Patent ID: 7343293

Claim:
A method for providing user information related to a user's selection of audio data, the method comprising the steps of: receiving a user's selection of audio data and an indicium identifying the user; analyzing the user's present selection of audio data and previous selections of audio data, and identifying at least one user interest category based on the user's present and previous audio data selections; selecting at least one user information item from the at least one identified user interest category; associating or combining the at least one user information item with the user's audio data selection; and delivering the associated or combined at least one user information item and the user's audio data selection to the user over an electronic network, wherein said step of analyzing and identifying comprises the steps of: assigning each of said user's present audio data selections and said user's previous audio data selections to said at least one user interest category, assigning each of said user's present audio data selections and each of said user's previous audio data selections an approximate time at which said audio data selection was received, assigning each of said audio data selections a weighting factor that decreases as the difference between a present time and the approximate time at which said audio data selection was received, multiplying the numerical value of an assignment to each of said at least one user interest category by a corresponding weighting factor to produce a numerical value for a weighted assignment to each of said at least one user interest category, and counting the numerical value of the weighted assignment to each of said at least one user interest category; and when the accumulated number of weighted assignments to a selected one of said at least one user interest category is greater than a selected threshold number, identifying the selected one of said at least one user interest category as a category from which said at least one user information item is selected.