Exploiting MPEG‐4 Capabilities for Personalized Advertising in Digital TV

The object‐oriented vision of multimedia contents enabled by MPEG‐4 brings in an opportunity to revolutionize the state‐of‐the‐art in TV advertising. In this chapter, we discuss a model of “dynamic product placement” that consists of blending the TV programs with advertising material selected specifically for each individual viewer, with interaction possibilities to launch e‐commerce applications. We give an architectural overview of a system that realizes this idea, followed by details of the MPEG‐4 modules and the accompanying tools we have developed for Digital TV providers and content producers. Finally, we include a report of experiments that sustain the technical feasibility of the proposal.