Patent ID: 7251696

Claim:
A system that facilitates maximizing utility of a communication, the system comprising: an identifier that identifies an initially selected communication channel; and an analyzer that determines whether the initially selected communication channel should be overridden by an overriding communication channel, wherein the initially selected communication channel is overridden if EU2−cost>EU1, where EU2=E[u(d i ,c)]=s j ε s 2 Σu(s j ,d i ) p(s j |d i ,c), EU1=E[u(d i ,c)]=s j ε s 1 Σu(s j ,d i ) p(s j |d i ,c) and, cost measures actual dollar cost; wherein p(s j |d i ,c) represents a probability of achieving a future state s j given a decision d i concerning communication channel parameters and a context c; each individual outcome state s j ε s represents a possible match of preferences to related communication parameters; and function u(s j ,d i ) represents a utility of state s j after the decision d i has been made.