Patent ID: 8060388

Claim:
A method of allowing a customer to reserve a resource, the method comprising steps performed by a computer system of: providing a potential customer with a choice of a plurality of different reservation contracts for reserving a resource to be provided at a future time; receiving from a contracting customer a selection of one of the plurality of different reservation contracts and a probability that the contracting customer will elect to receive the resource at the future time; and distributing the resource to the contracting customer who subsequently elects to receive the resource, wherein each of the plurality of different reservation contracts requires the contracting customer to make a first payment in aggregate if the resource ultimately is elected and to make a second payment in aggregate if the resource ultimately is not elected at the future time, wherein the future time comprises at least one of a point in time and an interval of time, and wherein the first payment is higher than the second payment and both are nonzero, and wherein the first payment and the second payment are both determined based upon the probability that the contracting customer will elect to receive the resource.