Patent ID: 6970914

Claim:
A method for effecting a connection between a user node and a destination node on the network with an audio program, comprising the steps of: playing at the user node the audio program having embedded therein a unique header code, the user node further includes user ID information that uniquely identifies the user node; detecting the unique header code at the user node during the playing of the audio program at the user node; in response to detecting output of the unique header code during playing of the audio program at the user node, without user intervention assembling the unique header code into a message packet and transmitting information regarding the unique header code over the first network to an intermediate node on the first network, and also transmitting the user ID information to the intermediate node; matching the received information regarding the unique header code with routing information stored in a database at the intermediate node and matching the received user ID information of the user node with the stored profile information in the database associated with the received user ID information, which routing information defines the location on the first network of a plurality of destination nodes, the database having stored therein a correspondence between unique header codes and select ones of the destination nodes and wherein the database includes a stored profile which is associated therein with the user ID information of the user node; and if there is a match between the received unique header code and a unique header code stored in the database, causing the destination node and the user node to be connected over the first network with the corresponding routing information, such that the destination node can transmit information to the user node, the step of causing the destination node and the user node to be connected if there is a match comprises the steps of: transmitting back to the user node the routing information determined to be stored in the database and corresponding to the received unique header code as associated with the information regarding the unique header code at the intermediate node and appended thereto the stored profile information, the user node utilizing the received routing information to effect a connection to the destination node from the user node and transmit thereto the received stored profile information, and the destination node, in response to being connected to the user node via the routing information, operable to transfer information to the user node.