Location-based services are provided in a communication system comprising
at least a portion of at least one wireless network. In one aspect of the
invention, one or more interested parties are permitted to bid on
available opportunities for delivery of messages to mobile user devices,
and delivery of at least one message to a given one of the mobile user
devices is controlled based on user profile information and at least one
received bid for a corresponding message delivery opportunity. The
message delivery opportunities may be specified as combinations of two or
more of a message category, a location for message delivery and a time
for message delivery. For example, a given message delivery opportunity
may be a category-location-time combination.