BACKGROUND
[0001] In past few years there has been a significant increase in Internet usage by users. The users often request network service providers for data services, such as streaming audio and video files, online gaming, e-shopping, 5 real-time file sharing, VOIP calling and teleconferencing, emailing, etc. The network service providers, typically, via different content providers facilitate browsing and downloading of different types of content corresponding to the data services.
[0002] Conventionally, data bytes consumed by a user for accessing 10 online content are metered and evaluated by the network service providers based on different data rating plans. The data rating plans may be based on different ratings for data bytes. Generally, the users subscribe for accessing the online content by choosing any one from the different data rating plans commonly referred as data packs, provided by the network service providers to the users. 15 Once subscribed, the user or a subscriber is provisioned for a service account for accessing the online content. Metering and evaluation of the data bytes consumed while accessing the content by the user, is done based on the data pack for which the user is subscribed. For example, in one situation, the user may be allocated a pre-defined amount of data bytes corresponding to a data usage limit set for the 20 user. In second situation, another user can access the content without a restriction of the data usage limit. Thus, for both the situations the network service provider performs the metering and evaluation of the data bytes consumed in a different manner.
[0003] With increase in online content consumption and competition 25 amongst the different content providers, nowadays, some of the content providers provide the online content as selective content to the users. The selective content provided to the users corresponds to any such online content for which the data bytes consumed corresponding to the accessing of the selective content are not
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metered and evaluated against the service account of the users. Rather, the data bytes consumed for accessing of the selective content are accounted against a service account of the content provider. In such situations, every time the user accesses the selective content, the data bytes consumed are deducted from the service account of the content provider. Therefore, the metering and evaluation of 5 the data bytes consumed by the user, may be performed against the service account of the content provider. For example, the content provider may be a shopping enterprise and may provide online data hosted on a website or a mobile application of shopping enterprise as the selective content to the users. Similar to toll free numbers, the users are provided unmetered browsing on such website 10 and the mobile application of the shopping enterprise. Further, the data bytes consumed for accessing the selective content provided by the shopping enterprise may be accounted against the service account of the content provider. Thus, the content providers may bear for the consumption of the data bytes corresponding to the accessing of the selective content by the users. 15
[0004] Usually, the selective content may be a part of overall content provided by the content providers and may be determined based on any pre-defined criteria decided by the content providers. The selective content may be hosted on any of a single source address and multiple source addresses corresponding to such content providers. Typically, the source addresses 20 corresponds to the address of source of the selective content where the selective content may be available. For example, the selective content provided by the shopping enterprise may be hosted on the source addresses, such as a set of URLs on which the selective content may be accessed. Using an internet connection provided by a network service provider to which the users are subscribed, the 25 users may browse and access the selective content provided by the content providers.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
[0005] The detailed description is provided with reference to the accompanying figures. In the figures, the left-most digit(s) of a reference number 30
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identifies the figure in which the reference number first appears. The same numbers are used throughout the drawings to reference like features and components.
[0006] Fig. 1(A) and 1(B) illustrates an example networking environment, implementing a Content Usage Assessment System (CUAS) for 5 real-time assessment of usage of selective content, according to an example implementation of present subject matter;
[0007] Fig. 2 illustrates various elements of the CUAS, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter;
[0008] Figs. 3(A) and 3(B) illustrate an example method for the real-time 10 assessment of the usage of the selective content, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter;
[0009] Fig. 4 illustrates an example call flow diagram indicating procedure for real time assessment of the usage of the selective content, in accordance with an embodiment of the present subject matter; 15
[0010] Fig. 5 illustrates an example method for providing the selective content to a client device based on real time assessment of the usage of the selective content, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter;
DETAILED DESCRIPTION 20
[0011] The present subject matter relates to techniques for real-time assessment of usage of selective content. The methods and systems as described herein facilitates in the real-time assessment of usage of the selective content provided by different content providers, such that a real time estimation of data bytes consumed against a usage of the selective content may be provided to the 25 content provider every time the selective content is accessed by a user. The assessment of the usage of the selective content may be performed using a first unique key and a first registered account corresponding to the different content
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providers and second unique key and a second registered account corresponding to a user accessing the selective content.
[0012] Conventionally, various content providers register with a network service provider in order to provide the selective content to users. During registration, a content provider provides details of various data rating plans 5 corresponding to the selective content to be provided by the content providers and source addresses on which the selective content is hosted. Usually, the source addresses may be associated with the content provider performing registration. Alternatively, the source addresses may be associated with a third party providing content via the content provider performing the registration. Generally, every 10 time a user accesses the selective content, estimated data bytes consumed by the user towards accessing the selective content are accounted against a service account of the content provider.
[0013] Typically, the network service provider performs metering and evaluation of the estimated data bytes in a post-processing way, such that the 15 content provider gets to know about the estimated data bytes after the user has accessed the selective content. Generally, details of data usage, specifically, usage of the estimated data bytes are maintained in records, such as call detail records (CDRs). Each data record usually includes details of source and destination entities involved in data exchange, data transferred during a data 20 exchange session, transaction details against the user accessing the selective content, and mediation function basis special identifier used for collating data consumed towards accessing of the selective content. Typically, for metering and evaluation of the data bytes consumed post-mediation of the raw call data records (CDRs) is performed in an offline manner after the selective content is already 25 been accessed by the user. The content provider gets to know about the data bytes consumed by the user for accessing the selective content after a subscription period or a subscription cycle.
[0014] Generally, the metering and evaluation of the estimated data bytes against the service account of the content provider includes processing and 30 reconciliation of the call data records. The processing of data records is done in a
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periodic manner, for example, on any of weekly, monthly and quarterly basis and includes settlement and reconciliation of information related to the data records. Upon the processing of the data records, data usage reports are generated and provided to the content providers. For example, the data usage reports may be in form of a monthly bill generated against the content provider. 5
[0015] However the processing of the data records is a complex and resource intensive process, as it includes storing, updating and maintaining multiple data records corresponding to different content providers. Also, the processing of the data records is not scalable, as it is difficult to manage the processing of the data records corresponding to multiple content providers 10 simultaneously by the network service providers.
[0016] Further, the content providers offer a fixed amount of data bytes of the selective content to the users. Such data bytes are generally allocated against the service account of the content providers. The fixed amount of data bytes are allocated according to a data rating plan which may have different ratings for data 15 bytes based on which the content provider may be subscribed to the network service provider. As the metering and evaluation of the estimated data bytes corresponding to the accessing of the selective content is performed in the post-processing way, the content provider is unable to know about the estimated data bytes required for accessing the selective content on a real-time basis. Thus, the 20 content provider is unaware about a remaining amount of data bytes available from the fixed amount data bytes which the content provider can still offer to the users. In some situations, the content provide remains unaware about the rate of consumption of the data bytes due to unfair, excess usage from the users. Further, in such situations the content provider often does not have knowledge of 25 exhaustion of the fixed amount of data bytes, and therefore, is unable to strategize on the real-time basis, about additional data bytes which the content provider may provide to the users. The content providers in some situations face issues of over-usage of the selective content, sudden exhaustion of data bytes in the service account of the content providers. Also, in such situations, the exhaustion of the 30 fixed amount of the data bytes may lead to sudden disruption in accessing of the
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selective content which results in bad user experience for the users. Further, upon exhaustion of the fixed amount of the data bytes, existing network service provider systems are unable to automatically switchover the evaluation and metering of the data bytes from any other existing account of the user. In such situations, services provided by the network service provider are either stopped 5 and/or the network service provider needs to account for additional data bytes in form of credit towards the content providers. Provisioning of the additional data bytes to the content providers in form of credit by the network service providers further leads to billing reconciliation again for the additional data bytes between the service providers and the content provider. Usually such situations require 10 manual intervention for reconciliation and processing of additional data bytes which further leads to delay in providing services to the user.
[0017] According to an example implementations of the present subject matter, techniques for real time assessment of usage of the selective content are described. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, a set of 15 source addresses may be received from a content provider to provide the selective content to users. For example, the set of source addresses may be a set of IP addresses on which the selective content may be hosted by the content provider. The content provider may set a pre-defined criteria that may determine any content hosted by the content provider to be provided as the selective content to 20 the users. For example, the content provider may be an e-commerce enterprise and may determine all videos, product reviews, and blogs related to newly launched products hosted on the content provider’s website to be provided as the selective content. In an example the content provider may define any of a complete website and a mobile phone application associated with the content 25 provider to be provided as the selective content to the users.
[0018] In an example implementation of the present subject matter, at least one first unique key may be allocated to the set of source address to uniquely identify the set of source address. The first unique key may be any value, such as a random number, an alphanumeric code, a combination of special 30
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characters, a cryptographically generated sequence, etc., which may be unique for the set of source addresses. Upon allocation of the first unique key, each of the source address from amongst the set of the source addresses may be mapped to a first registered account associated with the content provider based on the first unique key. For example, in one implementation, the first unique key may be 5 appended to each of a URL from amongst a set of URLs provided by the content provider on which the selective content may be hosted. Upon appending the first unique key, each of the URLs may be mapped to the first registered account associated with the content provider.
[0019] According to an example implementation of the present subject 10 matter, a request from a user may be received to access a part of the selective content associated with a source address from amongst the set of source addresses. For example, the content provider may be a music production enterprise and may offer a number of music albums hosted on a website of the music production enterprise to be provided as the selective content. A request 15 may be received from the user to access only such music albums which are related to vocal artists, from the number of music albums provided by the content provider as the selective content. The music albums requested by the user may be hosted at one or more of URLs associated with the website of the music production enterprise. 20
[0020] Upon receiving the request from the user, it may be determined whether the data bytes available in the first registered account corresponding to the set of source addresses are sufficient to provide the part of the selective content to the user. For example, the first registered account associated with the content provider may include a fixed number of data bytes against the set of 25 URLs associated with the music albums, provided by the content provider for hosting the selective content. In an example implementation, the fixed amount of data bytes available in the first registered account may be based on a data rating plan agreed between the content providers with any of network service providers. The data bytes available in the first registered account may be determined to be 30
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sufficient to provide the selective content requested by a user. For assessing the usage of the selective content, data bytes used in accessing the part of the selective content may be deducted in real time from the data bytes available in the first registered account. Thus, a real time assessment of the data bytes used for accessing the selective content may be performed. 5
[0021] As the data bytes used for accessing the part of the selective content may be deducted in real time from the data bytes available in the first registered account, the content provider may be aware of the usage of the selective content by the user every time the user accesses the selective content. Thus, the content provider may be updated about an estimated data bytes required 10 for providing uninterrupted access of the selective content to the user. Therefore, maintaining the data records and post processing of the CDRs for metering and evaluation of the data bytes by the network service providers may not be required. By not performing any reconciliation and processing of the data records, significant resources of the network service providers, such as 15 processing time, network storage may be saved. Also, in such situations, the content provider may also request for adding more data bytes in the first registered account associated with the content provider in a planned manner much before the exhaustion of the data bytes available in the first registered account to provide uninterrupted access of the selective content to the user. Thus, 20 by assessing the usage of the selective content in real time, the content provider may effectively strategize on real time basis, for new data rating plans and additional data bytes corresponding to the selective content which the content provider may offer to the user. For example, upon exhaustion of data bytes quota, the content providers may also perform a recharge for including additional data 25 bytes in the first registered account associated with the content provider.
[0022] The above techniques are further described with reference to figures, Fig. 1 to Fig. 5. It should be noted that the description and figures merely illustrate the principles of the present subject matter along with examples described herein and, should not be construed as a limitation to the present 30
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subject matter. It is thus understood that various arrangements may be devised that, although not explicitly described or shown herein, embody the principles of the present subject matter. Moreover, all statements herein reciting principles, aspects, and embodiments of the present subject matter, as well as specific examples thereof, are intended to encompass equivalents thereof. 5
[0023] Fig. 1A illustrates a network environment 100, implementing a CUAS 102 for real-time assessment of usage of selective content, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter. The network environment 100 may either be a public distributed environment or may be a private closed computing environment. The network environment 100 further comprises 10 multiple computing systems 104-1, 104-2, 104-3…104-N and a content provider system 106 connected over a network 108, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter. The computing systems 104-1, 104-2, 104-3…104-N are commonly referred to as computing systems 104, hereinafter. In an example, the computing systems 104 may be referred as client 15 devices operated by different users for accessing the selective content. In an example implementation, the computing systems 104 and the content provider system 106 may include, but are not restricted to, servers, workstations, desktop computers, laptops, smart phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), tablets, virtual hosts, applications, and the like. 20
[0024] The CUAS 102 may be implemented as, but is not limited to, a server, a workstation, a computer, and the like. In an example implementation of the present the subject matter, the CUAS 102 may be a network service provider system facilitating communication services over the network 108. According to an example implementation, the CUAS 102 may communicate with different 25 entities of the network environment 100, such as the computing systems 104 and the content provider system 106 through the network 108. In an example, the CUAS 102 may be the network service provider provisioning telecommunication and internet services over the network 108. For example, the CUAS 102 facilitate
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in providing the content associated with the content provider system 106 to any of the computing systems 104 via the network 108.
[0025] The network 108 may be an individual network or a collection of many such individual networks, interconnected with each other and functioning as a single large network, e.g., the Internet or an intranet. The network 108 may 5 be implemented as one of the different types of networks, such as intranet, local area network (LAN), wide area network (WAN), and such. The network 108 may either be a dedicated network or a shared network, which represents an association of the different types of networks that use a variety of protocols, for example, Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), Transmission Control 10 Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), etc., to communicate with each other.
[0026] In an example implementation, the network 108 related to the present subject matter may be implemented using two types of mobile data networks, namely, 3gpp cellular network, & non-3gpp like mobile data network. The network 108 may also include individual networks, such as, but are not 15 limited to, wireless networks that use exemplary telecommunications standards, such as Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) and a Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). It should be understood, however, that the systems and methods related to the present subject matter may be implemented in wireless networks that use any existing or yet to be developed 20 telecommunications technology. Some examples of other suitable telecommunications technologies include, but are not limited to, networks utilizing Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA), Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA), Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA), Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM), Long Term Evolution 25 (LTE), and various other 2G, 2.5G, 3G, 4G, and greater generation technologies. Examples of suitable data bearers include, but are not limited to, General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), Enhanced Data rates for Global Evolution (EDGE), the High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) protocol family, such as, High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), Enhanced Uplink (EUL) or otherwise termed 30
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High-Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA), Evolved HSPA (HSPA+), and various other current and future data bearers.
[0027] Depending on the implementation, the network 108 may include various network entities, such as base stations, gateways and routers; however, such details have been omitted to maintain the brevity of the description. Further, 5 it may be understood that the communication between the CUAS 102, the computing systems 104, and the content provider system 106, and other entities may take place based on the communication protocol compatible with the network 108.
[0028] In an example implementation, the content provider system 106 10 may be a server implemented by a content provider. The content provider may provide multiple types of content such as e-commerce shopping portals, web blogs, music files, on demand videos, online media streaming, live TV streaming etc., to the users of the network 108. As will be evident, the user of the network 108 use the above mentioned computing systems 104 to access the content 15 provided by the content provider system 106.
[0029] In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the content provider system 106 may provide selective content to the computing systems 104. The selective content may be any content such that data bytes consumed corresponding to the accessing of the selective content are not metered 20 and evaluated against a service account associated with any of the users of the computing systems 104 accessing the selective content. Thus, the computing systems 104 may access the selective content hosted by the content provider system 106 and the data bytes used in accessing the selective content may be metered and evaluated against a service account of the content provider. In an 25 example implementation, the content provided by the content provider system 106 may be determined to be the selective content based on a pre-defined criteria set by the content provider system 106. For example, the content provider may provide any of a promotional, non-chargeable, and zero rated content as the selective content to different users browsing the content provider’s website using 30
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any of the computing systems 104. Depending upon the data bytes used for accessing the selective content, the content provider may be charged by the CUAS 102.
[0030] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, the CUAS 102 may perform real-time assessment of the usage of the 5 selective content. For example, the CUAS 102 may meter and evaluate data bytes used in accessing the selective content in real-time based on one or more of service accounts registered with the content provider system 106. In an example implementation, the CUAS 102 may include a key generation module 110 for generating unique keys corresponding to the content provider system 106 and any 10 of the computing systems 104. The CUAS 102 may also include a usage evaluation module 112 for facilitating real-time assessment of the usage of the selective content based on the service accounts and the unique keys generated by the key generation module 110. Additional operational and constructional details of the key generation module 110 and the usage evaluation module 112 is 15 described in more detail in conjunction in reference to the description of Fig.2.
[0031] Fig. 1B illustrates various entities of the network 108 in the network environment 100, implementing the CUAS 102 for the real-time assessment of usage of selective content, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter. In an example implementation, the 20 computing systems 104 may communicate with any of the content provider system 106 and the CUAS 102 via various entities of the network 108. The network 108 may comprise various entities related to conventionally known telecommunication networks, such as an access network 108-1, a core network 108-2 connected over Internet 108-3 to provide communication between any of 25 the computing systems 104, CUAS 102 and the content provider system 106. The access network 108-1 may implement radio access technology and may include multiple network entities, such as a base station controller (BSC) 108-1-1 coupled to multiple base trans-receiver systems (BTS), and a radio network controller (RNC) 108-1-2. The access network 108-1 may be connected to the 30
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core network 108-2 which may be any of a packet switched network and a circuit switched network. The core network 108-2 may include a serving GPRS support node (SGSN) 108-2-1 connected with a gateway GPRS support node GGSN 108-2-1 to provide communication between a GPRS network with an external packet switched network, such as the Internet 108-3. 5
[0032] In an example, the GGSN 108-2-1 may receive requests from multiple user equipment (UE), such as any of the computing systems 104. In an example, the GGSN 108-2-1 may forward the requests received from the UE to a managed service provider associated with the CUAS 102 facilitating an onboarding of the content provider system 106. In an example implementation of 10 the present subject matter, the computing systems 104 may send HTTP Get requests via the GGSN 108-2-1 to the CUAS 102 for accessing the selective content. The HTTP Get requests may include a URL on which the selective content may be located. The GGSN 108-2-1 may forward the GET request to the managed service providers corresponding to the CUAS 102 which may send back 15 a HTTP response via the GGSN 108-2-1 to the UE along with a set of tokens. In one example, the managed service provide may function as a mediator and may send back the HTTP response even before a corresponding HTTP request by the computing systems 104 reaches to the content provider system 106. In an example, the HTTP response may include a modified URL such as the URL 20 appended along with the set of tokens, such as a set of unique key identifiers. The CUAS 102 may map the modified URL to a first registered account associated with the content provider system 106 based on a first unique key and may change a status of the URL. The CUAS 102 may also evaluate a volume of the selective content accessed by the computing systems 104 based on the set of the unique 25 key identifiers.
[0033] Any of the computing systems 104-1, 104-2, 104-3…104-N may send a request to access the selective content via the GGSN 108-2-1 to the CUAS 102. In example the request for accessing the selective content may be a HTTP GET request including the modified URL. The CUAS 102 may check for a status 30
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of the modified URL and determine the modified URL to correspond for accessing of the selective content. Based on the check at the CUAS 102, the selective content may be provided in a response to any of the computing systems 104 requesting the selective content. In an example, based on the check at the CUAS the CUAS 102 may forward the request to the content provider system 5 106 for delivering the selecting content to any of the computing systems 104. Depending on the functional requirements of the implementation, the network 108 may include various other known network entities for establishing communication between any of the CUAS 102, the computing systems 104 and content provider system 106 for assessing of the usage of the selective content, 10 however, such details have been omitted for the sake of brevity of the description.
[0034] Fig. 2 schematically illustrates components of the CUAS 102, in accordance with an example implementation of the present subject matter. The CUAS 102 may interact with any of the computing systems 104 and the content provider system 106 for the real-time assessment of the usage of the selective 15 content provided by the content provider system 106. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the CUAS 102 may include processor(s) 202 to run at least one operating system and other application and services. The CUAS 102 may also include, a memory 204 and interface(s) 206 coupled to the processor(s) 202. 20
[0035] According to example implementations of the present subject matter, the processor(s) 202 may be implemented as microprocessor(s), microcomputer(s), microcontroller(s), digital signal processor(s), central processing unit(s), state machine(s), logic circuit(s), and/or any device(s) that manipulates signals based on operational instructions. Among other capabilities, 25 the processor may fetch and execute computer-readable instructions stored in a memory. The functions of the various ‘processor(s)’ may be provided through the use of dedicated hardware as well as hardware capable of executing machine readable instructions.
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[0036] Further, the interface(s) 206 may include a variety of machine readable instructions-based interface and hardware interface that allow the CUAS 102 to interact with different entities. For example, the interface(s) 206 may enable the components of the CUAS 102 to communicate with any of the computing systems 104, the content provider system 106, and other 5 communication and computing devices, such as other web servers and external repositories.
[0037] According to one of the example implementation, as described in Fig. 2, the CUAS 102, may further include, modules 208 and data 210 which serves as a repository for storing data that may be fetched, processed, received, or 10 generated by the modules 208. The modules 208 in conjunction with other entities of the CUAS 102, such as the processor(s) 202, the memory 204, the interface(s) 206, and the data 210 serves for implementing various different functionalities of the CUAS 102 related to the present subject matter. The modules 208 may include routines, programs, objects, components, data structures, and the like, which 15 perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types.
[0038] The modules 208 may include a communication module 212 in addition to the key generation module 110 and the usage evaluation module 112 of CUAS 102 described in Fig. 1 for performing communication of the CUAS 102. Furthermore, the modules 208 may include a registration module 214 for 20 registering any of the computing systems 104 and the content provider system 106 with different service accounts respectively. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the module 208 may also include a notification module 216 for sending notifications to any of computing systems 104 and content provider system 106. Further, in an example implementation of the present subject matter, 25 the CUAS 102 may also include other module 218, which may supplement additional applications of the CUAS 102.
[0039] In one example implementation of the present subject matter, the data 210 may store data that may be fetched, processed, received, or generated by the modules 208 for implementing various functionalities of the CUAS 102. The 30
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data 210 may further include usage evaluation data 220 for storing data corresponding to the usage of the selective content. In an example implementation, the usage evaluation data 220 may also store any data related to the metering and evaluation of the usage of the selective content. Further, the data 210 may also include other data 222 for storing any other data to be utilized by the different 5 modules of the CUAS 102.
[0040] The following description describes the functionality of the CUAS 102 in accordance with Fig. 2, for implementing the real-time assessment of the usage of the selective content in the network 108. According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, multiple end users may operate the 10 computing systems 104. Therefore, for the ease of explanations and clarity, the communications initiated by the users, are referred as the communications performed by the computing systems 104, hereinafter throughout the description.
[0041] According to one of the example implementations of the present subject matter, the communication module 212 of the CUAS 102 may receive a 15 communication message, such as a request including a set of source addresses from the content provider system 106 to provide the selective content to any of the computing systems 104. In an example, the set of source addresses may be a subset of all source addresses associated with the content provider system 106. The set of source addresses may be any of URLs, IP addresses and any other 20 destination identifier at which the selective content provided by the content provider system 106 may be hosted. In another example, the source addresses may additionally host content other than the selective content hosted by the content provider. For example, the set of source addresses may host different content provided by other content providers systems which may be in 25 communication with the content provider system 106.
[0042] In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the selective content may be determined by the content provider system 106 based on a pre-defined criteria. For example, the content provider system 106 may be a news provider enterprise, which may set a pre-defined criteria which may include 30
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hosting news related to sports as the selective content. Additionally, the pre-defined criteria may include hosting advertisements, such as videos and articles related to newly launch electronic products, as the selective content. Thus, from an overall content hosted by the news provider enterprise, the content related to breaking news and the advertisements may be provided as the selective content to 5 any of the computing systems 104.
[0043] In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the communication module 212 of the CUAS 102 may further receive a request from any of the computing systems 104 to access a part of the selective content associated with a source address. The source address may be from amongst the 10 set of source addresses provided to the CUAS 102 by the content provider system 106. For example, the content provider system 106 may host videos related to newly launched smartphones as the selective content. The communication module 212 of the CUAS 102 may receive a set of URLs associated with the videos related to the newly launched smartphones by the content provider system 15 106 to be provided as the selective content. In an example, the communication module 212 of the CUAS 212 may further receive a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) based request from any of the computing systems 104 for accessing all the videos related to newly launched smartphones. The request from any of the computing systems may be based on any of well-known application protocols 20 used for data communications over World Wide Web. In another example, the communication module 212 may receive another HTTP request for accessing only such videos related to newly launched smartphones in South Asian countries. Thus, according to various example implementations of the present subject matter, the requests received may be related to accessing any of a part of 25 the selective content and overall selective content provided by the content provider system 106.
[0044] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, the key generation module 110 may allocate at least one first unique key to the set of the source addresses received from the content provider system 106 30
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to provide the selective content. In another example implementation, the key generation module 110 may further allocate a second unique key to any of the computing systems 104 requesting for accessing the selective content. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the first unique key and second unique key may be any of a nonce, a random number, a hash value and 5 any other code generated cryptographically, which may uniquely identify the set of the source addresses.
[0045] In an example, based on the first unique key, the usage evaluation module 112 of the CUAS 102 may map each of the source address from amongst the set of the source addresses to a first registered account associated with the 10 content provider system 106. The first registered account may be the service account of the content provider system 106 registered with the CUAS 102.
[0046] A pre-defined amount of data bytes may be available in the first registered account which may be used for providing the selective content. For example, based on a data rating plan agreed between the content provider system 15 106 and the network service provider implementing the CUAS 102 the pre-defined amount of data bytes may be an initial data bytes allocated to the content provider system 106 corresponding to the usage of which, the network service provider may provide the selective content offered by the content provider system 106. For example, according to one data rating plan decided between the content 20 provider system 106 and the network service provider, 100 Gigabytes (GB) of data may be available in the first registered account which may be used by various users for accessing the selective content.
[0047] The usage evaluation module 112 may be coupled to one or more of the communication module 212, the notification module 216, and the key 25 generation module 110. In an example implementation the usage evaluation module 112 may maintain an index table using the first unique keys as identifiers for mapping each of the source addresses to the first registered account associated with the content provider system 106.
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[0048] Upon mapping each of the source address, the usage evaluation module 112 may compare the data bytes available in the first registered account with an estimated data bytes to be used for accessing the part of the selective content for a given request received from a computing systems 104. For example, the CUAS 102 may receive a request from any of the computing systems 104 for 5 accessing promotional videos provided by the content provider system 106. Om am example the request for accessing promotional videos may be received by the communication module 212 of the CUAS 102. The usage evaluation module 112 may parse the request received from any the computing systems 104 to identify the content requested in the request as the selective content. In an example, the 10 usage evaluation module 112 may identify the content requested in the request to be the selective content based on the first unique key associated with a URL corresponding to the request. The usage evaluation module 112 may perform an estimation of the data bytes which may be required for accessing the promotional videos. For example, accessing the promotional videos may require estimated 15 500 Megabytes of data. The usage evaluation module 112 may compare the estimated data bytes for example 500 MB with the data bytes available in the first registered account of associated with the content provider.
[0049] Upon comparison, the usage evaluation module 112 may perform data byte evaluation for accessing the usage of the selective content in real-time. 20 The data byte evaluation may be performed based on the comparison by the usage evaluation module 112. In an example, if upon the comparison, the data bytes available in the first registered account are sufficient to provide the selective content, the usage evaluation module 112 may deduct the estimated data bytes from the data bytes available in the first registered account associated with 25 the content provider system 106, upon the consumption of the data bytes by any of the computing systems 104. The deduction of the estimated data bytes from the first registered account may be performed in real-time. For example, the estimated data bytes may be deducted from the data bytes available in the first
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registered account, every time the part of the selective content is be accessed by any of the computing systems 104.
[0050] Further, in an example implementation of the present subject matter, the usage evaluation module 112 may also perform a comparison of the estimated data bytes with data bytes available in a second registered account corresponding 5 to any of the computing systems 104 from which the request for accessing the selective content may be received. The second registered account may be associated with any of the computing systems 104 depending upon a data rating plan agreed between the network service provider and the computing systems 104. For example, second registered account may be according to a data rating 10 plan based on which any of the computing systems 104 may be subscribed to the network service provider, specifically for accessing content provided by the content provider system 106 as the selective content. The second registered account may include a pre-defined number of initial data bytes similar to the first registered account. In an example, the pre-defined number of initial data bytes 15 may be in accordance with the data rating plan according to which the computing system 104 may be subscribed to the network service provider for accessing the selective content. For example, based on the second registered account any of the CUAS 102 and the content provider system 106 may limit the usage of the selective content per subscriber basis to avoid abuse and implement a fair use 20 policy. Alternatively, any of the network service provider and the content provider system 106 may provide unlimited access of the selective content based on the second registered account to specific users operating computing systems 104. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the usage evaluation module 112 may also perform an authentication of the computing 25 system 104 for accessing the selective content based on any of the first unique key and the second unique key. For example, on receiving a request for accessing the selective content from any of the computing systems 104 the usage evaluation module 112 may authenticate the computing system 104 based on the first and second unique keys for accessing the selective content. In an example 30
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implementation of the present subject matter, the metering and evaluation of the estimated data bytes for assessing the usage of the selective content is performed after the authentication of the computing system 104 by the usage evaluation module 112.
[0051] In an example, if upon comparison the data bytes available in any of 5 the first registered account and second registered account are insufficient to provide the selective content to the computing systems 104, the notification module 216 may provide a notification indicative of an insufficient balance in any of the first registered account and the second registered account. In an example, the notification may be provided to a computing system 104 requesting 10 a content and/or the content provider system 106 depending upon any of availability, exhaustion, and insufficiency of the data bytes available in any of the first registered account and the second registered account. For example, if the data bytes available in the first registered account are insufficient to provide the selective content, the notification module 216 may provide a notification to the 15 content provider system 106. In another example, if the data bytes available in the second registered account are insufficient to provide the selective content, the notification module 216 may provide a notification to the computing system 104 which may be requesting for accessing of the selective content. In one example, the notification module 216 may provide a notification in real time and the 20 notification may also include a remaining number of data bytes available in any of the first registered account and the second registered account. In accordance with an example implementation of the present subject matter, the notification may further include an indication to initiate an addition of new bytes in the first registered account upon insufficiency of the data bytes available in the first 25 registered account to provide the selective content.
[0052] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, the notification module 216 of the CUAS 102 may provide a notification indicating evaluation of the estimated data bytes from a third registered account, which may be associated with the computing system 104 requesting the accessing 30
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of the selective content. For example, the notification module 216 may send the notification to the computing system 104 indicating evaluation of estimated data bytes from the third registered account when the data bytes available in any of the first registered account and the second registered account are insufficient for accessing the selective content. The third registered account may be based on a 5 data rating plan agreed between the computing system 104 and the network service provider for evaluating the usage of the content which may not be offered as the selective content by the content provider system 106. In an example implementation, the CSUA 102 may be the network service provider and may utilize the third registered account for evaluation of the data bytes which may not 10 be provided to the computing systems 104 as the selective content due to any reason. For example, when the data bytes available in any of the first and second registered account are insufficient and/or exhausted to provide the selective content, the CSUA 102 may utilize the third registered account to provide the content requested by the computing systems 104. In such situations, the part of 15 the selective content requested by the computing systems 104 may still be provided to the computing systems 104 even if the data bytes are not available in any of the first and the second registered account. However, the data bytes consumed in accessing the part of the selective content may be evaluated and deducted from the third registered account. 20
[0053] The usage evaluation module 112 may provide the part of the selective content to any of the computing systems 104 requesting for accessing the part of the selective content. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, upon providing the part of the selective content to any of the computing systems 104, the usage evaluation module 112 may further deduct the 25 estimated data bytes used in providing the selective content from the second registered account associated with the computing systems 104 requesting to access the selective content.
[0054] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, any of the first registered account and the second registered account may 30
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be created based on a registration performed by the registration module 214 of the CUAS 102. In an example implementation, for creating the first registered account, the registration module 214 may perform the registration of the content provider system 106 with the network service provider. In an example, the CUAS 102 may be the network service provider and may be registered with the content 5 provider system 106. In an example, the network service provider may be other than CUAS 102 and may be selected from amongst plurality of the network service providers by the content provider system 106. The selection of the network service provider may be done based on the data rating plan offered by the plurality of the network service providers, which may be suitable for the 10 content provider system 106 for providing the selective content.
[0055] The registration performed by the registration module 214 may include receiving of identification data associated with any of the content provider system 106, the network service provider and the data rating plan. For example, the registration module 214 may receive a content provider 15 identification data corresponding to the content provider system 106, a network service provider identification data corresponding to the network service provider and the data rating plan suitable for the content provider system 106. In an example, the content provider identification data may include any of a unique identifier related to content provider, content provider username, log in 20 credentials, and an identifier related to the first registered account. The network service provider identification data may include a network service provider identifier which may uniquely identify the network service provider from amongst a set of network service providers providing telecommunication and internet services. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the 25 content provider system 106 may also provide, during the registration, details of data rating plan suitable for the content provider system 106 and an initial set of source addresses corresponding to the selective content which the content provider system 106 may offer to different users.
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[0056] In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the registration may be a self-registration onboarding approach, such that the registration may be initiated by the content provider system 106 through a web portal provided to the content provider system 106. In an example when the CUAS 102 may be the network service provider, the CUAS may provide the web 5 portal to the content provider system 106. The content provider system 106 may provide the content provider identification data, the data rating plan, and the initial set of source addresses on an interface of the web portal provided by the CUAS 102. In another example implementation, when the network service provider may be other than CUAS 102, the web portal for performing the 10 registration may be accessed by the CUAS 102 from any of the network service providers selected by the content provider system 106 for the registration. Thereafter, the web portal accessed by the CUAS 102 may be provided to the content provider system 106.
[0057] Upon the receiving of the data rating plan and the identification data 15 related to the content provider system 106 and the network service provider, the registration module 214 of the CUAS 102 may access an approval acknowledgement from the network service provider. The approval acknowledgement may be indicative of an acceptance by the network service provider to register the content provider with the network service provider. 20
[0058] Further, the registration module 214 may register the content provider system 106 with the network service provider based on the accessing of the approval acknowledgement. In an example, the communication module 212 of the CUAS 102 may access the approval acknowledgement from the registration module 214 and may send the approval acknowledgement to the 25 content provider system 106 for completion of the registration.
[0059] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, the approval acknowledgement may be any of a URL, a specific URL for performing a log in completion with a one-time password (OTP) and a set of OTPs using which the content provider system 106 may proceed for completion 30
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of the registration. For example, the communication module 212 of the CUAS 102 may send the URL along with login credentials associated with the content provider system 106, as an approval acknowledgement to the content provider system 106. The URL may be send in an email body to an email account associated with the content provider system 106. The content provider system 5 106 may access the URL for completing the registration. In another example, the CUAS 102 may send the set of OTPs to a Mobile Station International Subscriber Directory Number (MSISDN) associated with the content provider system 106. Upon accessing the set of the OTPs on the MSISDN associated with the content provider system 106, the content provider system 106 may provide a response 10 indicative of a submission of the OTPs to the CUAS 102. The CUAS 102 may perform an authentication of the content provider system 106, upon the receiving of the OTPs from the content provider system 106. Upon the authentication, the CUAS 102 may send a notification to the content provider system 106 indicative of the completion of the registration. 15
[0060] Fig. 3(A) and 3(B) illustrates a method 300 for the real-time assessment of the usage of the selective content, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter. The order in which the method 300 is described is not intended to be construed as a limitation, and any number of the described method blocks may be combined in any order to implement the method 20 300, or an alternative method. Furthermore, the method 300 may be implemented by processor(s) 202 or computing system(s) (104) through any suitable hardware, non-transitory machine readable instructions, or combination thereof.
[0061] It may be understood that steps of the method 300 may be performed by programmed computing system(s) (104). The steps of the methods 25 300 may be executed based on instructions stored in a non-transitory computer readable medium, as will be readily understood. The non-transitory computer readable medium may include, for example, digital memories, magnetic storage media, such as one or more magnetic disks and magnetic tapes, hard drives, or optically readable digital data storage media. 30
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[0062] Further, although the method 300 may be implemented in a variety of computing environments; in an embodiment described in Fig. 3A and 3B, the method 300 is explained in context of the aforementioned network environment 100 having CUAS 102 , for ease of explanation.
[0063] Referring to Fig. 3(A), in an implementation of the present subject 5 matter, at step 302, a set of source addresses from a content provider system 106 to provide a selective content may be received. In an example implementation, the set of source addresses may be URLs on which the content provider system 106 may host the selective content. The selective content may be selected by the content provider system 106 based on a pre-defined criteria. In an example, the 10 content provider system may be an e-learning organization which may set the pre-defined criteria to provide indices of topics of various educational courses available as the selective content, such that a user browsing through a website of the e-learning organization to get information about the topics covered in the various educational courses need not have to bother about the data bytes 15 consumed in the process.
[0064] At step 304, at least one first unique key may be allocated to the set of source addresses. The first unique key may be any of a random number, a hash value, an alphanumeric code, and any other sequence of characters which may be generated randomly to uniquely identify the set of source addresses. In an 20 example, the first unique key may be concatenated with each of the source addresses from amongst the set of the source addressed. For example, the first unique key may be appended at the end of each of the URLs from amongst the set of URLs received from the content provider system 106. The first unique key may be used for identification of the set of the source addresses corresponding to 25 the selective content at any point of time.
[0065] At step 306, each of the source addresses from amongst the set of source addresses may be mapped to a first registered account associated with the content provider system 106 based on the first unique key. In an example, the first registered account associated with the content provider system 106 may be 30
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recognized using an account identifier, such as an account number, a unique MSISDN number provided by a network service provider operating on the network 108, to the content provider system 106. Thus, according to an example, each of the source addresses may be mapped against the MSISDN number corresponding to the first registered account based on the first unique key. In an 5 example implementation of the present subject matter, mapping may include maintaining a data table in which each of the set of source address mapped against the MSISDN number using an index value, such as the first unique key.
[0066] Referring to Fig. 3(B), at step 308, a request may be received from a user to access a part of the selective content associated with a source address. In 10 an example, the source address may be from amongst the set of source addresses received by the content provider system 106. As described in the description of Fig. 1, any of the computing systems 104 may be operated by the user. Thus, for ease of explanation and clarity of the description, it may be understood that a request received from the user corresponds to the request received from any of 15 the computing systems 104.
[0067] In an example, the request may be a HTTP request for accessing the part of the selective content received from any of the computing systems 104. A HTTP header of the HTTP request may contain attributes corresponding to the selective content. For example, the HTTP header may include attributes which 20 may be any of a selective content identifier, a content type, and any other content identification parameter corresponding to the part of the selective content. In one example implementation, the HTTP header may be parsed to identify the part of the selective content requested by the computing systems 104.
[0068] At step 310, data bytes available in the first registered account 25 corresponding to the set of the source addresses may be determined to be sufficient to provide the part of the selective content to the user. According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, a pre-defined amount of data bytes may be available in the first registered account which may be used for accessing the selective content hosted on the set of the source addresses. In an 30
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example, the pre-defined amount of the data bytes may be different for multiple sets of source addresses corresponding to various types of selective content provided by the content provider system 106. For example, 700 MB of data bytes may be available in the first registered account for a set of source addresses corresponding to promotional videos to be provided as the selective content by 5 the content provider system 106. For example, the 700MB data bytes available in the first registered account may be determined to be sufficient when a request for accessing the promotional video of size 300 MB is received.
[0069] At step 312, data bytes used in accessing the part of the selective content may be deducted in real-time from the data bytes available in the first 10 registered account to assess the usage of the selective content. For example, the data bytes required for accessing the promotional video, i.e. 300MB may be deducted from 700 MB of data bytes available in the first registered account. In an example implementation, identification of data bytes remaining in the first registered account may also be made. For example, upon deduction of 300 MB of 15 data bytes from the data bytes available in the first registered account, i.e., 700 MB, it may be identified that 400 MB of data bytes remains in the first registered account. In an example, a notification may be sent to the content provider system 106 indicating an amount of data bytes remaining in the first registered account associated with the content provider system 106. Thus, every time the part of 20 selective content is accessed by the user, a real-time assessment may be made about the data bytes used in accessing the selective content and the data bytes remaining in the first registered account. As the first registered account may be associated to the content provider system 106, thus, the content provider system 106 may be made aware about the usage of the selective content in real-time. 25
[0070] In addition to the steps described in the description of Fig. 3A and Fig. 3B according to an example implementation of the present subject matter, at least one second unique key may be allocated to the user requesting for accessing the part of the selective content. The second registered account associated with the user may be mapped to at least one of the second unique key. The second 30
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registered account may include a fixed amount of data bytes allocated to the user for accessing the part of the selective content. The fixed amount of the data bytes available in the second registered account may be based on a data rating plan offered to the user by any of the network service provider and the content provider system 106. For example, the fixed amount of the data bytes may 5 correspond to a maximum limit of data bytes which the user may utilize for accessing the selective content. There may be different limits of data bytes allocated to the users depending upon various data rating plans to which the users may be subscribed with the network service providers.
[0071] In an example implementation of the present subject matter, based 10 on the determination of the data bytes available in the first registered account to be sufficient to provide the part of the selective content, an assessment of the data bytes available in the second registered account may be performed. The data bytes available in the second registered account may accessed to be sufficient to provide the part of the selective content to the user. According to an example 15 implementation of the present subject matter, the user may be provided the part of the selective content based on the determination and the accessing of the data bytes available in the first registered account and the second registered account respectively. Thus, the user may be provided the part of the selective content when data bytes available in the first and second registered account are sufficient 20 to provide the selective content.
[0072] Further, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter, upon an exhaustion and/or insufficiency of the data bytes available in any of the first registered account and the second registered account, a notification indicative of an exhaustion of the data bytes may be provided to the 25 user. The notification may further indicate that upon the exhaustion, of the data bytes corresponding to the accessing the selective content would be performed against a third registered account associated with the user that is maintained by the network service provider implementing the CUAS 102. The third registered account may be a service account of the user which may be utilized when a 30
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content accessed by the user may not be the selective content. For example, in situations when the data bytes available any of the first and the second registered account are insufficient and still the user requests for accessing the part of the selective content. The user may be provided the part of the requested content, however, the evaluation and deduction of the data bytes used in accessing the part 5 of the requested content may be accounted against the third registered account associated with the user. Thus, the user may still access the part of the selective content requested but may not leverage benefits associated with the selective content as the user would incur the data bytes consumed for accessing the part of the selective content through the third registered account associated with the user. 10
[0073] Fig. 4 represents a call flow diagram 400 indicating procedure for real time assessment of the usage of the selective content, in accordance with an embodiment of the present subject matter. The various arrow indicators used in the call-flow diagram 400 depict the transfer of signal/information between the computing system 104, the CUAS 102, and the content provider system 106. 15
[0074] The call flow diagram 400, as described in the Fig. 4 has been explained in considerable details with respect to the content provider system 106 initiating the procedure. It will be understood that the principles described herein may be extended to various other scenarios as well, for example, where any of the computing system 104 and the CUAS 102 initiates the procedure. 20
[0075] In an example implementation at step 402, the content provider system 106 may send a registration initiation request to the CUAS 102 for performing a registration of the content provider system 106 with the CUAS 102. In an example, the CUAS 102 may be any of the network service provider which may provide telecommunication and Internet services to any of the computing 25 systems 104. For example, in an implementation, the CUAS 102 may be an Internet service provider (ISP) provisioning access of the internet via network 108. Thus, in such situations, the content provider system 106 may send the registration initiation request for registering the content provider system 106 with the ISP. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the 30
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registration initiation request send by the content provider system 106 may include any information related to the content provider and the set of URLs on which the selective content provided by the content provider system 106 may be hosted. For example, the information related to the content provider system 106 may include a content provider system 106 identifier such as any of an IP 5 address, a set of URLs, an account id, a MSISDN number, and a serial code associated with the content provider system 106. In an example, the content provide system 106 may provide the information related to the content provider system 106 and the set of the URLs on a self-onboarding registration portal which may be provided by the CUAS 102 to the content provider system 106. 10 The self-onboarding registration portal may be any of a website, a web-portal and any graphical user interface (GUI) which may be rendered to the content provider system 106 for providing registration details. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the set of the URLs provided by the content provider system 106 may include URLs associated with the content provider system 106 15 and may also include URLs associated with other content providers which may communicate to the content provider system 106. Thus, the content provider system 106 by providing such set of URLs may provision the selective content which may be related to the content provider system 106 along with provisioning the selective content which may be related to the other content providers. 20
[0076] Upon receiving the registration initiation request from the content provider system 106, at step 404, the CUAS 102 may perform registration of the content provider system 106 with the CUAS 102 and may send back a registration acknowledgement to the content provider system 106. The registration may include creation of the first registered account associated with 25 the content provider system 106. The first registered account may be identified by an account identifier associated with the content provider system 106. The registration acknowledgement may include any of the account identifier, log in credentials and information related to the data rating plan subscribed to the content provider system 106. In an example implementation of the present 30
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subject matter, the account identifier may be combination of any of the IP address, the MSISDN number, the account number and the serial code provided by the content provider system 106 to the CUAS 102. The log in credentials may include a username and a password for accessing the first registered account created upon the registration. The registration acknowledgement may be sent in 5 multiple ways to the content provider system 106. In an example, the CUAS 102 may send the registration acknowledgement as first time registration details including a first and a second one time password, such that the first one time password may be sent to an email account associated with the content provider system 106 and the second one time password may be sent to the MSISDN 10 number associated with the content provider system 106. The content provider system 106 may perform a validation indicative of a successful registration using the first one time password and the second one time password.
[0077] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, at step 406, the CUAS 102 may receive a request to access the selective 15 content. The selective content may be hosted on any of the set of URLs provided by the content provider system 106 during the registration. In an example, the request received by the CUAS 102 may be sent by a user operating the communication system 104. The user may send the request for accessing the selective content, upon visiting a URL corresponding to a web page associated 20 with the content provider system 106. In an example, the web page may include the selective content along with other content which may not be offered as the selective content by the content provider system 106. Further, the web page may also include content provided by various content providers which may be remotely located and may be in connected with the content provider system 106 25 over the network 108 to offer the content via the content provider system 106. For example, the content provider system 106 may be a social networking enterprise offering a platform to multiple users to communicate and share experiences. The content hosted on the URLs related to the social networking enterprise may be related to social networking, such as any of events, activities, 30
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and media files shared by the multiple users browsing on the social network platform. Along with the social networking content, the social networking enterprise may also host content associated with other content providers, like a news broadcasting enterprise, an educational enterprise, an e-commerce shopping enterprise etc. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the 5 content provider system 106 may also offer the content associated with the other content providers as the selective content to the user operating the computing system 104. The web page may include indications of the content to be offered as the selective content. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the user operating the computing system 104 may trigger the request to access the 10 selective content upon accessing the indications of the content to be offered as the selective content on the web page.
[0078] Upon the receipt of the request to access the selective content by the computing system 106, at step 408, the CUAS 102 may perform an authentication of the computing system 104 for accessing the selective content 15 based on any of a first unique key and second unique key associated with the first registered account and the second registered account respectively as described in the description of Fig. 3A and 3B. For example, upon the receipt of the request to access the selective content by a user operating the computing system 104, the CUAS 102 may authenticate the user based on a combination of the first unique 20 key and the second unique key. In an example, the first unique key may be associated with a URL for which the user may be requesting the selective content and the second unique key may be associated with a unique identity such as, MSISDN number of the computing system 104. In an example, generation of the second unique key may be based on the first unique key associated with the first 25 registered account of the content provider system 106. In an example implementation, at step 410, upon authentication, the CUAS 102 may determine an exhaustion of allocated of data bytes for accessing the selective content in any of the first registered account and the second registered account. The CUAS 102 may determine that the allocated quota of data bytes in any of the first registered 30
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account associated with the content provider system 106 and the second registered account associated with the user operating the computing system is exhausted and may subsequently send notifications indicative of exhaustion of data bytes to the content provider system 106 and the computing system 104 respectively. For example, upon determination of the exhaustion of allocated 5 quota of the data bytes in the first registered account, the CUAS 102 at step 412 may send a data bytes exhaustion notification indicative of an exhaustion of the data bytes in the first registered account, to the content provider system 106. For example, the data bytes exhaustion notification may be sent when a pre-defined threshold of data bytes allocated to the content provider system 106 in the first 10 registered account is reached. In an example, the data bytes exhaustion notification may also include details of additional data bytes to be allocated to the first registered account that may be required for the accessing of the selective content requested by the computing system 104. Alternatively, the content provider system 106 may register for addition of new data bytes in the first 15 registered account according to the need and/or any other criteria defined by the content provider system 106. In accordance with an example implementation of the present subject matter, the data bytes exhaustion notification may be sent upon the real-time assessment performed by the CUAS 102 as described in description of Fig. 2, Fig. 3A and Fig. 3B. 20
[0079] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, at step 414, a notification to notify the computing system 104 for the use of normal metering of data bytes and the third registered account may be sent to the computing system 104. In an example implementation, the notification for the use of the third registered account may be sent upon a determination of the 25 exhaustion of the allocated quota of the data bytes in any of the first registered account and the second registered account. Alternatively, the notification for the use of the third registered account may be sent upon a determination of the data bytes available in any of the first registered account and the second registered
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account to be insufficient to provide the selective content to the computing system 104.
[0080] According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, using the second registered account and the third registered account facilitates in an automatic on-off switching of metering and evaluation of the data 5 bytes for accessing the selective content by the CUAS 102. For example, when a data byte limit in the first registered account and the second registered account is sufficient, the content requested by the user may be provided as the selective content and the user may not be charged for accessing of the content. However, when there may be an insufficiency of data bytes in any of the first and second 10 registered account, the CUAS 102 may automatically switch the assessment and estimation of the data bytes consumed by the user operating any of the computing systems 104 as per normal data rating plans for which the user may be subscribed and not as the selective content. For example, the CUAS 102 may switch the assessment and estimation of the data bytes from the third registered account 15 corresponding to the normal rating plan, upon insufficiency of the data bytes in any of the first registered account and the second registered account.
[0081] In an example, the data bytes available in the first registered account may be according to the data rating plan based on which the content provider system 106 may be registered with the CUAS 102 for offering the 20 selective content. For example, based on a prepaid charges paid by the content provide system 106 to the CUAS 102 an initial amount of data bytes may be allocated in the first registered account corresponding to the content provider system 106. Similarly, the data bytes available in the second registered account may be according to another data rating plan specific to browsing of the selective 25 content, based on which the computing system 104 may be subscribed to the CUAS 102. In an example, the notification may be provided to the computing system 104 for use of the third registered account which may be associated with the computing system 104 for accessing data which may not be provided as the selective content. Thus, the user operating the computing system 104 may get to 30
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know that the content requested by the user may no more be provided as the selective content and the user may be accounted via the third registered account for the accessing of the selective content. In an example, the third registered account may be created based on any of normal voice calling and multiple data rating plans provided by various network service providers for providing such 5 content which may not be offered as the selective content by the content provider system 106.
[0082] In accordance with an example implementation of the present subject matter, the CUAS 102, at step 416, may send a request to the content provider system 106 for accessing the selective content. In one example, the 10 CUAS 102 may sent the request upon a determination of data bytes available in the first and second registered account to be sufficient to provide the selective content. Upon receiving the request for accessing the selective content by the CUAS 102, at step 418, the content provider system 106 may provide in response, the selective content requested by the computing system 104. The 15 CUAS 102 may further, forward the selective content provided by the content provider system 106 to the computing system 104. In an example implementation of the present subject matter, the CUAS 102 may initiate a browsing session for the computing system 104 to access the selective content provided by the content provider system 106. Thus, the CUAS 102 facilitates in 20 providing the selective content from the content provider system 106 to the computing system 104.
[0083] Fig. 5 illustrates a method 500 for providing the selective content to a client device based on real time assessment of the usage of the selective content, according to an example implementation of the present subject matter. In 25 an example implementation of the present subject matter the client device may correspond to any of the computing systems 104 operated by different users. The order in which the method 500 is described is not intended to be construed as a limitation, and any number of the described method blocks may be combined in any order to implement the method 500, or an alternative method. Furthermore, 30
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the method 500 may be implemented by processor(s) or computing system(s) through any suitable hardware, non-transitory machine readable instructions, or combination thereof.
[0084] It may be understood that steps of the method 500 may be performed by programmed computing systems. The steps of the methods 500 5 may be executed based on instructions stored in a non-transitory computer readable medium, as will be readily understood. The non-transitory computer readable medium may include, for example, digital memories, magnetic storage media, such as one or more magnetic disks and magnetic tapes, hard drives, or optically readable digital data storage media. 10
[0085] Further, although the method 500 may be implemented in a variety of computing environments; in an embodiment described in Fig. 5, the method 500 is explained in context of the aforementioned network environment 100 having CUAS 102 , for ease of explanation.
[0086] Referring to Fig. 5, in an implementation of the present subject 15 matter, at step 502 the CUAS 102 may receive a request from the client device for accessing online content. In one implementation the CUAS 102 may be any of the network service provider and Internet Service Provider (ISP) which facilitates in providing content from different content providers to various users requesting the content. For example, the client device may initiate an online 20 browsing session and may browse online content available on multiple websites related to shopping, music, education etc. In some situations, the content hosted on such websites may be provided as the selective content and the client device may request for accessing the selective content.
[0087] At step 504, the CUAS 102 may determine the content requested by 25 the client device to be the selective content. The CUAS 102 may determine the content to be the selective content by parsing the request and performing an inspection of the data packets of the content and associated URLs corresponding to the selective content requested by the client device. For example, the request for accessing the selective content may be a HTTP request and the CUAS 102 30
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may parse the HTTP request to identify the content requested by the client device. Further, the CUAS 102 may determine the content requested to be the selective content based on a first unique key associated with a URL on which the selective content may be hosted. The first unique key may be mapped to a first registered account of a content provider hosting the selective content. In one 5 example, the CUAS 102 may determine the content requested by the client device to be the selective content based on a subscription information corresponding to the content provider system 106 hosting the selective content with the CUAS 102.
[0088] At step 506, a determination of a sufficient balance of data bytes for 10 accessing the selective content in the first registered account and a second registered account associated with the client device may be performed. For example, the first registered account associated with the content provider and the second registered account associated with a user operating the client device may be allocated a pre-defined quota of data bytes which the content provider and the 15 user may utilize for the selective content. The CUAS 102 may determine the data bytes available any of the first registered account and the second registered account to be sufficient enough to provide the selective content requested by the client device.
[0089] At step 508, the CUAS 102 may perform metering and evaluation of 20 the data bytes corresponding to the accessing of the selective content from the first registered account associated with the content provider system 106. In an example implementation, the data bytes metered and evaluated by the CUAS 102 for accessing the selective content may be deducted from the first registered account of the content provider system 106 after the client device accesses the 25 selective content.
[0090] At step 510 the CUAS 102 may permit browsing session between the client device and a content provider for accessing of the selective content. For example, a HTTP session may be established between the client device and an origin server associated with the content provider system 106 for the 30
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accessing of the selective content by the client device. In an example, the selective content may be stored at the origin server.
[0091] At step 512, the CUAS 102 may provide a notification to the client device that the selective content may be provided to the user at zero rate. In one example, the notification may in form of any of a prompt, a pop-up message and 5 a dialog box indicating unmetered and zero rate access to the selective content. The notification may also indicate a data byte limit and an amount of data bytes available up to which the user may access the selective content. According to an example implementation of the present subject matter, the metering and evaluation of the data bytes from the first registered account facilitates in 10 provisioning a zero rate access of the selective content to the users operating the client devices. Thus, the user may not be accounted for the selective content accessed and the data bytes for accessing the selective content would be accounted against the content provider system 106.
[0092] At step 514 the selective content requested by the client device may 15 be provided to the client device. In an example implementation, if at step 506, the CUAS 102 determines that the data bytes for accessing the content requested by the client device is insufficient in any of the first registered account and the second registered account, at step 516 the content may still be provided to the user but based on normal metering and evaluation of the data bytes from the 20 third registered account associated with the client device. For example, the normal metering and evaluation may be any of conventional ways used for data byte evaluation irrespective of the content to be the selective content. Thus, in such situations, the user may be accounted against the access of the content based on a normal data rating plan according to which the user may be 25 subscribed with the network service provider. In one example, the normal data rating plan may be such that the user may be accounted for the data bytes consumed per second for accessing the content. In an example, the CUAS 102 may also provide automatic switchover of data rating plans for the metering and evaluation of the data bytes, to the user based on an availability of the data bytes 30
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for accessing the content as selective content. For example, upon exhaustion of data bytes available in the first registered account of the content provider and the second registered account of the user, the CUAS 102 may automatically switchover for a normal data rating plan to provide the content to the client device. The data bytes in such situations may be deducted from a third registered 5 account of the user. The third registered account of the user may be based on a subscription of the user with the network service provider corresponding to the normal data rating plan for accessing online content.
[0093] Although implementations of present subject matter have been described in language specific to structural features and/or methods, it is to be 10 understood that the present subject matter is not necessarily limited to the specific features or methods described. Rather, the specific features and methods are disclosed and explained in the context of a few implementations for the present subject matter.

I/We Claim:
1. A computer implemented method for real-time assessment of usage of selective content, the method comprising:
receiving a set of source addresses from a content provider to provide the selective content, wherein the selective content is determined by the content 5 provider based on a pre-defined criteria;
allocating at least one first unique key to the set of source addresses to uniquely identify the set of source addresses;
mapping each of the source address from amongst the set of source addresses to a first registered account associated with the content provider, based 10 on the first unique key;
receiving a request from a user to access a part of the selective content associated with a source address from amongst the set of source addresses;
determining data bytes available in the first registered account corresponding to the set of the source addresses to be sufficient to provide the 15 part of the selective content to the user, and;
deducting, in real-time, data bytes used in accessing the part of the selective content from the data bytes available in the first registered account to assess the usage of the selective content.
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2. The method as claimed in claim 1 further comprising, allocating at least one second unique key, to the user to uniquely identify the user.
3. The method as claimed in claim 1 further comprising, mapping at least one second unique key to a second registered account corresponding to the user. 25
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4. The method as claimed in claim 3 further comprising, assessing data bytes available in the second registered account corresponding to the second unique key to be sufficient to provide the part of the selective content to the user.
5. The method as claimed in claim 4 further comprising, providing the part of 5 the selective content to the user based on the determining of the available bytes in the first registered account and assessing the available data bytes in the second registered account.
6. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the first registered account is 10 created based on a registration performed by the content provider with a network service provider from amongst a plurality of network service providers.
7. The method as claimed in claim 6, wherein the registration comprises:
receiving at least one of content provider identification data, a network 15 service provider identification data and a data rating plan from the content provider,
accessing an approval acknowledgement from the network service provider wherein the approval acknowledgement is indicative of an acceptance by the network service provider to register the content provider with the network 20 service provider; and
registering the content provider with the network service provider based on the receiving and the accessing of the approval acknowledgement.
8. A selective content usage assessment system (CUAS) 102 comprising: 25
a processor 202;
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a communication module 212, coupled to the processor 202, wherein the communication module 212 is to,
receive a set of source addresses from a content provider to provide the selective content, wherein the selective content is determined by the content provider based on a pre-defined criteria; and 5
receive a request from a user to access a part of the selective content associated with a source address from amongst the set of source addresses;
a key generation module 110, coupled to the processor 202, wherein the key generation module 110 is to,
allocate at least one first unique key to the set of source addresses to 10 uniquely identify the set of source addresses
a usage evaluation module 112 coupled to the processor 202, wherein the usage evaluation module 112 is to:
map each of the source address from amongst the set of source addresses to a first registered account associated with the content provider, 15 based on the first unique key;
compare data bytes available in the first registered account with an estimated data bytes to be used for accessing the part of the selective content, and;
perform data byte evaluation based on the comparison to assess the 20 usage of the selective content, wherein to perform the data byte evaluation the usage evaluation module is to,
deduct, in real-time, the estimated data bytes from the available data bytes in the first registered account when the available data bytes in the first registered account are sufficient to provide the selective content to the 25 user, and;
a notification module 216 coupled to the processor 202, wherein the notification module 216 is to,
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provide a notification indicative of evaluation of the estimated data bytes from a third registered account when data bytes available in at least one of the first registered account and a second registered account corresponding to the user are insufficient to provide the selective content to the user. 5
9. The CUAS 102 as claimed in claim 8, wherein the usage evaluation module 112 is to further provide the part of the selective content to the user upon deduction of the estimated data bytes from the available data bytes in the first registered account. 10
10. The CUAS 102 as claimed in claim 9, wherein to provide the part of the selective content to the user, the usage evaluation module 112 is to further deduct in real time, the estimated data bytes from the available data bytes in the second registered account corresponding to the user. 15
11. The CUAS 102 as claimed in claim 8, wherein the key generation module 110 is to further allocate a second unique key to uniquely identify the user.
12. The CUAS 102 as claimed in claim 8 further comprising a registration 20 module 214, wherein the registration module 214 is to perform a registration of the content provider with a network service provider to create the first registered account.
13. The CUAS 102 as claimed in claim 12 wherein to perform the registration 25 the registration module 214 is to further,
receive at least one of content provider identification data, network service provider identification data and a data rating plan from the content provider;
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access an approval acknowledgement from the network service provider wherein the approval acknowledgement is indicative of an acceptance by the network service provider to register the content provider with the network service provider, and;
register the content provider with the network service provider based on 5 the receiving and the accessing of the approval acknowledgement.
14. The CUAS 102 as claimed in claim 8 wherein the third registered account is associated with the user for the evaluation of accessing of a content not offered as the selective content by the content provider to the user. 10
15. A non-transitory computer readable medium having a set of computer readable instructions that, when executed, cause a computing system to:
receive a set of source addresses from a content provider to provide the selective content, wherein the selective content is determined by the content 15 provider based on a pre-defined criteria;
allocate at least one first unique key to the set of source addresses to uniquely identify the set of source addresses;
map each of the source address from amongst the set of source addresses to a first registered account associated with the content provider, based on the first 20 unique key;
receive a request from a user to access a part of the selective content associated with a source address from amongst the set of source addresses;
determine data bytes available in the first registered account corresponding to the set of the source addresses to be sufficient to provide the part of the 25 selective content to the user, and;
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deduct, in real-time, data bytes used in accessing the part of the selective content from the data bytes available in the first registered account to assess usage of the selective content.
16. The non-transitory computer readable medium as claimed in claim 15, wherein the set of computing instructions when executed further cause the 5 computing system to provide a notification to the content provider, and wherein the notification is indicative of initiating addition of new data bytes in the first registered account, upon insufficiency of the data bytes available in the first registered account to provide the selective content.