Patent ID: 8069267

Claim:
A method for providing content to a user through a user interface, comprising: displaying content and an advertisement in the user interface; receiving a plurality of user inputs from a single user through the user interface, including receiving a selected portion of the content displayed in the user interface from the user; determining which of the plurality of user inputs qualify as one or more user actions; determining whether a number of user actions received from the single user through the user interface since the advertisement was initially displayed in the user interface exceeds a user action count threshold, wherein the user action count threshold designates a minimum number of user actions that must be received after the advertisement is initially displayed in the user interface before the advertisement may be refreshed; determining whether a period of time that has elapsed between the time the advertisement was initially displayed in the user interface and the number of user actions was received exceeds a minimum period of time, wherein the minimum period of time designates an amount of time that must elapse after the advertisement is initially displayed in the user interface before the advertisement may be refreshed; refreshing the advertisement displayed in the user interface to generate a refreshed advertisement responsive to the number of user actions received through the user interface exceeding the user action count threshold, the period of time exceeding the minimum period of time since the advertisement was last refreshed in the user interface, and responsive to not allowing advertisement refresh during text entry; and refreshing the content in the user interface and not the advertisement if either the number of user actions does not exceed the user action count threshold or the period of time does not exceed the minimum period of time.