System and method for bookmarking DVDs

• US 20040165483A1
• Filed: 02/26/2003
• Published: 08/26/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 02/26/2003
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.), Sony Electronics Inc. (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.), Sony Electronics Inc. (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Unger, Robert Allan
• Application Number:
  US10/374,888
• Publication Number:
  US 20040165483A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 369/30.09
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 19/025 'Virtual' control panels, e.g. Graphical User Interface [GUI]
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 19/027 Remotely controlled remote control systems in general G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 2220/2562 DVDs [digital versatile discs]; Digital video discs; MMCDs; HDCDs
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 2220/65 wherein solid state memory is used for storing indexing information or metadata
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/105 of operating discs
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/11 by using information not detectable on the record carrier

Abstract

A bookmark button on a remote control device can be depressed to store a bookmark in a DVD player'"'"'s memory without interrupting play. The bookmark includes a play counter value and a timestamp. When a viewer subsequently wishes to start play from the bookmark, the DVD player is stopped or paused, the bookmark button manipulated, and a menu listing bookmarks pertaining to the disk being played is displayed. The user may navigate through the list and select a bookmark, and the DVD player automatically resumes play at the selected bookmarked point.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

a content storage disk player configured for playing multimedia stored on at least one content storage disk; and

at least one remote control device controlling the player, the device being manipulable to cause the player to store in memory at least one bookmark location on the disk.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the bookmark location includes at least one play counter value.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein at least one time value is stored along with the bookmark location, the time value representing the time of a bookmark.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein disk identity information is stored along with the bookmark location.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein manipulation of at least one bookmark element on the remote control device causes the player to store in memory at least the bookmark location.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein manipulation of the bookmark element at least when the player is in at least one predetermined mode other than a play mode causes the player to display a bookmark menu.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein a user can select a bookmark from the menu to cause the player to resume playing a disk from the bookmark location.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the disk is a DVD.

9. A method for playing a content storage disk, comprising:

playing the disk in a disk player;

during play, manipulating a bookmark element on an input device to generate a bookmark signal; and

in response to the bookmark signal, storing at least a disk location while the disk is playing.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the disk location includes a play counter value.

11. The method of claim 9, comprising storing at least one timestamp value along with the disk location, the timestamp value representing the time of a bookmark.

12. The method of claim 9, comprising storing disk identity information along with the disk location.

13. The method of claim 9, comprising manipulating the bookmark element at least when the player is in a predetermined mode other than a play mode to cause the player to display a bookmark menu.

14. The method of claim 13, comprising selecting a bookmark from the menu to cause the player to resume playing a disk from the disk location.

15. The method of claim 9, wherein the disk is a DVD.

16. A system, comprising:

content storage means for storing multimedia content;

content playing means for playing the content; and

control means for causing the content playing means to automatically store a bookmark location of the content storage means.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the content storage means is a disk and the content playing means is a disk player, and the control means includes at least one bookmark element manipulable by a user to bookmark a location on the disk.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the bookmark location is stored along with at least one of:

time information, and disk identity information.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the bookmark element is manipulable to cause a menu of bookmarks to be displayed.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein a bookmark can be selected from the menu of bookmarks to cause the player to immediately play the disk from the bookmark location.