Data processing: generic control systems or specific application – Specific application – apparatus or process – Contest or contestant analysis – management – or monitoring
Reexamination Certificate
1999-05-03
2001-05-22
Chapman, Jeanette (Department: 3711)
Data processing: generic control systems or specific application
Specific application, apparatus or process
Contest or contestant analysis, management, or monitoring
C463S016000, C463S021000, C463S025000, C463S042000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06236900
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to interactive data exchange and gaming systems in which remote users participate via electronic communications media, and, in particular, to a method and system for remote users to make and monitor predictions from various future events.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
During the past decade, the remarkable increase in the number and capabilities of personal computers (“PC”), combined with the growth and development of the Internet, has fueled the development and popular acceptance of a variety of different Internet-based forums that provide shared access and participation to communities of Internet users. These forums include web pages that can be downloaded and displayed concurrently by many different Internet users, Internet-based email systems that allow users to exchange email messages, chat rooms that provide a number of Internet users with the ability to exchange messages in real time, and a wide variety of different interactive, Internet-based gaming systems, such as fantasy football and computer-based versions of popular board and card games. A wide variety of Internet-based gambling systems are also currently available to Internet-users, including Internet-based casinos and sports waging systems. Many of the currently-available forums, including Internet-based gaming systems, are inherently constrained, or constrained for technical reasons, in the number of users that can concurrently participate in the game. For example, many popular interactive games are designed to accommodate between two and six players, such as Chess, Bridge, and various other computer-based implementations of traditional board and card games. As another example, real-time interactive systems, and even live Internet-based auction systems may be severely limited in the number of participants by interconnection bandwidth and server computer throughput. Many currently-available Internet-based gambling and wagering systems are of questionable legality, may have deleterious social effects, and are likely soon to be targets of legislative restrictions or prohibitions. However, wagering on future events have an almost universal appeal within human communities, and are likely to have continued and increasing appeal to communities of Internet users. Thus, a need has been recognized by Internet applications developers and service providers for an Internet-based forum that provides a legal, socially acceptable medium in which an unrestricted number of Internet-users can express a natural speculative and competitive interests in various types of future events.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a method and system for organizing the competitive speculation of a large number of remote participants with regard to one or more future events. In one embodiment of the present invention, a game master defines a new game, or forum, based on some set of related future events. Participants may then join the forum via a sign-up process. A participant may then log on to the forum and submit one or more predictions related to one or more of the future events that define the forum. A participant may submit a simple prediction related to a single future event, as well as complex predictions comprising a number of simple predictions. In addition, a user may submit an aggregate prediction that is automatically resubmitted, at some fixed interval, up until the future event to which the aggregate prediction is related occurs. When an event for which a participant has submitted predictions occurs, the participant is rewarded, in points, for accurate predictions and is penalized, in loss of points, for incorrect predictions. At the conclusion of a game or forum, participants with the largest point totals may be rewarded for their skill in predicting the outcomes of the events that define the forum in various ways, including Internet-based recognition, and prizes. Factors that contribute to the number of points added, for correct predictions, or removed for incorrect predictions, from a participant's point total as the result of the outcome of an event include: (1) the confidence of the participant in his or her prediction, expressed in a number of points; (2) the length of time between the prediction and the occurrence of the event; (3) the degree by which the outcome of the event exceeded or fell short of some predicted outcome; and (4) a predictive probability of the occurrence of the event.
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Bergstrom Robert W.
Chapman Jeanette
Collins Dolores R.
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