METHOD OF SURVEYING WATCHING OF IMAGE CONTENT, AND BROADCAST RECEIVING APPARATUS AND SERVER EMPLOYING THE SAME

• US 20120284740A1
• Filed: 03/22/2012
• Published: 11/08/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 05/02/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Inventors: PARK, Tae-suh
• Granted Patent: US 8,893,166 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 725/19
• 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 21/2408 Monitoring of the upstream path of the transmission network, e.g. client requests monitoring data switching networks utilization H04L43/0876; scheduling or organising the servicing of application requests H04L67/60
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25866 Management of end-user data customer care in data networks H04L41/5077
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44008 involving operations for analysing video streams, e.g. detecting features or characteristics in the video stream arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition of video in broadcast systems H04H60/59
• 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

Abstract

A method of surveying watching image content, and a broadcast receiving apparatus and server employing the same are provided. The method includes displaying image contents on a screen; capturing and storing signature images of the image contents; and in response to receipt of a query, comprising a target image of image contents to be surveyed, from an external server, determining whether one of the stored signature images is identical to the target image, and transmitting a result of the determining to the external server.

Claims

1. A method of surveying watching of image content output from a broadcast receiving apparatus, the method comprising:

displaying image contents on a screen;

capturing and storing signature images of the image contents; and

in response to receipt of a query, comprising a target image of image contents to be surveyed, from an external server, determining whether one of the stored signature images is identical to the target image, and transmitting a result of the determining to the external server.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the query further comprises a timestamp of a point of time when the target image is captured.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the determining comprises:

setting a search period with reference to the timestamp included in the query; and

surveying whether there is a signature image identical to the target image from among signature images captured during the search period.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein a start point of the search period is based on a difference between the timestamp of the target image included in the query and a timestamp measured by the broadcast receiving apparatus when the query is received.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein the timestamp is based on Greenwich Mean Time.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the query further comprises contents identification (ID) of the image contents, and

the transmitting comprises transmitting the result of the determining together with the contents ID.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the storing comprises storing the signature image in a queue having a predetermined size.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein:

the query is received within a predetermined period of time after the image contents are output, and

the predetermined period of time is determined based on the predetermined size of the queue.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the image contents comprises at least one of broadcast content, advertising content, and video on demand (VOD) content.

10. A broadcast receiving apparatus comprising:

an output unit which displays image contents on a screen;

an extracting unit which extracts a signature image from the displayed image contents;

a storage unit which stores the extracted signature image;

a communication unit which communicates with an external server; and

a controller which, in response to receipt of a query comprising a target image of the image contents to be surveyed from an external server, controls the communication unit to determine whether there is a signature image identical to the target image, and to transmit a result of the determination to the external server.

11. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 10, wherein the query further comprises a timestamp that indicating when the target image is captured.

12. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 11, wherein the controller sets a search period with reference to the timestamp included in the query, and determines whether a signature image, identical to the target image, is among signature images captured within the search period.

13. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 12, wherein a start point of the search period is set based on a difference between:

the timestamp of the target image included in the query, and

a system timestamp based on when the query arrives at the broadcast receiving apparatus.

14. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 11, wherein the time information included in the timestamp is based on Greenwich Mean Time.

15. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 10, wherein:

the query further comprises contents identification (ID) of the image contents, and

the controller controls the communication unit to transmit the survey result together with the contents ID of the image contents.

16. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 10, wherein the storage unit stores the signature image in a queue having a predetermined size.

17. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 16, wherein:

the communication unit receives the query within a predetermined period of time after the image contents are output, and

the predetermined period is based on the predetermined size of the queue.

18. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 10, wherein the image contents comprises at least one of:

broadcast contents, advertising contents, and video on demand (VOD) contents.

19. A method of surveying watching of image content of a server, the method comprising:

extracting a target image corresponding to image contents to be surveyed;

generating a query comprising the target image and a timestamp of the target image, wherein the timestamp indicates when the target image is captured;

transmitting the query to a plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses; and

receiving from the plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses information indicating whether the image contents were watched.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the transmitting comprises dispersively transmitting the query, to the plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses, over a predetermined period of time.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the query further comprises a contents identification (ID) of the image contents to be surveyed.

22. A server for surveying whether image contents, output from a plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses, are viewed, the server comprising:

an extracting unit which extracts a target image from the image contents to be surveyed;

a query generating unit which generates a query comprising the target image and a timestamp of the target image, wherein the timestamp indicates when in time the target image is captured; and

a communication unit which transmits the query to a plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses and receives information from the plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses about whether the image contents were viewed.

23. The server of claim 22, wherein the communication unit transmits the query to the plurality of broadcast receiving apparatuses over a predetermined period of time.

24. The server of claim 22, wherein the query further comprises contents identification (ID) of the image contents to be surveyed.

25. A method of surveying watching of image content output from a broadcast receiving apparatus, the method comprising:

extracting a plurality of signature images of displayed image content, and storing the signature images in a signature queue;

in response to receipt a query, comprising a target signature of image contents to be surveyed, from an external server, determining whether one of the signature images in the signature queue is identical to the target signature; and

when it is determined that there is the signature identical to the target signature, performing a predetermined additional process.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the query further comprises a timestamp indicating when the target image is captured.

27. The method of claim 26, wherein:

the query further comprises one or more of;

a program to be executed in the broadcast receiving apparatus,

an identifier of a corresponding program, and

a universal resource locator (URL) of a predetermined Internet resource, and

the performing the predetermined additional process comprises executing the program or accessing the predetermined Internet resource through the URL.

28. A broadcast receiving apparatus comprising:

an output unit which outputs input image contents on a screen;

an extracting unit which extracts signatures from the output image contents;

a storage unit which stores the extracted signatures in a signature queue;

a communication unit which communicates with an external server; and

a controller which, in response to receipt of a query comprising target signature of image contents to be surveyed from an external server, determines whether there is in the signature queue a signature identical to the target signature, and, when it is determined that there is the signature identical to the target signature, performs a predetermined additional process.

29. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 28, wherein the query further comprises a timestamp indicating when the target image was captured.

30. The broadcast receiving apparatus of claim 28, wherein the query further comprises one or more of:

a program to be executed in the broadcast receiving apparatus,

an identifier of a corresponding program, and

a universal resource locator (URL) of a predetermined Internet resource, and

when it is determined that there is the signature identical to the target signature, the controller executes the program or accesses the predetermined Internet resource through the URL.

31. A broadcast receiving apparatus, comprising:

a control unit comprising a processor, and carrying out control operations;

a display; and

a storage;

wherein the control operations comprise;

displaying image content on the display;

generating a signature corresponding to the displayed image content;

storing the generated signatures in a signature queue in the storage;

receiving a target signature;

determining whether the received target signature corresponds to one or more of the signatures in the signature queue; and

transmitting an indication of the result of the determining.

32. The broadcast receiving apparatus as set forth in claim 31, wherein the target signature is received together with an indication of a target signature collection time.

33. The broadcast receiving apparatus as set forth in claim 32, wherein the determining whether the received target signature corresponds to the one or more of the signatures in the signature queue is carried out with respect to only ones of the signatures in the signature queue that have collection times that are within a predetermined period of time from the target signature collection time.

34. The broadcast receiving apparatus as set forth in claim 31, wherein:

the target signature is received together with an indication of a subsequent action to be taken; and

when the determination indicates that the received target signature corresponds to one or more of the signatures in the signature queue, carrying out the subsequent action to be taken.