Is this the most important patent ever for gaming and metaverse advertising?

"Anzu - which counts among its backers WPP, Sony Innovation Fund, NBCUniversal, HTC and Bitkraft - has been on a mission since 2017 to make advertising in games better. Recently, it has been making waves as studios cross a once-dreaded line to create ads in 3D games. As the only licensed in-game ad provider for Xbox, it has made headway on a product that will ease marketer concerns about the viability of in-game advertising."

"The patent is for a system that can measure the percentage of the creative on-screen in a 3D world, accounting for the size of the ad, how long it is in view and the angle it is viewed at. If said creative is a video, the duration of the view also comes under scrutiny. In short, viewability requires much more work to prove in 3D than it ever did in 2D."

"The system collects viewable impressions and viewability. It also adheres to MRC standards of what actually constitutes a view, the slightest glimpses at an obtuse angle in a speeding car won't make the cut. And then there is data about the lifecycle of each individual piece of inventory, like their average screen coverage, occlusions, virtual world position and orientation in relation to user view. In short, it will make it easy to find the most lucrative spots across a slew of titles."

Anzu has developed patented 3D ad-tracking technology to measure viewability and collect viewable impressions in games. The system measures percentage of creative onscreen, accounting for ad size, duration, viewing angle and occlusions, and applies MRC standards to define valid views. It tracks inventory lifecycle metrics such as average screen coverage, virtual world position and orientation relative to user view. As the only licensed in-game ad provider for Xbox, Anzu enables studios to embed ad inventory within 3D titles and helps advertisers validate effectiveness and optimize less effective placements across multiple games.

Read at The Drum