Abstract:
An internet service and game that automatically tracks celebrity publicity over time. The service searches the internet for news articles containing names of celebrities. When an article is found, a point value is assigned to the relevant celebrity. To win the game, players attempt to predict future celebrity publicity by selecting celebrities and accruing points when news articles are found by the internet service.

Description:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
       [0001]    The present invention relates to online fantasy league games and methods of playing a celebrity related online fantasy league game. 
       BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0002]    Online fantasy league games are typically oriented around sports and published sports scores. The object of these online games are to predict the abilities of individual sports players in their real world athletic games. Users playing these online fantasy league games create fantasy teams of sports players. The game tallies the scores of each sports player after their real world athletic games and assigns points to the users who have these players on their fantasy team. 
         [0003]    The present invention, on the other hand, is a fantasy league game related to celebrities. The object of the game is to accurately predict when celebrities will receive publicity. When playing the game, users create teams of celebrities and receive points when said celebrities generate publicity. 
         [0004]    Unlike sports, there are no published publicity scores for celebrities. Consequently, this invention uses articles published on the internet to award a score or publicity level for each celebrity. The invention searches the internet for articles containing the celebrity&#39;s name. For each article it finds, a point value is assigned to the user who has the celebrity on their fantasy team. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES 
         [0005]      FIG. 1  is a view of the web page that shows the home page the user sees when first connecting. 
           [0006]      FIG. 2  is a view of the web page that shows a user creating an account to play the game. 
           [0007]      FIG. 3  is a view of the web page that shows which celebrities are generating the most publicity for a give time period. In this case, it is the celebrities with the most publicity in the last 24 hours. 
           [0008]      FIG. 4  is a view of the web page that shows a celebrity fantasy league in progress. A user can see how well they are playing versus the other users in their league. 
           [0009]      FIG. 5  is a view of the web page that shows the user&#39;s fantasy team. From this page the user can trade celebrities, view how many points they have acquired, and see their standing in leagues. 
           [0010]      FIG. 6  is a view of the web page showing a user leaving a message for other users. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION  
       [0011]    The present invention is an internet service that tracks stories written about individuals with celebrity status and an online game built around this internet service. 
         [0012]    The Internet Service 
         [0013]    The internet service is software running as a process on a server computer. It maintains a database of names of people with celebrity status and information about news articles written about them. The service regularly uses the names in the database to make queries of web sites for published articles containing the names. For each article that is found, the service makes a record in the the database of the date and time, the title of the article, the web location or URL of the article, and most importantly the celebrity named in the article. The service then assigns points to users who were skillful enough to previously select the celebrities who&#39;s names have appeared in the articles. 
         [0014]    The Game 
         [0015]    The player or user, using internet browser software, connects to a web site which is the front end for the internet service previously described ( FIG. 1 ). The user creates a user account on the web site that they will use to play the game. To create the account, the user enters a name or alias that they wish to be known as in the game ( FIG. 2 ). They also provide a password so that only they may play the game with that alias. After filling out the required text fields on the web page, the user clicks a link typically labeled as “submit.” Consequently their internet browser software sends the information to the server, which directs the information to the internet service software running on the server, which records the new user in the database. The user may now play the game by using links on the web site. 
         [0016]    The web site displays publicity data for each celebrity, as gathered by the internet service described above ( FIG. 3 ). Using this data, as well as any knowledge the user may have regarding a celebrity, the user makes an educated guess as to what celebrities will generate publicity in the future. The user makes their guess known to the internet service through the web site by clicking a link, typically one labeled as “buy” or “trade”. This action makes a request to the internet service, which moves the selected celebrity into the user&#39;s fantasy team or portfolio by creating a record in the database ( FIG. 5 ). 
         [0017]    While a celebrity is in a user&#39;s fantasy team, any news articles found by the internet service that contain that celebrity&#39;s name are assigned as points to the user. The user may hold the celebrity and continue to receive points if they think the celebrity will continue to be in the news, or they may “trade” or “sell” the celebrity. 
         [0018]    The goal of the user is to accrue more points then other users playing the game. To keep score, the internet service uses the database to track each user&#39;s accrued points and compare them against other users. 
         [0019]    Since the internet service runs indefinitely, users playing the game need to specify a set time period during which they compete. To solve this problem, the web site allows the creation of leagues. Leagues are a period of time during which specific groups of users try to accrue the most points. The internet service tracks how many points each user accrues during the duration of league play and ranks the users in the league based on their points accrued ( FIG. 4 ). 
         [0020]    To create a league, a user clicks a link on the web site, typically labeled “start league” or “create league.” They select a day and time they would like the league to start and a day and time for the league to end. When this information has been entered on the league creation area of the web site, the user clicks a link typically labeled “submit” to send the information to the server. This action requests that the internet service create a record of this league in the database. The user can then invite other users to join their league so that they may compete directly with each other. 
         [0021]    Leagues also serve as forums where users can discuss their progress in the game. A user may leave a message or comment to another user to read when they return to the website and view the league ( FIG. 6 ). To leave a message, the user clicks a link typically labeled as “write comment” or “leave message.” The user then fills in the text area on the web page and clicks a link typically labeled as “submit.” This causes their internet browser software to send the message to the server. In turn the internet service records the message in the database, making it available for display on the web page. 
         [0022]    At the conclusion of league play, a winner is declared. Users may continue to play the game outside of league play or they may create a new league. 
         [0023]    Although the invention has been described in language specific to structural features and/or methodological steps, it is to be understood that the invention defined in the appended claims is not necessarily limited to the specific features or steps described. Rather, the specific features and steps are disclosed as preferred forms of implementing the claimed invention.