Patents Examined by Scott Beliveau
  • Patent number: 7882521
    Abstract: Provided are an Electronic Program Guide (EPG) providing apparatus and method. The EPG providing apparatus includes a receiver receiving EPG channel information from a broadcast receiver, a channel table showing entire broadcast channel information, and a display device displaying a screen of a channel corresponding to a current location of the display device on the channel table based on the received EPG channel information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 17, 2007
    Date of Patent: February 1, 2011
    Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Kuk-hyun Han
  • Patent number: 7873982
    Abstract: A system for creating and viewing customized multimedia segments allows a user to create event identification data from in-band data in a program stream. The in-band data is processed and compiled into event identification data associated with the content stream. The event identification data identifies patterns or sequences of in-band data associated with events in the content stream. Metadata are also included in the event identification data. The event identification data is provided to multimedia devices which receive multimedia content streams containing content streams with in-band data. The in-band data are parsed and compared to the event identification data. If a match occurs, the multimedia device uses the metadata to identify events or perform specified actions.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 22, 2006
    Date of Patent: January 18, 2011
    Assignee: TiVo Inc.
    Inventors: Kevin P. Smith, Paul Stevens, Adam Feder, James M. Barton
  • Patent number: 7870586
    Abstract: A digital television (DTV) signal for use in a DTV receiver includes an extended text table (ETT) which includes a header and a message body. The header includes a table identification extension field which serves to establish uniqueness of the ETT, and the message includes an extended text message (ETM). If the ETT is an event ETT, the table ID extension field includes an event identification which specifies an identification number of an event associated with the ETT. On the other hand, if the ETT is a channel ETT, the table identification extension field includes a source identification which specifies a programming source of a virtual channel associated with the ETT. A section-filtering unit included in the DTV receiver is able to use table identification extension fields of a plurality of ETTs for section-filtering a pertinent event or channel ETT from the ETTs.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 4, 2010
    Date of Patent: January 11, 2011
    Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    Inventors: Jin Pil Kim, Kyung Mee Lee
  • Patent number: 7865927
    Abstract: Systems and methods for providing enhanced metadata to a user. Systems and methods can include extraction of data from metadata and searching for related metadata based upon the the extracted data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 12, 2006
    Date of Patent: January 4, 2011
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Rainer Brodersen, Rachel Clare Goldeen, Mihnea Calin Pacurariu, Jeffrey Ma
  • Patent number: 7861276
    Abstract: A video program broadcasting apparatus includes a program table storage unit and a program-URL matching table storage unit. The URL of a video program which is being broadcasted at the present is acquired by a URL generation unit with respect to a plurality of video programs which are sequentially broadcasted depending on the time schedule of a video program table. The URL of the video program which is being broadcasted at the present and the URLs of video programs which were broadcasted are invisibly embedded by steganography. The video program URL is converted into a simple code, and the code is invisibly embedded by steganography in a video program which is being broadcasted.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 18, 2003
    Date of Patent: December 28, 2010
    Assignee: Fujitsu Limited
    Inventor: Jun Moroo
  • Patent number: 7853972
    Abstract: A menu having menu items is arranged in an interface environment. A first abstraction is arranged proximate to the menu, the first abstraction being based on a highlighted menu item. A second abstraction is transitioned into the interface environment upon the occurrence of an event, the second abstraction being proximate to the menu.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 11, 2006
    Date of Patent: December 14, 2010
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Rainer Brodersen, Rachel Clare Goldeen, Jeffrey Ma, Mihnea Calin Pacurariu, Eric Taylor Seymour, Steven Jobs, David Alan Pound
  • Patent number: 7853975
    Abstract: A digital television (DTV) signal for use in a DTV receiver includes an extended text table (ETT) which includes a header and a message body. The header includes a table identification extension field which serves to establish uniqueness of the ETT, and the message includes an extended text message (ETM). If the ETT is an event ETT, the table ID extension field includes an event identification which specifies an identification number of an event associated with the ETT. On the other hand, if the ETT is a channel ETT, the table identification extension field includes a source identification which specifies a programming source of a virtual channel associated with the ETT. A section-filtering unit included in the DTV receiver is able to use table identification extension fields of a plurality of ETTs for section-filtering a pertinent event or channel ETT from the ETTs.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 4, 2010
    Date of Patent: December 14, 2010
    Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    Inventors: Jin Pil Kim, Kyung Mee Lee
  • Patent number: 7853969
    Abstract: Set top box logs are received from a television provider and processed to compensate for broadcast latency and generate normalized log data, e.g., log data that are indexed to a relative time. Channel tunes and the channel tune times of the normalized log data can be compared to expected air times of television advertisements on channels, and an impression values, e.g., projected viewers, can be generated for each television advertisement.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 10, 2007
    Date of Patent: December 14, 2010
    Assignee: Google Inc.
    Inventors: Geoffrey R. Smith, Iain Merrick, Michael A. Killianey, John Alastair Hawkins, Greg Hecht, Simon Rowe
  • Patent number: 7853977
    Abstract: A display device including a communication function for performing wireless communication of data with each of a plurality of devices, and a display function for displaying and outputting information. First, reception quality of each device is obtained (S 100). Next, based on the reception quality of each device, average reception quality of each room in which each device is placed is obtained (S 101). Next, based on the average reception quality of each room, the size of an image indicating each room is obtained (S 102), and based on the obtained size, the image indicating each room is illustrated on a display screen (S 103). Next, based on the reception quality of each device, the size of an image indicating each device with respect to each room is obtained (S 104), and based on the obtained size, the image indicating each device is illustrated on the display screen (S103).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 14, 2004
    Date of Patent: December 14, 2010
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventor: Kenji Sakamoto
  • Patent number: 7853976
    Abstract: A digital television (DTV) receiver and a decoding method are discussed. According to an embodiment, the DTV receiver includes: a receiving unit for receiving a digital broadcasting signal including a plurality of extended text tables (ETTs) that appear in transport stream packets having common PID values, each ETT comprising a section header and a message body, wherein the section header contains a table identification extension field that serves to establish uniqueness of each ETT, and wherein the message body includes an extended text message (ETM) which provides detailed descriptions of a virtual channel or an event associated with each ETT; and a program and system information protocol (PSIP) decoder for detecting the table identification extension field to determine uniqueness of each ETT and detecting at least one pertinent ETT from the plurality of ETTs using the determined uniqueness of each ETT.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 17, 2010
    Date of Patent: December 14, 2010
    Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    Inventor: Kyung Mee Lee
  • Patent number: 7849484
    Abstract: A digital television (DTV) receiver and a decoding method are discussed. According to an embodiment, the DTV receiver includes: a receiving unit for receiving a digital broadcasting signal including a plurality of extended text tables (ETTs) that appear in transport stream packets having common PID values, each ETT comprising a section header and a message body, wherein the section header contains a table identification extension field that serves to establish uniqueness of each ETT, and wherein the message body includes an extended text message (ETM) which provides detailed descriptions of a virtual channel or an event associated with each ETT; and a program and system information protocol (PSIP) decoder for detecting the table identification extension field to determine uniqueness of each ETT and detecting at least one pertinent ETT from the plurality of ETTs using the determined uniqueness of each ETT.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 17, 2010
    Date of Patent: December 7, 2010
    Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    Inventor: Kyung Mee Lee
  • Patent number: 7840985
    Abstract: A system and method that provide reduced latency in a video signal processing system. Various aspects of the present invention may comprise transmitting a first video information stream representative of a unit of video information. For example, the transmitted first video information stream may correspond to a video channel. A second video information stream representative of the unit of video information may be transmitted simultaneously with the first video information stream. The second video information stream may also, for example, correspond to the video channel. Various aspects of the present invention may comprise receiving a plurality of simultaneously transmitted video information streams. A video information stream of the plurality of received video information streams may be identified that, when processed, is expected to result in the lowest latency in presenting the unit of video information to the user. The identified video information stream may then be so processed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 26, 2009
    Date of Patent: November 23, 2010
    Assignee: Broadcom Corporation
    Inventor: Alexander G. MacInnis
  • Patent number: 7827584
    Abstract: A method and system that reduces the impact of packet loss on video data quality. Packet selection is performed by the method and system to selectively drop low priority packets so that the overall quality of the received video data may be improved. In one exemplary embodiment, the probability of higher priority layers being delivered on time is computed and a packet is transmitted only if this probability is greater than a given threshold h. In another exemplary embodiment, the system and method have the capability of backing up the process to transmit previously skipped packets, if time allows.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 9, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 2, 2010
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II
    Inventors: Zhimei Jiang, Leonard Kleinrock
  • Patent number: 7823182
    Abstract: A method and system that reduces the impact of packet loss on video data quality. Packet selection is performed by the method and system to selectively drop low priority packets so that the overall quality of the received video data may be improved. In one exemplary embodiment, the probability of higher priority layers being delivered on time is computed and a packet is transmitted only if this probability is greater than a given threshold h. In another exemplary embodiment, the system and method have the capability of backing up the process to transmit previously skipped packets, if time allows.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 22, 1999
    Date of Patent: October 26, 2010
    Assignee: AT & T Intellectual Property II
    Inventors: Zhimei Jiang, Leonard Kleinrock
  • Patent number: 7810121
    Abstract: A resident application and a second application are provided in a set-top terminal to receive a TV broadcast service and network personal video recorder (NPVR) service, respectively. The resident application is suspended in favor of the second application when a user changes from a broadcast channel to an NPVR enabled channel, and vice versa. In an embodiment where a digital video recorder (DVR) set-top terminal is used, a DVR server therein provides trick mode functions (pause, rewind and fast-forward) before an NPVR session, e.g., a Look Back session, is established. In another embodiment, during an NPVR session the DVR server plays back recorded programming content downloaded from a communications network, and provides trick mode functions as well.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 18, 2003
    Date of Patent: October 5, 2010
    Assignee: Time Warner Interactive Video Group, Inc.
    Inventors: Vipul B. Patel, John W. Callahan
  • Patent number: 7810130
    Abstract: Provided is a receiving apparatus for receiving streaming contents which is capable of receiving contents at a higher speed. The receiving apparatus receives and accumulates the streaming contents periodically during a power off state or while other contents are being audiovisually enjoyed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 29, 2003
    Date of Patent: October 5, 2010
    Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Atsushi Mizutome, Masaki Kutsuna
  • Patent number: 7810122
    Abstract: A method of distributing content includes receiving at least one request for a particular content item. Based on the at least one request, a number of users who are to receive the particular content item and are capable of receiving the particular content item via a wireless link is determined. Based on the number of users, at least one of a wireline link and the wireless link from which the users are to receive the particular content item is selected. The particular content item is distributed to the users via the selected at least one link.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 22, 2005
    Date of Patent: October 5, 2010
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I, L.P.
    Inventor: Dinesh Nadarajah
  • Patent number: 7802280
    Abstract: Advertising parameters and associated television advertisements are received from advertisers. The television advertisements can be designated as pending approval. An automated approval process and a television provider approval process can be utilized to approve or disapprove of the television advertisements pending approval. Approved television advertisements can be provided to the television provider, e.g., by a download process over a network.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 1, 2007
    Date of Patent: September 21, 2010
    Assignee: Google Inc.
    Inventors: Daniel J. Zigmond, Jason Bayer, Greg Hecht, Bryan McQuade
  • Patent number: 7797713
    Abstract: An Internet-enabled TV can display thumbnails of audio-video content available from an Internet server for selecting content to be displayed on the TV by a user manipulating a remote control. Internet information loading rules and thumbnail navigation rules are disclosed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 5, 2007
    Date of Patent: September 14, 2010
    Assignees: Sony Corporation, Sony Electronics Inc.
    Inventors: Thomas Patrick Dawson, Ted Mark Dunn, Seth Hill, Yuko Nishikawa, Rolf Toft, George Williams
  • Patent number: 7797723
    Abstract: A transmission systems suitable for video.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 21, 2005
    Date of Patent: September 14, 2010
    Assignee: Sharp Laboratories of America, Inc.
    Inventors: Mehmet U. Demircin, Petrus J. L. van Beek