 - System and method for document imaging management: The present disclosure provides a system and method for providing an improved system and method for document imaging management....

20060190401 - Content distribution system and method: Methods, systems, and articles of manufacture consistent with the present invention provide an electronic marketplace that matches units of content from secondary content providers with suitable vacancies from primary content providers. Vacancies may constitute, or be included in, any digital transmission containers, such as a television or radio programming, web...

20060190403 - Method and apparatus for content protection and copyright management in digital video distribution: This patent presents a method, apparatus and system for content protection and copyright management in digital video distribution over packet-based networks. The system consists of a distribution server and its agents. The distribution server first divides a digital video into parts and then processes them into public and control portions....

20060190402 - System and method of controlling access to content: A method of providing access to content is described and includes receiving a selection of content. The method includes determining whether access is allowed to the content. A PIN entry screen is presented at a television. Further, a request permission soft button is presented at the television. When a correct...

20060190404 - System for controlling the distribution and use of digital works: A method, system and software for establishing a secure communications channel between repositories using a repository transaction protocol, including generating a registration identifier and registration message including an identification certificate, and an identifier of a master repository that encrypted the identification certificate; receiving the registration message and verifying the identity...

20060190405 - Utilizing distribution types to assign attributes to distribution lines in an accounting system: A computer-implemented financial system that includes a user interface for entering transaction header data, which includes a transaction header amount. The financial system also includes a distribution type component that associates the transaction header amount with at least one distribution type (named category with associated characteristics) of multiple distribution types....

20060190406 - Accounting system content reproduction device, license sales device, program and recording medium: There is provided an accounting system for accounting a content distributed by an accumulation broadcast or a removable recording medium while preventing an unauthorized use and holding privacy of a user. An accounting ID specifying the money information stored in a prepaid card is read and a content ID of...

20060190410 - Digital content distribution systems and methods: Embodiments of the present invention enable a user to acquire an item (e.g., a digital song, digital video, etc.) using one device (e.g., a portable device) and to easily move a copy of the acquired item from the one device to another device so that a user of the other...

20060190407 - Method and apparatus for deploying and licensing wireless communication device computer software infrastructure to manufacturers: Feature-provisioning computer software infrastructure for wireless communication devices is conveniently deployed and licensed to device manufacturers and the like. The exemplary system provides a simple integrated solution that incorporates licensing, revenue sharing and provisioning....

20060190409 - Method and system for licensing digital works: A method and system is presented for a digital licensing scheme that separates the license from the digital file containing the copyrightable material. According to the present invention, the files can be downloaded from any server, and transferred from user to user, even after the file has been licensed. The...

20060190408 - System and method for customized bundled license generation: A system and method for customized bundled license generation is presented. A license generator uses license sections as building blocks in order to dynamically generate a customized bundled license agreement for use with a bundled software package offering. Each license section has attributes, which are used to select the license...

20060190411 - System and method for authenticating transactions: A system and method for authenticating document processing transactions wherein the transaction is rejected if the user is not within a selected geographical region. A transaction request is first received representing a request for the completion of a selected transaction associated with a selected user. Preauthorized geographic region data, associated...

20060190413 - Digital content distribution systems and methods: Embodiments of the present invention relate to storing a token file on a portable device, wherein the token file may store information pertaining to user preferences and/or account information....

20060190412 - Method and system for preventing fraudulent use of credit cards and credit card information, and for preventing unauthorized access to restricted physical and virtual sites: A method and system for preventing fraudulent card transactions and unauthorized access to computers and physical and virtual sites online and offline whether or not involving payment. A physical card, identified by a unique identification number (ID) is issued to the user. The method provides a system of password-protected, single-use,...

20060190414 - Large capacity data sales mediation server and method: An animation data sales mediation method, an animation data sales mediation system and so on are capable of providing large capacity data such as animation data by a large capacity storage medium in advance, rendering the time required for transfer of the data via the network extremely short by passing...

20060190415 - Large capacity data sales mediation server and terminal: An animation data sales mediation method, an animation data sales mediation system and so on are capable of providing large capacity data such as animation data by a large capacity storage medium in advance, rendering the time required for transfer of the data via the network extremely short by passing...

20060190416 - Electronic bartering system: A bartering system implements barters between a plurality of parties each having one or more classes of items available for barter. Preferably, barter orders are created by designating a selected quantity of a first class of items to be bartered, designating a date range for transferring title of the first...

20060190417 - System, method and program to estimate cost of distributing software: System and computer program product for estimating the cost of an ESD for software and subsequent updates for the software. Various cost factors can be considered such as one or more of the following. First program instructions determine a cost of the ESD associated with packaging together components of the...

20060190418 - System and method of postal-charge assessment: A system and method of postal-charge assessment facilitates the production of mail pieces exhibiting a collective postage-fee payment code issued by a postage vendor and authorized to be applied to a plurality of mail pieces in response to a postal-customer request. There is associated with the process no inherent limit...

20060184375 - Branded content: Configuration of an application module to utilize branded content is described. In an implementation, a method includes identifying one of a plurality of business relationships which correspond to a request sent by a client over a network. A configuration file is the formed for communication to the client and for...

20060184381 - Computer-implemented method and system for matching a consumer to a home service provider: A method and system for matching ready-to-act consumers and pre-qualified service providers are described. Consumer-to-Business commerce transactions can be facilitated by pre-qualifying both consumers and service providers and matching a consumer who selects a single, pre-qualified service provider. For example, according to one exemplary embodiment of the invention, using information...

20060184374 - Data collection, identification, and notification system: A system including a processor and a memory coupled to the processor. The memory has stored therein a property offering database of properties for sale, a client database, and a contact database, wherein each contact is associated with a client. The system further includes software stored in the memory and...

20060184377 - Embedded warranty management: Methods and systems for obtaining and analyzing data from embedded sensors in electronic products for warranty management. A data collection unit in an electronic product collects and reports data about environmental factors that is relevant about a warranty agreement and transmits the data over a communications link to a data...

20060184379 - Embedded warranty management: Methods and systems for obtaining and analyzing data from embedded sensors in electronic products for warranty management. A data collection unit in an electronic product collects and reports data about environmental factors that is relevant about a warranty agreement and transmits the data over a communications link to a data...

20060184372 - Intelligence value index calculation method: It is possible to judge an enterprise value which does not appear in finance tables. For each of the enterprises stored in a database, the technical innovation power of the enterprise, relationship with a customer and a business partner, productivity of employees, usefulness of the facility, benefit brought about in...

20060184373 - Method and system for quick and automatic police canvas operation of an identified crime scene area using an autodialer: A data processing system to automatically canvass for witnesses within an identified crime scene area. After an incident report is received, the locus and boundary of the crime scene is determined. Telephone calls are automatically initiated to a list of compiled telephone numbers within the boundary of the identified crime...

20060184384 - Method of community purchasing through the internet: In accordance with the present invention, a method and system of communal purchasing is disclosed. The preferred embodiments describe a community purchase model where a product can be purchased a particular price only if enough buyers are willing to purchase at that price. The preferred embodiments pool together the collective...

20060184378 - Methods and apparatuses for delivery of advice to mobile/wireless devices: Methods and apparatuses to connect consumers to diverse advice sources of experts. In one embodiment, a method includes: providing a list of experts to a mobile device via a wireless media channel for presentation to a consumer; responsive to receiving from the mobile device a selection of one expert from...

20060184383 - Methods and systems for pricing parts and components: A method and system for sourcing a part is provided. The method comprises specifying a generic part description for a part. In addition, the method comprises mapping the generic part description to one or more specific part descriptions across a plurality of vendors. Further the method comprises generating a list...

20060184386 - Methods and systems for providing combination gift card and greeting card: Systems and methods for providing a combination gift element and greeting element may comprise receiving a request to create a greeting element, the greeting element comprising at least one of an electronic greeting element and a physical greeting element. Furthermore, the systems and methods may include receiving a request to...

20060184371 - Risk management: A risk management process is provided that has steps of defining a risk by providing: (a) a descriptive title; (b) a risk impact value; and (c) a likelihood value. (a), (b), and (c) are then set as a first set of initial conditions for the risk. A node for the...

20060184385 - Serving signals: Output signals are served from a serving device to a plurality of browsing devices connected to a network. The output signals represent commands executable by each browsable device so as to display viewable data in accordance with specified page formatting. Requests from browsing clients are identified which contain information relating...

20060184382 - Structured real estate analysis: A method of selecting a real estate option according to a structured analysis. The structured analysis may be used to determine a preferred real estate option for a user based on criteria such as the preferences and financial resources of the user. The structured analysis may be used to facilitate...

20060184376 - Use of location awareness to detect potentially supsicious motion or presence of equipment in a healthcare environment: A system for detecting potentially suspicious motion of a piece of equipment in a healthcare establishment. The system comprises a first functional entity adapted to determine a set of authorized clinicians associated with the piece of equipment; a second functional entity adapted to determine, based at least in part on...

20060184380 - Xml-based resource data structures and networks managed by xml-based resource data structures: A network that uses XML-based resource data structures. The network comprises: i) a plurality of network elements; 2) a configuration manager for managing and configuring the plurality of network elements; and iii) a plurality of resource data structures suitable for configuring the plurality of network elements of the network. Each...

20060184388 - Consumers-buyers-physicians health-care: A system and method of controlling the expenses of health-care resources by companies, corporations, health-care consumers and physicians. The data on health-care consumers and resources being generated or expended by the above parties are available to, accounted for by and communicated among the above responsible parties in a check-and-balance health-care...

20060184392 - Healthcare procedure management and clinical alerting system and method: The embodiments of the present invention include a system and method for alerting a user of a potential violation of hospital policies or procedures comprising receiving data identifying a patient and identifying a user administering a particular treatment to the patient, acquiring medical record data of the patient, and generating...

20060184387 - Insurance policy renewal chain: A system and method for the automatic linking of expired, current, and future insurance policies is provided. Within each insurance policy is a plurality of conditions frequently used in the determination of an insurance policy premium or rate quote. Such terms are calculated based upon information either associated with or...

20060184391 - Method for providing consumer choice and equalizing pharmacy provider availability in prescription medication dispensing plans: A method is disclosed whereby consumers enrolled in a prescription benefit plan can obtain prescription medication fulfillment at any participating pharmacy of their choice, regardless of whether the fulfillment is by a retail pharmacy or a mail order pharmacy, and whether the quantity of medication prescribed is for administration over...

20060184393 - Online medical data collection: A method and system for facilitating the filling out of a medical evaluation form online and/or for facilitating the reviewing of the medical information form online are disclosed. By filling out the medical information form online, the form can be filled out generally anywhere and generally any time prior to...

20060184390 - Perfect system of compensations for physicians: A system of computerized utilizations of physicians' decisions contain in physician-generated digital health and health-care information arrived and stored in designated computers or servers wherein physicians' decisions computer-automatically direct the utilizations of health and health-care information and data to produce outcomes leading to payments to appropriate physicians....

20060184389 - Physicians' optimal management of health information: A computerized system comprising computer commands, health and health-care information and fields of distinct health and health-care information identifications adaptable to computer-automatically and continually merge health and health-care information on an individual, individuals or people to modify and expand on health and health-care databases on individual, individuals or people in...

20060184395 - Method and system of verifying and authenticating personal history: A method and system of verifying and authenticating personal history data of a subject comprising requesting the personal history data of the subject from a data base provider, searching the data base for the personal history data of the subject, transmitting the requested personal history data to the requester, reviewing...

20060184394 - Method to display up-to-date medical information graphs: A system employs a prediction processor for predicting demand for a graph and in response to receiving an individual new clinical result, observation or other information, updates associated graphs as a background process to provide a graph with reduced response time upon user request. A medical data graphing system includes...

20060184397 - Health care patient benefits eligibility research system and business method: The software of the present invention provides a means for creating a file of unpaid claims for a service provider. The software is used to create one or more queries to compare information in the file of claims against records in a benefit provider's database to determine the eligibility status...

20060184396 - System and method for surgical navigation: A surgical intervention data base includes major systems including a navigational system, an interventional system, a billing system and an on-line authorization system. The navigational system includes sub-systems that provide communication between the major systems to enable registration of data sets, image displays and billing capabilities for services rendered. Further,...

20060184398 - Card reservation settlement system by acceptance via telephone and card reservation settlement method: A card reservation settlement system via telephone acceptance for card settlement in travel, teleshopping, and other telephone reservation. The system is characterized by including: reservation reception means of a reservation receiver and the like receiving a reservation made by a reservation transmitter; card information transmission means for transmitting information required...

20060184399 - Method for improved reporting of travel agency-issued airline tickets: A method and system that enables airlines to collect revenue when customers seek to exchange an existing ticket for a new ticket on a given airline or other travel provider. In one embodiment, the reporting of ticket sales is performed in real-time, and therefore, the travel agent facilitates collection of...

20060184400 - System and method for real-time pricing through advertising: A method, system, and computer-readable medium for providing real-time pricing through advertising are provided. The method includes generating at least one search result satisfying a user request and generating a visit parameter set in response to the request. The method also includes augmenting the visit parameter set with at least...

20060184406 - Delivery operations information system and methods of use: The present invention provides a system for managing information related to a delivery service provider and systems of using such a system. The system and systems provided herein allow a delivery service provider to coordinate with efficiency the volume of mail or packages to be delivered with the carrier resources...

20060184404 - Delivery operations information system with daily workload management feature and methods of use: The present invention provides a system for managing information related to a delivery service provider and systems of using such a system. The system and systems provided herein allow a delivery service provider to coordinate with efficiency the volume of mail or packages to be delivered with the carrier resources...

20060184405 - Delivery operations information system with planning and scheduling feature and methods of use: The present invention provides a system for managing information related to a delivery service provider and systems of using such a system. The system and systems provided herein allow a delivery service provider to coordinate with efficiency the volume of mail or packages to be delivered with the carrier resources...

20060184403 - Delivery operations information system with route adjustment feature and methods of use: The present invention provides a system for managing information related to a delivery service provider and systems of using such a system. The system and systems provided herein allow a delivery service provider to coordinate with efficiency the volume of mail or packages to be delivered with the carrier resources...

20060184402 - Hospitality analytics: Hospitality Analytics is an advanced suite of interactive analysis tools developed to thoroughly analyze any hospitality environment. Analysis is of both physical and virtual workspaces and their interrelationship with each other. The tool suite allows for design and implementation to be correct by construction....

20060184407 - Operation information management device and surgery system: An operation information management device for managing a use history of multiple medical apparatuses has a management item setting section for setting management items which classify the use history of the various medical apparatuses, a management item storing section for storing the use history information of the various medical apparatuses...

20060184401 - System and method for resource and cost planning of an it migration: A system, method and program product for managing an information technology (IT) migration. A system is disclosed that includes: a database of inventory data records, wherein each inventory data record includes a set of migration parameters for a system to be migrated; a set of estimation tables that provide migration...

20060184409 - Comprehensive goal management through the use of an integrated software application: A method, system and computer program product for managing goals. A goal to be achieved by a goal-setter is defined. At least one action to be completed is defined. The at least one action is associated with an achievement of the goal by the goal-setter. One or more goal-setter attributes...

20060184408 - Method and system for modeling a call center transformation process: A computer-implemented method, system and program product for modeling a business transformation process. In accordance with one embodiment, a transformation modeling tool receives as input multiple operational resource values associated with a specified transformation process. The operational resource values include at least one value expressed as a labor resource metric...

20060184410 - System and method for capture of user actions and use of capture data in business processes: Systems and methods are disclosed for capturing data representative of user interactions with a desktop computer, and processing the capture data to identify and analyze business processes performed by the user. The disclosed system comprises listeners that capture key actuations, mouse-clicks, screen information, and other data representative of user interaction...

20060184411 - System for creating maintenance plans: The invention relates to a system and a method for creating maintenance plans for machines and/or installations simply, dynamically and at low cost, in particular an automation system from production automation and/or process automation. The said machines and/or installations comprise one or more components, wherein the components contain maintenance information,...

20060184412 - Resource optimization system, method and computer program for business transformation outsourcing with reoptimization on demand: Disclosed are a method, a system and a computer program for managing services of human resources. The method comprises the steps of modeling human resources delivery services from a services provider to a client company to determine outputs from inputs and constraints; and constructing an objective function representative of services...

20060184413 - System and method to manage resources: A system and method for management including steps of defining revenue associated with at least one procedure, monitoring revenue generated by performance of the at least one procedure throughout a plurality of personnel and dynamically assigning at least one of the plurality of personnel based on the monitored revenue. The...

20060184414 - Business management tool: The present invention includes a business management tool that is configured to receive and process both first and second data sources for planning, performance and forecasting purposes. The business management tool of the present invention is further configured to utilize essential data including key performance indicators. The foregoing data sets...

20060184415 - Business statistical analysis reporting module and method for client application systems: A method, system, and computer program product for collecting data for business statistical analysis from an information technology provided solution is provided. In one exemplary embodiment, business critical processes are determined and from the identities of these business critical processes, business critical collection points are determined. The business critical processes...

20060184416 - Method and apparatus for evaluation of business performances of business enterprise: A method and apparatus for resource based evaluation of business performances of business enterprise is provided. The method provides a new company rating scheme using resource based profit points. The apparatus consists of a score card for cost drivers graded on 400 RTP points, a score card for value drivers...

20060184421 - Dynamically optimizing the presentation of advertising messages: A facility for adjusting the execution of an advertising campaign in which advertising messages are presented using a plurality of advertising alternatives as described. During a first time period, the facility presents advertising messages using each of the advertising alternatives in accordance with an initial allocation for each of the...

20060184418 - Matching product system and method: Computer-implemented systems and method for generating individualized email communications to customers promoting a second customized product that shares design elements with a previously ordered first customized product. Customer records are searched to identify product promotion candidates. A personalized email order solicitation adapted to display an automatically created image of the...

20060184419 - Method and system for reward points redemption for computer-based activity: A system and method for operating a reward points accumulation and redemption program wherein a user earns reward points from a plurality of reward points issuing entities, each of the reward points issuing entities tracking the user's earned reward points in a user reward point account stored on a rewards...

20060184420 - System and method for redemption of awards by award program participants: A system and method for maximizing airline award program participant's use of the accumulated award miles even in light of mileage shortfalls for the redemption of mileage awards is described. The system and method not only a benefit to the award program participant, but also provides financial benefits to the...

20060184417 - System and method to merge pay-for-performance advertising models: Methods and apparatuses for merging different types of pay for performance advertisements. In one embodiment, a method includes: determining an indicator of potential revenue for a party from price information of a list of entities, which includes first price information for a first type of advertisements and second price information...

20060184422 - Method and apparatus for accessing transaction data in a travel settlement system using a graphical user interface: A computer-implemented method of processing transaction data relating to settlement of travel transactions that utilizes a graphical user interface is described. A user of a travel-agency computer system enters data corresponding to a financial transaction relating to travel using the graphical user interface, and the travel-agency computer system communicates corresponding...

20060184423 - Selecting business partners to conduct business-to-business (b2b) transactions: A directory server which provides a reply indicating suitable supplier transaction systems (or suppliers) from which products/services of interest can be purchased by a B2B transaction. The directory server may generate such a reply in response to receiving an enquiry electronically from a buyer transaction system. The buyer transaction system...

20060184426 - Electronic transactions providing net present value: Electronic commerce systems and methods are described in which a customer accrues and receives an accounting of net present value (“NPV”) in exchange for purchasing goods and/or services from one or more vendors in a first group of vendors. The NPV may be in the form of monetary credits and/or...

20060184431 - Media content delivery systems and methods: The present invention provides systems and methods for enabling a consumer to acquire media content items....

20060184430 - Message audit trail feature for facilitating electronic transactions: An electronic commerce system provides various features for assisting customers in locating items and generating orders from a merchant's electronic catalog, and for assisting customers and merchants in communicating about such orders. A user-definable categories feature allows customers and/or merchants to define search queries for searching the electronic catalog, and...

20060184429 - Method and apparatus for customer-specific creation of entries in a telephone book or the like: An efficient, flexible, fail-safe and customer-friendly method is specified for customer-specific creation of entries in a compilation, such as a telephone book or the like, as well as an associated device. At least one customer data record is transmitted from a central core database to a mobile presentation system for...

20060184424 - Product marketing system and method: Computer-implemented systems and method for generating personalized email communications soliciting orders of custom products. Product reorder candidates are identified from customer records and a personalized email order solicitation is sent to the customer. The email is adapted to display an image of the customer's previously designed custom product, either exactly...

20060184425 - Product system and method: Computer-implemented systems and methods for automatically creating a second customized product design incorporating information from a first customized product design. Information from a first custom product design is automatically combined with additional automatically selected content to create a new custom product to be promoted to the customer. When possible, information...

20060184427 - System and method for providing exercise programs, goods and services: A system and method for providing exercise programs, goods and services to users through a transmission system includes a database having a plurality of exercise video programs providing different types of exercise classes that can be accessed by registered users at a date, time and place that is convenient for...

20060184428 - Transferring funds in connection with internet orders using order variables from two sources and authentication: Methods for purchasing of goods or services over the internet. A customer has a customer account set up at a bank with associated account information. The account information includes verification information for verification parameters, such as authorized computer identification, authorized delivery addresses, authorized user identification, authorized telephone caller identification, and/or...

20060184432 - Product design system and method: Computer-implemented product design creation system and method for quickly developing a product design having desirable component elements. Multiple candidate product designs are simultaneously displayed for review. Controls are provided allowing a reviewer to enter a preference level for individual component elements of each of the displayed designs. A new set...

20060184433 - Method or application for generating postings based on transformation rules and posting classes: An application or method of populating a transaction from a document using procedures associated with document type. In the embodiments described, the application or method posts a financial transaction from a financial document, such as a sales invoice or vendor bill to a financial account, such as A/R or COGS....

20060184439 - Asset backed commercial paper program: In general, in one aspect, the invention includes an asset backed securities structure. The structure includes a first and second liquidity and/or credit provider and an entity structured to acquire interest in financial assets from sellers (and to issue to a plurality of investors notes backed by the financial assets)....

20060184441 - Check clearing systems: A system and process for more efficiently clearing checks by transmitting MICR line data together with a URL link to facilitate check clearing via electronic debits by an ACH. The URL link can be used at the option of the paying bank (or other entity) to access images of the...

20060184435 - Debt collecting and financing method: The invention proposes an improvement for a method for collecting a debt. The method includes entering in a data processing system data at least including data concerning the debtor and the debt, permitting debt access to at least two parties to at least a part of the data entered in...

20060184438 - Fund management system and method: A dynamic and flexible method, system and apparatus for managing index mutual funds and index exchange traded funds (ETFs) through using and measuring Relative Strengths and Alphas of the underlying index components to periodically reweight the underlying index components. These reweightings are used in the daily rebalancing of the respective...

20060184436 - Method and system for providing a marketplace to professionals: A system for providing contact between a buyer and a seller, the system including a first zone in the form of a chat room, the first zone being displayed at the station of the seller and the buyer; a second zone in the form of a data acquisition zone for...

20060184442 - Premium financing method and product using life insurance policies and method for administering same: A premium financing method and a loan product using life insurance policy as all or a portion of the collateral for a loan or credit line. The proceeds of the loan or draws against the credit line are used to ensure payment of at least one scheduled premium of the...

20060184440 - Risk-based pricing for rental property: A risk-based pricing system for computing rental pricing based on the background information on an individual applicant and property-specific information is provided. Rental pricing, such as rent payments and deposits, is computed by determining a risk score corresponding to the applicant. The risk score may be based on a credit...

20060184437 - Settlement engine for settling transactions and a method for settling transactions: Summarising, the present invention aims to provide a more efficient settlement engine requiring less computation effort and processing time. This is accomplished by establishing a total priority list of all transactions. The received transaction data to be settled are step-wisely transferred to an intermediate table storing the transaction data of...

20060184434 - Warranty claim preparation system: This warranty claim preparation system for use with a computer relies on a comprehensive computer database and a versatile program to streamline warranty claim preparation, processing and tracking. The computer accessible database lists all vehicles on which warranty claims could be prepared for a user, all vehicle systems for each...

20060184447 - Automated system for conditional order transactions in securities or other items in commerce: An apparatus and method of automatically and anonymously buying and selling positions in fungible properties between subscribers. The specific embodiment described in the disclosure relates to the buying and selling of securities or contracts where the offer to purchase or sell the property may be conditioned upon factors such as...

20060184448 - Computerized system for managing communications between a buyer, seller, and lender: A computerized system and method are presented for exchanging information between a buyer, a seller, and a lender. The system permits sellers and lenders to input buyers that are then submitted for activation. The buyers use the system to obtain information about items, while the sellers and lenders make consistent...

20060184443 - Method for conducting an on-line forum for auctioning intangible assets: An on-line forum for auctioning non-performing assets includes offering for auction sale of non-performing assets in a lot of as few as a single asset or a plurality of assets following completion of a third-level registration. Access to a limited amount of information on the on-line forum is permitted without...

20060184446 - Method for indicating the market value of an employee stock option: A method is disclosed for indicating the value of an employee stock option issued by an employer to an employee. The method comprises the steps of issuing the employee stock option having employee stock option restrictions. A secondary stock option of the stock of the employer is established having secondary...

20060184445 - Systems and methods for trading emission reductions: Systems and methods for facilitating trading of emission allowances and offsets among participants are described. In some embodiments, methods of facilitating such trading include establishing an emissions reduction schedule for certain participants based on emissions information provided by those participants; determining debits or credits for each certain participant in order...

20060184444 - Trading tool to enhance stock and commodity index execution: The invention provides systems and methods for providing replicable financial instrument orders, and establishing a fill price that is better than the theoretical upper limit of the industries' best order execution. The system has the capability of transforming a client's index order into a replicable product, such as index futures...

20060184449 - A risk management system for securities: A method and system (100) for identifying, measuring and managing the risk associated with a portfolio of securities....

20060184450 - Financial product and method which link a debt instrument to a bond: A financial product which is comprised of a note and a bond. The note is linked to the bond in that when an interest rate declines, the note interest rate also is reduced in a predetermined manner and the bond interest rate is reduced in a preselected manner. The interest...

20060184451 - Integrated electronic presentment and payment of bills by different entities: To electronically present bills and request payment of presented bills, billing information representing a bill of a biller for a payee, and an associated selectable payment indicator having a first linking function, are received from a first network site associated with a bill presentment entity via a first communications link...

20060184452 - Electronic document management system: An electronic document management system. The system includes a document entry module; a document management module; and a real time digital certificate generator for effecting electronic signatures. In the preferred embodiment, the system further includes a document repository module for storing documents and for accessing documents....

20060184453 - Method and apparatus for providing sponsorship for a directory: A method for providing sponsorship for a directory comprises permitting a search of the directory. The method further comprising displaying a search result on a page and incorporating a designated web page of a sponsor on the same page as the search result....

20060184454 - System and method for copy monitoring and automated invoicing: A method and apparatus for monitoring and identifying users responsible for copying copyrighted material, such as digital content provided on compact disks (CD) and digital video disks (DVD), are described. A multi-module software apparatus monitors and detects copying on a network, collects user information, and invoices the user. The system...

20060184455 - System and method for privacy management: There is disclosed a system and method for managing the privacy of a patient's PHI within a medical/healthcare domain (e.g. within a healthcare institution or organization). More generally, listing of a caregiver or assistant in a patient's circle-of-care is managed by a circle-of-care manager that tracks the names and any...

20060184456 - Vehicle-based wireless identification system: Certain exemplary embodiments comprise a method comprising: receiving a signal from a transmitter, the signal comprising a unique identifier, the signal transmitted responsive to a predetermined input from a user, the signal requesting approval of a proposed transaction, transmitting the unique identifier to a central processor adapted to approve the...

20060184457 - Computerized conflict checking system: The present invention is herein described as a computerized method for checking and clearing relationship problems in an organization including a plurality of members and a conflicts administrator. The present invention receives and stores data denoting existing client information within a central database. Upon potential client information being inputted, the...

20060184458 - Serving signals: Output signals are served from a serving device to a plurality of browsing devices connected to a network. The output signals represent commands executable by each browsable device so as to display viewable data in accordance with specified page formatting. Requests from browsing clients are identified which contain information relating...

20060173698 - Approvals management production-rule engine: Methods and apparatus for processing of transactions within an approvals management system that utilizes production rules stored in a relational database are disclosed. According to one aspect of the present invention, a management approval system includes a database and an engine. The database is arranged to store a set of...

20060173693 - Computerized trading system and methods useful therefor: A computerized trading system including a price information cache including a multiplicity of price information items originating from more than one transaction queries posed by more than one trader from among a population of traders, each of the price information items having a cached life cycle, and a trading query...

20060173707 - Electronic information management system for abstracting and reporting document information: An electronic information management system abstracts and reports document information. The system utilizes a computer communicating with an electronic database. An input device is operatively connected to the computer for entering document information into the database. A plurality of electronic indexing tags are provided at predetermined locations within the stored...

20060173701 - Electronic system and method coupling live event ticketing and interactive entries with the sale, distribution and transmission of event recordings, mastering system and intelligent terminal designs: The present disclosure provides a method and system of electronically associating one or any combination of the production, balancing, editing, transmission, distribution and sale of live event “Recordings” with the sale of a “ticket” [defined to include any entrance payment/receipt, (tournament) entrance fee or logged placed bet] to or during...

20060173703 - Fee transaction system and method for intellectual property acquisition and/or maintenance: A facility has been developed whereby an applicant (or his representative) may initiate performance of an intellectual property service such as the making of a maintenance fee, annuity, renewal, tax or other payments and transact the associated fees coincident therewith. Such a facility has several advantages including the ability to...

20060173694 - Information processing system, information processing device, method, and program: An information-processing system, which allows a specific apparatus in a movement-destination space to be operated with the anonymity of the user kept as it is even when the user moves to the movement-destination space, information-processing apparatus, information-processing methods and information-processing programs are provided. A mobile terminal 11-2 issues a request...

20060173700 - Mail consolidation tool: a mail consolidation system. The system includes a delivery option integration device with a user interface that allows a user to enter shipping address information for a mailpiece into the integration device. A shipment analysis device uses the shipping address information to determine a best delivery service for the mailpiece....

20060173695 - Marking system for identifying baby care articles suitable for particular stages of child development: A marking system for assisting identification of baby care articles appropriate for a particular baby includes an array of pictorial representations including at least a first set of pictorial representations corresponding to a first stage of development and a second set of pictorial representations corresponding to a second stage of...

20060173696 - Method and apparatus for product management: A method for selecting products includes solving a maximal s-t flow in a bipartite graph to obtain a minimum cut for the bipartite graph and selecting products bounded by the minimum cut. An apparatus for product selection is also described....

20060173697 - Method and system for value added international mail service: A method for providing mailing services between countries includes applying a tracking number to a mailing, encoding actual sender and recipient information of the mailing being sent from one country to another, and monitoring postal tracking to the destination using the tracking number....

20060173706 - Method of and system for evaluating financial risk associated with a construction project: A system and method for managing a construction payment process. One method embodying the invention can include evaluating financial risk associated with a construction project by electronically aggregating construction project data associated with participants in a construction project, the data aggregated from a software application that manages payment workflows for...

20060173702 - Network-based interaction and review service for facilitating communication in a network-based commerce environment: A network-based interaction and review server allows a user (e.g., a purchaser) to obtain reviews, collaboratively shop and consult experts with respect to a topic, web domain, website or product without being limited to engaging a service specific to a particular web domain, website or the network location. An interaction...

20060173704 - Secure computer system: A secure computer system is shown and described. The computer system includes (1) a network power controller that has slots and (2) removable cards that are inserted into the slots. The computer system may also include peripheral devices that are coupled to the network power controller through a digital current...

20060173705 - Systems and methods for preparation of an intellectual property filing in accordance with jurisdiction-and/or agent-specific requirements: A facility has been developed whereby an applicant (or his representative) may file corresponding applications in multiple jurisdictions using multiple associates while automating the preparation of filings in accordance with jurisdiction- and/or associate-specific requirements and/or procedures. An intellectual property filing portal or hub is employed, which in some realizations is...

20060173699 - Virtual technology transfer network: A Virtual technology transfer Office and method for a) accessing a secure on-line system for entering, retrieving, displaying, editing, storing and printing technology transfer and intellectual property information; b) utilizing voice commands or manually entered numeric, alpha or alphanumeric characters to navigate through the an on-line electronic interactive environment. c)...

20060173714 - Apparatus, system, and method for facilitating compliance with guidelines for pharmaceutical preparations: An apparatus, a system, and a method for facilitating compliance with guidelines for pharmaceutical preparations are described. In one embodiment, a computer-readable medium includes a documentation module to track activities related to pharmaceutical compounding. The computer-readable medium also includes a reporting module to evaluate the activities so as to characterize...

20060173709 - Bodywash additive business methods: The invention encompasses business methods that include supplying an additive for addition to a bodywash, or a bodywash containing such an additive, and receiving payment for the additive or bodywash, as well as encompassing business methods that include designing, testing, and marketing an additive for addition to a bodywash....

20060173715 - Health information system and method: The present invention relates to a distributed computer-based decision support technology for the healthcare industry. It also relates to a systematic knowledge diffusion technology for the healthcare industry. The tool and methodology packages and distributes computation and data processing software components in both centralized and federated fashions to process medical...

20060173713 - Integrated medical device and healthcare information system: A system integrates diagnostic, therapeutic, monitoring and other devices commonly found in a healthcare environment into a Hospital Information System (HIS) to improve the delivery of healthcare. The system uses intelligent, networked diagnostic, therapeutic, monitoring and other devices to provide device performance and availability information. A medical device management system...

20060173718 - Medical information card and system and method for using same: A system for ensuring that a person receives individual-specific health care and avoiding adverse drug reactions, generally comprises: an information card on which critical need medical information, specific to said person, is be stored, and a database that can be electronically accessed by the person so that the person can...

20060173717 - Method and apparatus for determining familial risk of disease: Personal and family health history information can be used to assess familial risk of disease. For example, information can be collected about the disease history of a person and the person's first- and second-degree relatives and then analyzed to determine the familial risk of common diseases such as coronary heart...

20060173711 - Patient health status data management method and system: The present invention comprises a method for managing patient health status data. More specifically, a method and system is disclosed for reviewing and analyzing patient health related information and ensuring that it contains all appropriate health status data for the patient. All of a patient's health related information is gathered...

20060173712 - Portable medical information system: A computerized system for monitoring and maintaining the health of a person comprising the steps of (a) obtaining parameter data from the patient and inputting the parameter data into a computer database; (b) analyzing the parameter data using a computerized statistical modeling technique module and a computerized adaptive expert system...

20060173708 - System and method for providing health care: A method of providing health care by establishing a predetermined patient population grouped by geographic regions where the patient population has access to a traveling healthcare professional that may travel to the patient's location. The healthcare professional evaluates and examines the patient using a plurality of technologies including a microprocessor...

20060173716 - System and method for real time regional feedback: The present invention relates to a regional health data exchange infrastructure comprising a measurement and feedback framework to enable continuous and automatic quality and safety data collection, dissemination, and reporting. The present invention provides near real time monitoring of healthcare environment at the regional and preferably nationally level, across organization...

20060173710 - System and user interface supporting item ordering for use in the medical and other fields: A User Interface (UI) system allows a user to select treatment orders efficiently and to search and select particular treatment orders with a reduced number of navigation actions for completion of a physician treatment order, for example. A user interface system enables a user to select items for addition to...

20060173719 - Message-based connectivity manager: A connectivity manager for use in a medical information system. The medical information system can include a facility information system, a medical imaging ordering system, and a picture archiving system, and the connectivity manager can be configured to use message-based communications to receive messages from the medical imaging ordering system,...

20060173720 - Methods and apparatus for securitizing insurance, reinsurance, and retrocessional risk: A method and apparatus of securitizing insurance, reinsurance and retrocession risk is provided. The system provides a vehicle whereby investors may directly participate in such risk. The system includes establishing a limited-life business entity. Capital is raised through the sale of common and/or preferred shares in the business entity. The...

20060173721 - Computer-based transportation-safety system: Disclosed is a transportation safety system which is used to identify potential dangers surrounding shipments of goods and/or humans. The system is automated. Initially, the shipment is inspected. The inspection involves the use of digital sensors (e.g., visual, audio, olfactory, chemical) which are used to create an electronic fingerprint which...

20060173725 - Integrated treatment planning and scheduling system: A system maps components of prescribed treatments to multiple appointments of a patient, tracks patient progress through a course of treatment by recording results of treatment in a clinical information system and replaces multiple manual processes to improve concurrent monitoring of a treatment plan versus actual results. A system schedules...

20060173722 - Method and system for managing documents: There are provided a method and an apparatus in which data created by scanning bits of information such as characters and figures depicted on the depiction board of an electronic blackboard are stored and managed as image data (documents). According to the apparatus and method, when the image data is...

20060173724 - Methods and apparatus for work management and routing: Methods and apparatus for service-level based and/or skills-based assignment of a work item to one (or more) of a plurality of resources based on fitness, for example, of skills required by the former to those provided by the latter. Assignment takes into account the level of stress on the work...

20060173726 - Online business case software and decision support system: The present invention provides an on-line computer systems (herein defined to include software) that includes processes, technologies, facilities to manage comprehensively a “project.” Management defined as spanning the time from the idea or inception that inspired the project to the resulting products' or processes' ends-of-life. The system provides a central...

20060173723 - Scheduler: Provided is a method for scheduling activities. The method includes receiving an activity having a designated priority, a life span, a preferred implementation time, and a scheduling time budget. The schedule is searched to determine the availability of the preferred implementation time and amount of available execution time. The activity...

20060173727 - Production control apparatus and production control method: Embodiments of the invention provide a production control apparatus and a method capable of reducing the management load and providing improved convenience. In one embodiment, a control unit assigns an identifier to each unit variation (or each candidate) for each unit to be assembled in a sub-process (or a portion)...

20060173728 - Adaptive product configuration model: The adaptive product conditioning is a computer-implemented method for identifying product configurations that can be provided to customers in reaction to supply imbalances. The methodology uses data mining techniques to collect and analyze business level meta data to coordinate supply and sales goals in terms of optimizing profits or managing...

20060173730 - Adjusting resource activation based on a manufactured date of a computer: A method, apparatus, system, and signal-bearing medium that, in an embodiment, adjust a resource capable of being activated at a computer based on whether the elapsed time since the manufactured date of a computer is greater than a threshold. The threshold may be fixed or variable. In various embodiments, the...

20060173729 - System and methods for managing a volunteer organization: A system and method for managing a volunteer organization such as a political campaign has a merit based recognition system, a centralized contact and task database. The system awards recognition or impact points to volunteers based on their participation in or completion of tasks, and also awards point to sponsors...

20060173731 - Method and apparatus for personnel evaluation: A method and system for facilitating employee evaluations and generating written evaluation reports provides a software application that furnishes a graphical user interface (GUI) for the user, who is typically an administrative reviewer. The software application provides personalized desktop portalling for the reviewer, as well as rubrics and templates for...

20060173732 - Method of collaboratively solving a problem: A method of collaboratively solving a problem by holding group meetings. The group comprises members each being given equal status, a problem expert, a facilitator, and a scribe. The problem expert initially explains the problem to the group. Afterwards, he or she is available for questions from the group regarding...

20060173733 - System and method for centralized parking management: A method and system for the full automation of parking garages and eliminating cashier or garage manager discretion in the calculation, collection, and reporting of revenue through a fully integrated enterprise-level system to control 1) monthly parking account management, billings and revenue reporting; 2) transient revenue control and reporting; and...

20060173742 - Augmenting and searching classified items via the internet: Systems and methods for augmenting and searching classified items via the Internet are provided. According to one embodiment, periodicals are provided with the ability to define custom fields of data for each classification of ads. Advertisers may then populate these custom fields with data appropriate for their ad thereby allowing...

20060173737 - Business card cd that contains an e-brochure that is simultaneously published on the internet: A computer readable medium that may be a business CD card is disclosed that contains the same information that is contained in a web or marketing site. The same information may be an E-brochure published to the Internet and placing the same e-brochure on a business card CD to produce...

20060173739 - Customer retention systems and methods: A method of communicating a renewal incentive for an expiring account to a user of the account. The method includes the steps of identifying a renewal date for the account with a host computer, and calculating whether the account qualifies for the renewal incentive based on account history accessible by...

20060173734 - Display apparatus for and method of displaying baby care articles: A retail display for baby care articles includes a first display section associated with a first set of baby care articles adapted for use during a first stage of development. The first set of baby care articles includes baby care articles from at least two different baby care article sub-sets...

20060173740 - Distribution device, distribution method, and distribution program: A content distribution server 1 which distributes, to a client, promotion content for prompting a user to execute destination content comprises: a state acquisition section that acquires the states of the client and destination content; a suitability calculation section 21 that calculates the suitability of the destination content in the...

20060173744 - Method and apparatus for generating, optimizing, and managing granular advertising campaigns: Systems for and methods of the present invention are directed to managing and optimizing ad campaigns. One method in accordance with the present invention comprises selecting a parent advertising campaign and generating a child advertising campaign, wherein the child advertising campaign automatically inherits selected advertising criteria from the parent advertising...

20060173738 - Method and system of marketing diamonds: A method and system of marketing diamonds that came from a single rough diamond is described. A single rough diamond is cut into at least two smaller diamonds. The smaller diamonds are provided for sale in sets, each set having at least two diamonds. Documentation stating that the diamonds in...

20060173743 - Method of realtime allocation of space in digital media based on an advertiser's expected return on investment, ad placement score, and a publisher score: A method of allocating advertising space. Information about a user that is currently accessing the web page is provided to a number of advertiser computational agents, along with statistical data on the relative value of the particular ad placement. These agents compute for an advertiser, the advertiser's “effective Return On...

20060173741 - Permission-based marketing method and system: A permission-based marketing system for selling goods and services wherein a consumer requests one or more sellers to present proposals for the consumer to purchase a particular item and the opportunity to respond to the request for these proposals is advertised and sold to sellers for a fee. A portion...

20060173736 - System and method for providing purchasing incentives over a network: A method and system for providing an incentive to purchase merchandise from a merchant over a computer network is disclosed. A merchant computer is coupled to a customer computer through a computer network. The merchant computer has a memory area that is searchable for determining a first merchandise available for...

20060173735 - Targeted mailing services: A method for providing mailing services targeted to a particular market sector includes securely identifying a demographic segment of a population for special attention, and providing a security means to authenticate a user of a targeted demographic population segment....

20060173745 - Tiered method for advertising: A method of cooperative advertising in which advertisers are categorized into tiers defined by certain appropriate criteria (e.g., distribution channels, existing relationships, public image, stakeholder base), and costs and benefits of advertising are allocated among these tiers and advertisers. The advertisers then cooperatively provide advertising directed toward a target market...

20060173746 - Efficient methods for temporal event clustering of digital photographs: Techniques for reducing the computational complexity of conventional similarity-based approaches for temporal event clustering of digital photograph collections include one or more approaches to select boundaries based on dynamic programming and the Bayes information criterion. Each method performs competitively with conventional approaches and offer significant computational savings....

20060173749 - Method and apparatus for subscription-based shipping: Computer-accessible medium and apparatus for providing subscription-based shipping of items. Embodiments may provide mechanisms that allow customers of an e-commerce Web site to pay a fee to obtain a subscription in a shipping program that provides subscribed customers with free and/or reduced-rate shipping for at least some items ordered via...

20060173747 - Method and system for providing reverse online auction and mobile commerce: A system for providing product pricing information is disclosed. The system includes a mobile client configured to allow a user to issue a request for pricing information on a specified product, a price research server configured to receive the request from the mobile client and generate pricing research results on...

20060173748 - Method and system of processing missing orders in e-commerce: A method and a system of processing missing orders in E-commerce are disclosed to exchange trading message among the buyers, the payment platform, and the seller and to immediately find out any missing order. The payment platform includes a back-stage procedure, which is automatically executed regularly to compare a merchandise...

20060173750 - System and method for controlling access to a local inventory storage system via a remote e-commerce application: A local inventory control system according to the invention can be remotely regulated by a centralized server architecture. The local inventory control system contains product offered by a business entity, and the same business entity can control unlocking of the local inventory control system using the centralized server architecture. In...

20060173755 - Catalog management apparatus, catalog generation method and catalog retrieval method: The specification of the present application discloses a catalog management apparatus that is capable of managing a database in which merchandise related information that relates to merchandise is registered in a retrievable condition as a record, and catalog data which contains information relating to merchandise, comprising: a retrieval unit that...

20060173751 - Catalog search agent: A computer-based system that provides services for searching and displaying catalog items. The system enables a user to pass a request to one or more catalog servers and display aggregated results in a user interface. Furthermore, the system enables the user to select one or more items from the user...

20060173752 - Interactive database systems and methods for environments with high concentrations of mobile users: A database system usable in a high user concentration environment includes a central database containing content relating to associated users. Software is configured for loading onto associated portable computers carried by the users. The software when executed on one of the associated portable computers performs a method including: (i) downloading...

20060173753 - Method and system for online shopping: The invention provides a business method and a system to perform focused online shopping and sharing the online shopping experience with other users. The shopping-related information from various sources, and the search query, is converted into directed acyclic graph forests. These graphs are then compared to identify the search results...

20060173754 - Methods and apparatus for on-line ordering: Systems and methods for ordering supplies from suppliers or for other e-commerce activities are described. Standards for placing orders and registering catalog information in a database are described. Systems and methods for placing orders, preprocessing supplier information using geographic information, conducting data searches and analyses locally on user access devices,...

20060173756 - Inventory management tracking control system: An inventory management tracking control system includes a first event processor operative to receive a video data signal from at least one video capturing device, the video data signal including an archive attribute signal, relating an item being tracked; reader circuitry operative to generate an event attribute signal in response...

20060173757 - Method of describing components and building a bicycle: A method of identifying components and building a bicycle is provided. Methods and products described provides component characteristics, compatibility attributes, and optionally multiple functionality of components in a single component database record. Methods and products described also provide adjustability of component lists for bike building as components are selected. Methods...

20060173758 - System and method for providing subscribed applications on wireless devices over a wireless network: A system and method for the provision of downloadable subscription-based software applications to one or more wireless devices where the applications are downloadable from one or more application download servers across a wireless network. An accounting module receives subscription-based application download data from the one or more application download servers...

20060173760 - Computer-based management and reporting methods for tax-advantaged drilling investments: The present invention relates to a system and method for funding a drilling fund using the established benefits of tax deductions and/or losses associated with the drilling of oil and gas wells. More particularly, the present invention relates to a system having computer software which provides searching and documentation functions...

20060173766 - Electronic apparatus, charging system and method, charge processing device, storage medium, and prepaid card: An apparatus of the invention comprises an operation inputting element for designating one of a plurality of functions; a function executing element for executing the function designated by the operating inputting element; a measuring element for measuring the time during which each of the functions has been executed by the...

20060173763 - Methods and systems for providing tax efficient hedge fund returns: In one aspect, the invention comprises a method comprising: (1) selling a note to an investor for a specified amount; and (2) using proceeds from selling the note to purchase (a) one or more zero coupon municipal bonds, and (b) an option on at least one of the group comprising:...

20060173762 - System and method for an automated project office and automatic risk assessment and reporting: In the automation of project risk identification, various qualitative and quantitative measures are combined to report a project's risk level, areas, and mitigation in an automatic and objective manner. The software package includes a risk assessment and report framework and a risk engine, a portfolio analysis, a project plan validator,...

20060173765 - System and method for determining an evolving combination of network components to maximize the net present value of a provider's cash flow: A method and computer program product are presented for selecting and arranging an appropriate combination of network components, or elements, in a communications network. The selection of network components is done in a manner that maximizes the net present value of cash flow resulting from the provision of communications services...

20060173767 - System and method for managing and evaluating network commodities purchasing: Managing and evaluating commodities pricing, in one embodiment, includes retrieving and summing one or more price data sets exchanged between a buyer and seller agent in a specified time period. Additionally, metric data indicative of market prices for commodities indicated by the retrieved price data sets are summed. The summed...

20060173761 - System and method for market research based on financial exchange: A system for trading a plurality of derivative financial instruments comprises a processor operable to receive a first order to buy a derivative financial instrument representing at least one product. The processor is further operable to receive a second order to sell the derivative financial instrument. The processor is further...

20060173764 - System and method for trading based on tournament-style events: A system for trading a plurality of derivative financial instruments comprises a processor operable to receive a first order to buy a derivative financial instrument that represents a contestant in a contest. The processor is further operable to receive a second order to sell the derivative financial instrument. The processor...

20060173759 - System and method for two-pass regulatory compliance: An automated system and method for ensuring that information in the form of data files provided by highly regulated businesses, such as financial institutions, comply with the most currently applicable Federal, state and local laws and regulations. This may be accomplished by applying a set of computer-encoded compliance rules to...

20060173775 - Computer system and method for facilitating and managing the project bid and requisition process: A comprehensive, web-enabled computer system and method is provided for facilitating and managing all aspects of project work, while synchronizing communications, data and transaction processing across multiple user platforms. To implement the computer system and method, a bid item list is utilized to create configurable and scalable customized bid templates...

20060173769 - Computer system for evaluating fixed income trade opportunities: Systems and methods embodying the present invention permit a trader of securities such as municipal bonds to observe real-time data relating to actual or prospective trades of relevance to a contemplated trade, while excluding those actual or prospective trades that are insufficiently relevant. The trader, or other user, can specify...

20060173771 - Foreign currency exchange: In accordance with the principles of the present invention, a system is provided to help link foreign exchange liquidity at a given settlement date. Exchange trade is represented as a positive product flow and a negative product flow relative to a side of the exchange trade. An exchange relationship between...

20060173768 - Processing of deal tickets: A deal feed system for passing deal tickets to back office systems comprises a deal feed contributor which receives tickets from trades on a plurality of trading systems on a plurality of trading floors, a database for storing the tickets, and a distributor for passing the tickets to back office...

20060173773 - Systems and methods for automated offer-based negotiation: A system/method for simultaneously extending an offer to multiple sellers of an identical product/service in real time and on a substantially simultaneous basis is provided. The system has the ability to filter and/or sort the list of sellers who receive the offer based on credibility levels, user feedbacks scores, and/or...

20060173772 - Systems and methods for automated processing, handling, and facilitating a trade credit transaction: The present invention relates to methods and systems for automated processing, handling, and facilitating a trade credit transaction. One embodiment of the invention can comprise an automated trade credit processing application engine. The automated trade credit processing application engine can be adapted to approve a customer for a purchase using...

20060173774 - Systems and methods for improving auction liquidity: Systems, methods, apparatus, and means for improving liquidity in a securities auction include selecting a cover to use to provide general liquidity to the auction, the cover having a plurality of options, calculating a fair value price for each option in the cover, creating an order associated with each of...

20060173770 - Telephony controlled auction: An online auction such as Ebay is provided with a telephone interface. This allows buyers, sellers or auction watchers to receive spoken information describing the auction progress and also allows bidding by telephone using speech and/or DTMF. Reminders may also be issued when a certain bid price has been reached...

20060173776 - A method of authentication: The present invention relates to the authentication of parties involved in transactions performed remotely over a network, such as the Internet. When a first party initiates a transaction with a second party, the second party can request authentication of the first party. Authentication is carried out by sending a communication...

20060173778 - Enterprise billing system for medical billing: An enterprise medical billing system receives patient identifying and charge information from a variety of sources, associates the charge data with a guarantor, provides a consolidated statement to the guarantor, and allocates portions of a received payment to the variety of sources based on a series of configurable payment rules....

20060173780 - System and method for offering and managing online purchasing card transactions: A purchase card system configured in accordance with the invention offers purchase card products that facilitate online purchases of life sciences research products and/or services via an e-commerce application. The acquisition and use of such purchase card products complies with mandated procurement, spending, and appropriations rules, regulations, and laws, such...

20060173779 - System, method, and computer program product for receiving and processing payments: A system, method, and computer program product is provided that is capable of receiving and processing payments from a payor. In one embodiment, the system includes a processing element capable of identifying a payor account, the payor account being associated with a payor and with one of a plurality of...

20060173777 - Systems and methods for management and analysis of telecommunication access service: This invention provides methods and systems for accessing, integrating, and analyzing multiple telephone rate and billing systems across multiple telephone service regions to execute an access carrier service customer rate and billing detail to effectively service customer accounts, resolve billing questions, and/or develop new revenue products....

20060173781 - System and method for interactive messaging and/or allocating and/or upgrading and/or rewarding tickets, other event admittance means, goods and/or services: A method, system, server architecture and/or tangible medium upgrade and award admittance of events to an event customer, preferably via a data communication network. The method includes, for example, receiving a communication from the event customer, the communication including a request to obtain admittance to at least one event, the...

20060173782 - Data access methods, media repository systems, media systems and articles of manufacture: Data access methods, media repository systems, media systems and articles of manufacture are described. According to one embodiment, a data access method includes storing media content using a media repository system and wherein a plurality of different usage rights are provided for controlling the consumption of the media content, providing...

20060173783 - System and method for authorized digital content distribution: A digital content distribution system uses a Digital Rights Management Controller that performs a set of arbitrary tests against the transfer request from one user to another such as user A to user B. Assuming these tests are successful, the DRM sends an encryption key to transferring user A. This...

20060173784 - Payment system for the distribution of digital content using an intelligent services control point: A payment system for a digital content distribution system uses a Digital Rights Management (DRM) Controller that inquires through and accounting and content web server whether the user requesting the transfer of content has sufficient funds. Upon receiving information about the balance of the account associated with the receiving user...

20060173785 - Interactive agenda for personal and groups activities and projects management: A system and method of planning and managing tasks to be worked out by many entities. The each task has task details relevant thereto including entities to whom task will be assigned and auto identification of task controller (The entity assigning these tasks). The auto identification of task assignee can...

20060173786 - Medium content protection method: In the present invention, a medium content protection method for protecting a content of a first storage medium having a first manufacture information is provided. The method includes steps of pre-recording a first identification datum into the first manufacture information, providing a second storage medium having a second manufacture information,...

20060173787 - Data protection management apparatus and data protection management method: The data protection management apparatus protects digital licenses and digital data, so that the abuse and illegal use of digital data is prevented. The apparatus has an I/O port, session manager, license management engine, usage rules administrator, encryption engine, memory manager, and memory. The license management engine acquires, stores, and...

20060173788 - Flexible licensing architecture in content rights management systems: A license is issued to a user as decryption and authorization portions. The decryption portion is accessible only by such user and has a decryption key (KD) for decrypting corresponding encrypted digital content and validating information including an identification of a root trust authority. The authorization portion sets forth rights...

20060173789 - System and method for distributing digital content over a network: A system and method for distributing digital content over a computer network. A set of digital content is provided in a storage location that is accessible by the network. One or more physical tokens store data related to accessing the set of digital content. When a token is at a...

20060173790 - Optical payment transceiver and system using the same: An optical payment transceiver and an optical settlement system using the same uses a personal portable terminal incorporated with an optical transceiver as a card substitute payment unit for settlement. Here, card information is incorporated in a personal portable terminal incorporated with an optical transceiver such as a portable phone...

20060173791 - System for providing cardless payment: The method and system of the invention provide a variety of techniques for using a selected alias and a selected personal identification entry (PIE) in conjunction with use of a transaction card, such as a credit card, debit card or stored value card, for example. A suitable number or other...

20060173792 - System and method for verifying the age and identity of individuals and limiting their access to appropriate material: Limiting access to the Internet, eCommerce websites, accounts and/or other venues, for example, by providing an Internet access account, and/or other access account, to an “in person” and/or “single number” age verified and identified “adult” who assumes responsibility for use of such account and viewing of appropriate material via such...

20060173793 - System and method for verifying the age and identity of individuals and limiting their access to appropriate material and situations: Limiting access to the Internet, intranets, computers, appliances, websites, individuals and/or other venues, for example, by providing an access account, to an “in person” and/or otherwise verified “adult” who assumes responsibility for such account's use for accessing appropriate material, websites and/or individuals, while empowered by control of a “single access...

20060173794 - Secure electronic commerce using mutating identifiers: Methods and systems for performing electronic commerce using mutating identifiers. One method can include encrypting buyer transaction data with a first mutating identifier, transmitting the buyer transaction data to an authenticator device, decrypting the buyer transaction data, generating a payment request, encrypting the payment request with a third mutating identifier,...

20060173796 - System and method for printing multiple postage indicia: An envelope having a window for allowing a printed postage indicia to show through is shown. According to a preferred embodiment, the postage indicia window may be provided with a glassine covering. Preferably the postage indicia may be put in a corner of a document to be mailed and the...

20060173795 - System for dynamically providing address and indicia information: A system for dynamically providing labeling information includes a meter with a communications port, and a label operable to receive and display address and indicia information from the meter....

20060173800 - Infrastructure with meter communication capabilities: A system for providing franking services includes one or more networks, one or more postage meters, and a postal infrastructure data center connected to the one or more meters through the one or more networks, wherein the postal infrastructure data center establishes communication with the one or more meters as...

20060173797 - Method for tracking mail piece data: A method for tracking data related to mail pieces. The method is provided having steps of: assigning a mail delivery service code to the mail piece; storing the mail delivery service code in a database; receiving data corresponding to the mail piece; storing the data in the database; and linking...

20060173798 - Method of providing tracking numbers for a mail piece: A method of providing mail piece labeling and tracking includes allocating at least one tracking number a postal service provider customer, associating the at least one tracking number with information about a mail piece, applying the at least one tracking number to the mail piece, and using the at least...

20060173799 - Technique for prioritizing tasks in a postal service provider data center: A postal service provider system includes a sever and a plurality of meters. The meters access the server to initiate tasks for data collection, reporting, and accounting purposes and the server prioritizes the tasks so as to service the meters efficiently....