P4P: Role-Specific Web Experiences

Recommendation systems or real-time click mining are common means to create a personalised customer interaction in today’s Internet. However, one major aspect of customisation and adaptation has thus far been neglected – one user might assume multiple roles. Searching as a buyer for a present for an 11-year-old daughter is a role with a different preference profile than evaluating workstations for the purchasing department. This paper proposes the role gate – a site on the Internet where users can create, maintain, or share different roles with specific preference profiles for various types of Web interactions, such as listening to music or shopping. We code-name the framework underlying the role gate "Profile- and Preference-based Personalisation for Personae" (P4P). Before embarking on an electronic shopping trip, a buyer can pass the role gate, choose the appropriate role, and thus ensure that the corresponding preference profile is available to the merchants ‘along the way’. As a result of this, the user can enter shops or portals with a role-specific 'skin'. Our prototype implementation of the P4P role gate server, role representation, and protocol is based on open standards and emerging technologies such as the platform for privacy preferences (P3P), Web Services, and peer-to-peer (P2P) computing.

Keywords: Strobel, Stroebel