Patent ID: 7149704

Claim:
A method for collecting information about a user, comprising: obtaining a set of one or more rules for collecting information by a first application residing on a client, wherein the first set of rules is obtained in response to a request that includes an identifier associated with the client and information related to rules previously received by the client; utilizing the first application to monitor a second application on the client in communication with the network for information that satisfies one or more rules of the set of rules, wherein the second application is utilized by a user to access sites coupled to the network; collecting information that satisfies one or more rules of the set of rules from the second application utilizing the first application; storing at least a portion of the collected information on the client utilizing the first application; receiving content via the network for presentment by the first application based on the portion of the collected information stored on the client, wherein prior to receiving the content, a table at the client is accessed to determine whether at least a portion of the content is available locally to the client; and updating the set of one or more rules based on the collected information.