Method and apparatus for enabling call originator to select a notification ...

1. A system comprising:

a notification insertion logic to send a notification that is selected by a caller for a recipient, wherein the caller selected notification announces an incoming call to the recipient, identifies the caller to the recipient, and comprises one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data;

a call router in a server to send a message to a recipient device notifying the recipient of the caller selected notification; and

the call router in the server further to receive an acknowledgement from a notification verification logic in the recipient device indicating that the recipient device does not already have the caller selected notification stored in memory, and the notification insertion logic to deliver the caller-selected notification to the recipient device in response to receiving the acknowledgement, wherein if the delivery does not finish before a preset period has elapsed, playing a normal ringtone by the recipient device, and finishing delivery of the caller-selected notification onto the recipient device for storage by the recipient device for future use.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the audio data comprises a caller voice recording, a computerized voice recording, or a ringtone.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the caller selected notification is associated with one or more telephone numbers.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the caller selected notification is stored on the caller's device or uploaded onto a web interface.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the caller selected notification is captured directly onto the caller device or by other digital medium and transferred onto the caller device.

6. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

a web interface to upload and manage notifications and associated phone numbers.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein data from the web interface is uploaded to a customer profile database.

8. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

an internal notification database to store a concatenated notification file, for forwarding to the recipient device.

9. A method comprising:

enabling a caller to select a notification for a particular recipient device, wherein the caller-selected notification identifies the caller to a recipient and comprises one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data;

sending, by the server, a message to the recipient device notifying the recipient of the caller-selected notification; and

delivering, by the server, the caller-selected notification via a mobile communication network to the recipient device in response to receiving an acknowledgement message from the recipient device, wherein the acknowledgement message indicates that the recipient device does not already have the caller-selected notification identifying the caller, wherein when the delivery does not finish before a preset period has elapsed, the recipient device uses another ringtone, and the caller-selected notification is stored by the recipient device for future use.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein selecting audio data comprises of selecting a caller voice recording.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein selecting the one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data comprises:

capturing one or more of a caller voice, photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data, or video data;

associating the notification with one or more phone numbers in the caller's phone book; and

synchronizing the caller device with the mobile communication network.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein capturing one or more of a caller voice, photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data comprises:

capturing the notification directly onto the caller device;

or capturing the notification onto other digital media and transferring the notification to the caller device.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein synchronizing the caller device with mobile communication network comprises:

comparing current mobile communication network customer profile with the caller's phone book;

uploading any new notifications to mobile communication network;

updating a customer profile to reflect new associations.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein selecting one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data comprises:

capturing one or more of a caller voice, photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data;

uploading the notification to a website;

associating the notification with phone numbers stored in a customer profile;

saving a new customer profile to mobile communication network.

15. The method of claim 9, wherein delivering a caller-selected notification via a mobile communication network to a recipient device comprises:

sending a “pick up” notification through short message service (SMS) to the recipient device;

transferring the caller-selected notification from the mobile communication network to the recipient device via the recipient's web browser;

storing the caller-selected notification on the recipient device for future use.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein transferring the caller-selected notification from the mobile communication network to the recipient device via the recipient's web browser comprises:

determining whether the recipient device has rejected the caller-selected notification.

17. The method of claim 9, wherein selecting a notification by the caller comprises capturing one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein selecting audio data comprises of:

recording a voice recording;

selecting a recipient from the caller device phone book; and

placing a call to the recipient with the voice recording as the incoming call notification and identifier of the caller.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein selecting one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, multimedia data or video data comprises of:

capturing a visual image, wherein the visual image is at least one of a photo, animation, graphic, multimedia data or video data;

selecting a recipient from the caller device phone book; and

placing a call to the recipient with the visual image as the incoming call notification and identifier of the caller.

20. A device of a recipient of a call comprising:

a notification verification logic module to receive a message that a caller originated notification is available, to determine whether the device already has the caller originated notification identifying the caller in memory, to send an acknowledgement that indicates that the recipient device does not already have the caller originated notification stored in memory, and to initiate download of the caller-selected notification;

a memory to store caller originated notifications sent by a caller to the device of the recipient for future use when the device receives a call from the caller, wherein the caller originated notifications comprises one or more of a photo, animation, graphic, audio data, multimedia data or video data; and

a notification selector to select a notification to use, when the recipient device receives the call, the notification selector to determine whether there is a caller originated notification associated with the call, and if so, using the caller originated notification to announce the call and to identify the caller to the call recipient, if the caller originated notification has not completed download within a preset period of time the notification selector to select another notification.

21. The device of claim 20 further comprising:

the notification verification logic module to initiate download of the caller-selected notification;

the notification selector further to play a normal notification when the download of the caller-selected notification does not finish before a preset period has elapsed; and

the notification verification logic module to finish the download of the caller-selected notification onto the recipient device and store for future use.

22. A system comprising:

an interface to enable a caller to specify a notification to be used when the caller places a call to a recipient, wherein the specified notification announces the call to the recipient and identifies the caller to the recipient;

a notification insertion logic coupled to the interface to send the specified notification to a call router;

a call router coupled to the notification insertion logic to send a message to a recipient device notifying the recipient of the specified notification, and to receive an acknowledgement from the recipient device, wherein the acknowledgement indicates that the recipient device does not already have the specified notification; and

a notification verification logic in the recipient device to determine whether the recipient device already has the specified notification stored in memory, to send an acknowledge when the specified is not stored in memory and to send a rejection when the specified notification is stored in memory, and to initiate download of the caller-selected notification, wherein if the download does not finish before a preset period has elapsed, playing a normal ringtone and finishing download of the caller-selected notification onto the recipient device to store for future use.