A
system and method of providing contextual content to an
end user viewing a video in a
video player in a
client is provided. In one embodiment the
system and method of provides contextual content via an
interactive video skin to an
end user viewing a video in a
client. These video
skin may surround the viewing portal and (1) provide
contextual information in the areas outside the video viewing area, (2) embody logic that manipulates the video
stream to insert audio, text,
graphics, and / or video, (3) interact with
third party servers, (4) interact with the user via menus, buttons, and / or graphical widgets, or (5) any combination thereof. In one embodiment, the method may comprise determining contextual data for the
end user that comprises one or more of: geographical information of the end user; demographical information of the end user; personal information of the end user, video
metadata, and technical data related to the end user's computer or the network to which the computer is connected. Next, the method may include determining advertising content to present to the end user based on the contextual data and presenting the advertising content to the end user concurrently with the
video player such as along a periphery of the
video player. The advertising content may include a
user input mechanism configured to receive information from the end user in which case the method may further include receiving information from the end user via the input mechanism, determining secondary content to present to the user based on the received information, and presenting the secondary content to the end user. The method may also include receiving one or more content elements selected based on the contextual data and supplying the one or more content elements to the video player for integration into the video to thereby customize the video.