User-friendly electronic program guide based on subscriber characterizations
First Claim
1. A method for providing user-friendly Electronic Program Guide (EPG) screens to a subscriber of television or multimedia programming, the method comprising:
- monitoring subscriber viewing activities;
collecting raw subscriber selection data based on source material selected by the user over a predetermined period of time;
evaluating the raw subscriber selection data to filter out irrelevant data and generate a record of actual subscriber selection data;
processing the actual subscriber selection data to create a subscriber profile, and configuring a customized EPG screen based on the subscriber profile, wherein the EPG screen is transmitted to the subscriber.
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Accused Products
Abstract
Monitoring a subscriber'"'"'s 120 viewing activities and creating a subscriber characterization. The subscriber characterization is then used to create the subscriber'"'"'s preferred categories of programming, and to configure the display of an Electronic Program Guide (EPG) 140 or other suitable guide system in accordance with the subscriber characterizations. The EPG 140 includes one or more specifically preferred categories that indicate what the subscriber 120 is interested in, e.g., the highly watched programming, etc., as well as what may be of interest to the subscriber 120 based on his/her subscriber characterizations. Generally, the EPG 140 presents the preferred programming/category at the top of the EPG guide providing easy access to the subscriber'"'"'s favorites. Thus, the EPG screen transmitted to the subscriber is a customized screen based on subscriber characteristics.
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Citations
56 Claims
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1. A method for providing user-friendly Electronic Program Guide (EPG) screens to a subscriber of television or multimedia programming, the method comprising:
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monitoring subscriber viewing activities;
collecting raw subscriber selection data based on source material selected by the user over a predetermined period of time;
evaluating the raw subscriber selection data to filter out irrelevant data and generate a record of actual subscriber selection data;
processing the actual subscriber selection data to create a subscriber profile, and configuring a customized EPG screen based on the subscriber profile, wherein the EPG screen is transmitted to the subscriber. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41)
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42. A data processing system for generating a customized electronic program guide (EPG) for a subscriber of television programming, the data processing system comprising:
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a storage medium;
means for monitoring subscriber activity and creating a record of raw subscriber selection data wherein the raw subscriber selection data corresponds to the source material selected by the subscriber;
means for evaluating the raw subscriber selection data and filtering out the selection data associated with irrelevant activities and for creating a record of an actual subscriber selection data;
means for retrieving source related information wherein the source related information contains descriptive fields corresponding to the actual subscriber selection data;
means for processing the actual subscriber selection data with respect to the descriptive fields to form a subscriber profile; and
means for receiving the subscriber profile and generating a customized EPG screen based on the subscriber profile. - View Dependent Claims (43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56)
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Specification