Content identifiers triggering corresponding responses through collaborative processing

1. A method comprising:

aggregating first fingerprint data and second fingerprint data, wherein fingerprint data comprises at least a reduced-bit representation of content, and wherein the first fingerprint data originated at a first source and the second fingerprint data originated at second source, and wherein the first source and the second source are remotely located;

identifying information associated with the first fingerprint data and the second fingerprint data; and

determining a subset of the associated information.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein said determining is based at least in part on a frequency occurrence of the subset, and wherein the frequency occurrence comprises a vote tally.

3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein said determining is based at least in part on a frequency occurrence of the subset, and wherein the subset comprises at least one of audio, video, or image data.

4. The method according to claim 3 , wherein the associated information comprises at least one of audio, video or image data.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein said aggregating comprises aggregating fingerprint data within a predetermined time period.

6. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the first fingerprint data comprises a first set of audio fingerprints, and wherein the second fingerprint data comprises a second set of audio fingerprints.

7. A method to match a song based on an audio fingerprint, said method comprising:

aggregating a first set of audio fingerprints provided by a first device with a second set of audio fingerprints provided by a remotely located second device;

determining a plurality of songs relating to the aggregated fingerprints; and

selecting a song from the plurality of songs based on a number of times a selected song matches the aggregated fingerprints.

8. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the selected song includes the highest number of matches.

9. A method comprising:

receiving a signal from a first broadcast source at a reference receiver;

generating first fingerprint data from the received signal;

applying the first fingerprint data to a database to select associated information;

receiving second fingerprint data; and

comparing the second fingerprint data with the associated information.

10. The method according to claim 9 , wherein said comparing comprises selecting a subset from the associated information based on a vote tally.

11. A method comprising:

receiving a signal from a first broadcast source at a reference receiver;

generating first fingerprint data from the received signal;

applying the first fingerprint data to a database to select associated information;

receiving second fingerprint data; and

comparing the second fingerprint data with the associated information, wherein said comparing comprises selecting a subset from the associated information based on a vote tally, and wherein the vote tally includes probabilities of a match with the second fingerprint data, and wherein the selected subset has a highest probability of a match.

12. A method comprising:

receiving a signal from a first broadcast source at a reference receiver;

generating first fingerprint data from the received signal;

applying the first fingerprint data to a database to select associated information;

receiving second fingerprint data; and

comparing the second fingerprint data with the associated information, wherein a user device generates the second fingerprint data.

13. A method comprising:

receiving a signal from a first broadcast source at a reference receiver;

generating first fingerprint data from the received signal;

applying the first fingerprint data to a database to select associated information;

receiving second fingerprint data, wherein a cell phone generates the second fingerprint data; and

comparing the second fingerprint data with the associated information.

14. A method comprising:

receiving a signal from a first broadcast source at a reference receiver;

generating first fingerprint data from the received signal;

applying the first fingerprint data to a database to select associated information;

receiving second fingerprint data, wherein a user device generates the second fingerprint data;

comparing the second fingerprint data with the associated information; and

determining a geographical location of the user device.

15. The method according to claim 14 , wherein the user device comprises a cell phone, and wherein the geographical location of the user device is determined by at least one of area code, cell site, device identifier, repeater identifier, or alpha-numeric data.

16. A method comprising:

receiving a signal from a first broadcast source at a reference receiver;

generating first fingerprint data from the received signal;

applying the first fingerprint data to a database to select associated information;

receiving second fingerprint data;

comparing the second fingerprint data with the associated information;

receiving a signal from a second broadcast source at the reference receiver;

generating third fingerprint data from the received signal of the second broadcast source; and

applying the third fingerprint data to the database to select associated information.

17. The method according to claim 16 , wherein the reference receiver comprises a plurality of receivers.

18. The method according to claim 17 , wherein at least a first receiver of the plurality of receivers and a second receiver of the plurality of receivers are located in different geographical locations.

19. The method according to claim 9 , wherein when a comparison of the second fingerprint data with the associated information does not identify a subset of the associated data, said method further comprises querying a second database to determine additional associated information.

20. A method comprising:

receiving a signal front a first broadcast source at a reference receiver, the signal comprising an embedded digital watermark;

decoding the digital watermark to obtain a plural-bit identifier;

interrogating a database with the identifier to identify a set of fingerprints associated with the received signal;

receiving second fingerprint data; and

comparing the second fingerprint data with the set of fingerprints.

21. The method according to claim 20 , wherein said comparing comprises selecting a subset from the set of fingerprints based on a vote tally.

22. A method comprising:

cumulating a first set of representations of audio or video with a second set of representations of audio or video, wherein the representations comprise reduced-bit representations of audio or video, and wherein the first set of representations are provided from a first device and the second set of representations are provided from a second device;

determining a plurality of audio and video content relating to the cumulated sets; and

selecting a set of audio or video content from the plurality of audio or video content based on a number of times a selected set of audio and video content corresponds with the cumulated sets.

23. A method comprising:

receiving content, wherein the content comprises an embedded digital watermark;

decoding the digital watermark to obtain a plural-bit identifier;

deriving a reduced-bit representation of the content;

accessing a database with at least the plural-bit identifier; and

using at least the reduced-bit representation of the content to help identify or authenticate the content.