ADVERTISING METRICS SYSTEM AND METHOD

• US 20110102600A1
• Filed: 10/29/2009
• Published: 05/05/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 10/29/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ineoquest Technologies Incorporated (Telestream Holdings Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Ineoquest Technologies Incorporated (Telestream Holdings Corp.)
• Inventors: Todd, Marc A.
• Granted Patent: US 8,239,888 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 348/180
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 17/004 for digital television systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23418 involving operations for analysing video streams, e.g. detecting features or characteristics television picture signal circuitry for scene change detection H04N5/147; filtering for image enhancement G06T5/00; methods or arrangements for recognising scenes G06V20/00; arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition of video in broadcast systems H04H60/59
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/235 Processing of additional data, e.g. scrambling of additional data or processing content descriptors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2407 Monitoring of transmitted content, e.g. distribution time, number of downloads arrangements for monitoring programmes for broadcast or for distribution combined with broadcast H04H20/14
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/266 Channel or content management, e.g. generation and management of keys and entitlement messages in a conditional access system, merging a VOD unicast channel into a multicast channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/437 Interfacing the upstream path of the transmission network, e.g. for transmitting client requests to a VOD server flow control in data networks H04L47/10; streaming protocols, e.g. RTP or RTCP, H04L65/65; scheduling or organising the servicing of application requests in data packet switching networks H04L67/60
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44204 Monitoring of content usage, e.g. the number of times a movie has been viewed, copied or the amount which has been watched monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; protecting generic digital content where the protection is independent of the precise nature of the content G06F21/10; arrangements for monitoring the use made of the broadcast services in broadcast systems H04H60/31
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44209 Monitoring of downstream path of the transmission network originating from a server, e.g. bandwidth variations of a wireless network arrangements for maintenance or administration in data switching networks involving bandwidth and capacity management H04L41/0896
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44213 Monitoring of end-user related data arrangements for monitoring the users' behaviour or opinions in broadcast systems H04H60/33
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/64723 Monitoring of network processes or resources, e.g. monitoring of network load traffic related reporting in data switching networks H04L43/062
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02

Abstract

The present disclosure relates to a system and method for monitoring audio-video (AV) streams transported over a network. The system may include at least one AV probe configured for installation at a network node. The at least one AV probe may be configured to receive an incoming AV stream at a native frame rate and to capture at least one thumbnail of the incoming AV stream at a sampling rate which is less than the native frame rate to form a thumbnail stream. The at least one AV probe may be further configured to timestamp and transmit the thumbnail stream, and to forward the incoming AV stream substantially in real-time. The system may further include at least one monitoring engine operatively connected with the at least one AV probe, the at least one monitoring engine configured to receive the thumbnail stream, capture AV data from the thumbnail stream, and transform the AV data into a visual representation of AV stream quality of experience (QoE).

Claims

1. A system for monitoring audio-video (AV) streams transported over a network, the system comprising:

at least one AV probe configured for installation at a network node, the at least one AV probe configured to receive an incoming AV stream at a native frame rate and to capture at least one thumbnail of the incoming AV stream at a sampling rate which is less than the native frame rate to form a thumbnail stream, the at least one AV probe further configured to timestamp and transmit the thumbnail stream, and to forward the incoming AV stream substantially in real-time; and

at least one monitoring engine operatively connected with the at least one AV probe, the at least one monitoring engine configured to receive the thumbnail stream, capture AV data from the thumbnail stream, and transform the AV data into a visual representation of AV stream quality of experience (QoE).

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one AV probe receives the incoming AV stream through an AV input port, transmits the thumbnail stream through a network interface port, and forwards the incoming AV stream through an AV output port.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the AV input port and the network interface port comprise a single bi-directional port.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one AV probe is configured for respective installation between an AV tuner and AV destination customer premises equipment.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one AV probe is configured to store the thumbnail stream for delayed transmission to the monitoring engine.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein said monitoring engine is configured to receive a plurality of thumbnail streams from the at least one AV probe and to capture AV data from each of the plurality of thumbnail streams, the monitoring engine further configured to aggregate and transform the AV data into a visual representation of collective AV stream QoE.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one AV probe is configured to capture, timestamp, and transmit the thumbnail stream substantially in real-time.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the monitoring engine is configured to receive, capture, and transform the AV data substantially in real-time.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the AV data includes at least one of AV content verification data, advertisement insertion data, and black screen detection data.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one monitoring engine is configured to perform at least one of the following:

monitoring advertisements in real-time;

monitoring advertisements simultaneously across a plurality of AV streams;

monitoring start and stop times of advertisements;

verifying that avails were present at scheduled times;

detecting SCTE-35 advertisement cue signals;

detecting advertisement pre-rolis;

detecting advertisement program in/out information;

monitoring presence and timing of incoming splice messages;

monitoring presence and timing of outgoing splice messages;

monitoring splice event IDs; and

generating AV quality metrics.

11. The system of claim 2, wherein the AV probe is configured to transmit the thumbnail stream through the network interface port to the monitoring engine.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the sampling rate is less than or equal to at least one of about half the native frame rate or about one third the native frame rate.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the sampling rate is variable based on content of the AV stream.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein said AV probe is configured for receiving user data, and for transmitting the user data through the network interface port to the monitoring engine, the monitoring engine being configured to process the user data.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein said monitoring engine comprises an AV management module configured to collect and aggregate transport stream (TS) data pertaining to one or more transport streams.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein said AV management module is configured to receive AV data from a plurality of monitoring engines.

17. The system of claim 15, wherein said AV management module is configured to correlate the AV data with the TS data.

18. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one AV probe is configured for arrangement between a set top box (STB) and a television.

19. The system of claim 1, wherein the AV stream comprises at least one frame that has been decoded from an AV transport stream.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein the AV stream comprises at least one frame that has been decoded from an MPEG-2 transport stream format.

21. The system of claim 1, wherein the AV data is compared with at least one of an advertisement schedule file and an advertisement verification file to generate a result set, the result set configured to indicate whether an advertisement was displayed correctly, and if not, a reason for a display error.

22. The system of claim 18, further comprising a management server configured to receive an actual audio output measured from the STB and to compare at least one dialnorm value with the actual audio output.

23. A method for monitoring at least one audio-video (AV) stream transported over a network, the method comprising:

receiving an incoming AV stream at one or more AV probes at a native frame rate;

capturing thumbnails of the incoming AV stream at a sampling rate which is less than the native frame rate, to form a thumbnail stream;

timestamping the thumbnail stream;

transmitting the thumbnail stream to a monitoring engine; and

forwarding the incoming AV stream through the one or more AV output ports substantially in real-time.

24. The method of claim 23, further comprising;

receiving the thumbnail stream at the monitoring engine;

capturing AV data from the thumbnail stream; and

transforming the AV data into a visual representation of AV stream Quality of Experience (QoE).

25. The method of claim 24, wherein capturing comprises capturing AV content verification data.

26. The method of claim 23, further comprising capturing user data.

27. An article of manufacture for monitoring at least one audio-video (AV) stream transported over a network, said article of manufacture comprising:

a computer readable storage medium having a computer readable program code embodied therein, said computer readable program code, when executed by a processor, results in the following;

receiving an incoming AV stream at one or more AV probes at a native frame rate;

capturing at least one thumbnail of the incoming AV stream at a sampling rate which is less than the native frame rate, to form a thumbnail stream;

timestamping the thumbnail stream;

transmitting the thumbnail stream to a monitoring engine; and

forwarding the incoming AV stream through the AV output port substantially in real-time.