Patents by Inventor Nicholas A. Nicas

Nicholas A. Nicas has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Publication number: 20100058400
    Abstract: A system and method for managing access to high definition (HD) content includes a master customer premises equipment (CPE) device enabled for prioritizing conflicting requests for HD content based on predefined priority settings associated with a plurality of client CPE devices. Access to HD content by the client CPE devices may be associated with a token and conflicting requests may be resolved in favor of the client CPE device that holds the token. Disclosed systems permit administrators to control the use of limited resources within a location by limiting access to the limited resources by secondary users.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 29, 2008
    Publication date: March 4, 2010
    Applicant: AT&T INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY I, L.P.
    Inventors: Nicholas A. Nicas, Douglas R. Medina, Brian Wilson
  • Publication number: 20100023992
    Abstract: A system that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, a set top box having a controller to monitor for a triggering event that is associated with viewing of media content, retrieve a screen saver from a remote server when the triggering event is detected, and apply the screen saver to a display device connected with the set top box. Other embodiments are disclosed.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 24, 2008
    Publication date: January 28, 2010
    Applicant: AT & T INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY I, L.P.
    Inventors: Todd Fryer, Brian Wilson, Nicholas Nicas
  • Publication number: 20090187950
    Abstract: An audible menu system associated with distribution of television content over a service provider network is disclosed. The menu system includes a speech synthesizer and screen reader. Electronic programming guide (EPG) elements are read by a screen reader and provided to a speech synthesizer for presenting audible representations of EPG elements to a user. The user may provide inputs to a remote control device to navigate an EPG that may also be presented through a graphical user interface. As a user navigates a cursor over selectable EPG elements, disclosed embodiments provide audible outputs that correspond to the selectable EPG elements. In some embodiments, users may provide customized audio inputs that are played as audio outputs during future menu navigation sessions.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 18, 2008
    Publication date: July 23, 2009
    Applicant: AT&T Knowledge Ventures, L.P.
    Inventors: Nicholas A. Nicas, Christopher R. Heck, James Huffman
  • Publication number: 20090132358
    Abstract: A method for delivering advertising data, comprising receiving end user data at a server, the data indicating available advertising spots in content data stored at an end user device; and updating from the server advertising data in the available advertising spots for presentation of the advertising data during replay of the content data at the end user device. A system is disclosed for performing the method. A data structure embedded in a computer readable medium is disclosed for containing data for performing the method.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 19, 2007
    Publication date: May 21, 2009
    Applicant: ATT Knowledge Ventures L.P.
    Inventors: Christopher Heck, Nicholas Nicas, James Huffman