摘要:
A system for executing a sale of information between a buyer and an anonymous seller. The buyer transmits a request for information to a website hosted by a server. A seller who has information transmits a response to the website indicating that the seller has relevant information to sell. The buyer and the seller negotiate anonymously through the server using unique, anonymous identifiers to agree to the price and content of the information.Upon agreement, the buyer deposits the payment in an escrow account. The seller is instructed to disclose information to the buyer through the anonymous relay system. The buyer reviews the information and, if satisfactory, transmits acceptance of it to the server. The server then instructs the escrow account to release the funds to the seller. If the information is not satisfactory, a third-party arbitrator decides whether the funds are released to the seller.
摘要:
Apparatus and methods of managing a virtual area based on communicant capabilities are described. The communicant capabilities are updated based on rules in response to events in the virtual area. An action by one communicant can affect the capabilities of another communicant. Communicant capabilities can be stored in respective server-side proxies and the virtual area can be managed without transmitting any of the capabilities to the communicants' client network nodes. Capability-based permissions checks can be performed against communicant capabilities with wildcarded attribute fields.
摘要:
Other communicants in a network communications environment who have relationship ties with a user that satisfy a particular relationship predicate and who are present in a zone of a respective other virtual area that is assigned to the other communicant are determined. Indications of presence of the determined other communicants in the zones of the other virtual areas is transmitted to the user. Each virtual area is associated with a respective communicant who is present in the virtual area and has a relationship tie with the user that satisfies a relationship predicate. Responsive to user input referencing a selected virtual area, a request to establish a presence for the user in the selected virtual area is transmitted. Responsive to user input referencing a particular communicant, a request to establish a network communications link between the respective network nodes operated by the user and the particular communicant is transmitted.
摘要:
Examples that are described herein provide systems and methods for creating virtual areas for realtime communications. Some examples provide a quick and easy process for creating a virtual area for a set of communicants and provisioning those communicants for realtime communications in the virtual area. Some examples provide a quick and easy way for a user to wrap a realtime communications framework around a network service. Through seamless integration of realtime communications (e.g., realtime audio, video, chat, screen sharing, and file transfer) in persistent virtual areas, these examples are able to enhance and improve communicants' experiences with a network service relative to traditional browser based methods of collaborating on network service based projects.
摘要:
In a network communications environment supporting realtime communications between respective network nodes of a user and other communicants in virtual areas associated with respective sets of communicant members, a graphical user interface (GUI) is provided in connection with the user's network node. The GUI includes controls for establishing presence in respective ones of the virtual areas, managing realtime communications with other communicants in respective ones of the virtual areas, and presenting different views of communicants associated with the network communications environment. Based on user input in connection with the GUI, a presence is established for the user in a selected one of the virtual areas, realtime communications are administered between the user and one or more communicants who are present in the selected virtual area, and a visualization that shows graphical representations, locations of presence, and realtime activities of communicants across respective ones of the virtual areas is displayed.
摘要:
A network communications environment has advanced interaction management functionality that enables the opportunities for users to interact with one another to be expanded beyond the opportunities that exist with closed interaction management approaches while still providing reasonable privacy and security protections that are not available with open interaction management approaches. The advanced interaction management functionality also encourages the proliferation of trust-based interactions.
摘要:
Switching real-time data stream connections between network nodes sharing a virtual area is described. In one aspect, the switching involves storing a virtual area specification. The virtual area specification includes a description of one or more switching rules each defining a respective connection between sources of a respective real-time data stream type and sinks of the real-time data stream type in terms of positions in the virtual area. Real-time data stream connections are established between network nodes associated with respective objects each of which is associated with at least one of a source and a sink of one or more of the real-time data stream types. The real-time data stream connections are established based on the one or more switching rules, the respective sources and sinks associated with the objects, and respective positions of the objects in the virtual area.
摘要:
Rights management information is used at least in part in a matching, narrowcasting, classifying and/or selecting process. A matching and classification utility system comprising a kind of Commerce Utility System is used to perform the matching, narrowcasting, classifying and/or selecting. The matching and classification utility system may match, narrowcast, classify and/or select people and/or things, non-limiting examples of which include software objects. The Matching and Classification Utility system may use any pre-existing classification schemes, including at least some rights management information and/or other qualitative and/or parameter data indicating and/or defining classes, classification systems, class hierarchies, category schemes, class assignments, category assignments, and/or class membership. The Matching and Classification Utility may also use at least some rights management information together with any artificial intelligence, expert system, statistical, computational, manual, or any other means to define new classes, class hierarchies, classification systems, category schemes, and/or assign persons, things, and/or groups of persons and/or things to at least one class.
摘要:
An integrated, modular array of administrative and support services are provided for electronic commerce and electronic rights and transaction management. These administrative and support services supply a secure foundation for conducting transaction-related capabilities over electronic networks, and can also be adapted to the specific needs of electronic commerce value chains. In one embodiment a Distributed Commerce Utility having a secure, programmable, distributed architecture provides these administrative and support services. The Distributed Commerce Utility may comprise a number of Commerce Utility Systems. These Commerce Utility Systems provide a web of infrastructure support available to, and reusable by, the entire electronic community and/or many of its participants. Different support functions can be collected together in hierarchical and/or networked relationships to suit various business models or other objectives. Modular support functions can be combined in different arrays to form different Commerce Utility Systems for different design implementations and purposes.
摘要:
Documents and other items can be delivered electronically from sender to recipient with a level of trustedness approaching or exceeding that provided by a personal document courier. A trusted electronic go-between can validate, witness and/or archive transactions while, in some cases, actively participating in or directing the transaction. Printed or imaged documents can be marked using handwritten signature images, seal images, electronic fingerprinting, watermarking, and/or steganography. Electronic commercial transactions and transmissions take place in a reliable, “trusted” virtual distribution environment that provides significant efficiency and cost savings benefits to users in addition to providing an extremely high degree of confidence and trustedness. The systems and techniques have many uses including but not limited to secure document delivery, execution of legal documents, and electronic data interchange (EDI).