VIDEO PIN SHARING

• US 20140281996A1
• Filed: 03/14/2013
• Published: 09/18/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/14/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: University of Phoenix Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Apollo Group Incorporated
• Inventors: Paulraj, Prince, Srivastava, Dipti
• Granted Patent: US 9,653,116 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/720
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/11 by using information not detectable on the record carrier

Abstract

Techniques are provided for assisting users to share specific locations within videos. Specifically, controls are provided to enable a viewer of a video to drop a “video pin” on a location within a video. In response to the user dropping a video pin at a particular location in the video, a “video pin record” that indicates the selected location is automatically generated by a video pin application. The video pins may be used to identify specific time points in the video and/or specific time segments of the video. Video pin records may be shared with other users to allow the other users to immediately jump to the locations, within the video, at which the corresponding video pins were dropped.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

in response to user interaction with a first set of controls generated by a video pin application that is executing separate from a video playback application, the video pin application storing metadata that identifies specific points or segments of a video that is loaded in the video playback application; and

in response to user interaction with a second set of controls generated by the video pin application, causing the metadata to be shared over a network with one or more users;

wherein the method is performed by one or more computing devices.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the metadata includes labels, tags or comments, associated with the specific points or segments, received through user interaction with the video pin application.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the metadata includes an indication of a preferred playback application for the video.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein causing the metadata to be shared includes:

the video pin application receiving user input that designates one or more email addresses; and

the video pin application sending the metadata by email to the one or more email addresses.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein causing the metadata to be shared includes:

the video pin application receiving user input that designates one or more social networks; and

the video pin application causing the metadata to be posted to the one or more social networks.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein causing the metadata to be shared includes:

sending the metadata to a back-end service; and

the back-end service sending messages to the one or more users to enable the one or more users to play back the video at the specific points or segments.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

enabling a user, of the one or more users, to specify one or more additional points or segments of the video; and

adding, to the metadata, information that identifies the one or more additional points or segments.

8. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

enabling a user, of the one or more users, to specify one or more additional labels, tags or comments associated with the specific points or segments; and

adding, to the metadata, information that identifies the one or more additional labels, tags or comments.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein:

the first set of controls includes a progress bar; and

the user interaction with the first set of controls includes associating video pin indicators with specific points on the progress bar to specify the specific points or segments.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein the first set of controls includes:

controls for associating a point-in-time video pin indicators with specific points on the progress bar, and

controls for associating segment video pin indicators with specific segments of time on the progress bar.

11. The method of claim 1 further comprising an application on a client device of a user, of the one or more users, performing the steps of:

reading the metadata received over the network;

based on the metadata, causing

a second video playback application to load the video; and

display of controls for causing the second video playback application to jump to the specific points or segments within the video.