System and method of providing broadcasting informations

• US 7,120,921 B1
• Filed: 10/27/2000
• Issued: 10/10/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 10/28/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NEC Corporation
• Original Assignee: NEC Corporation
• Inventors: Ito, Noriko
• Primary Examiner(s): VU, NGOC K
• Application Number:
  US09/697,503
• Time in Patent Office: 2,174 Days
• Field of Search: 725/75, 725/76, 725/82, 725/85, 725/36, 725/60, 725/61, 725/42, 725/134, 725/142, 725/74, 705/14, 386/35, 386/46, 386/40, 386/108, 342/457, 342/458, 324/207.26, 324/226, 434/307.R, 340/989, 701/300
• US Class Current: 725/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 40/90 specially adapted for satellite broadcast receiving
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/27 Arrangements for recording or accumulating broadcast information or broadcast-related information
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/37 for identifying segments of broadcast information, e.g. scenes or extracting programme ID
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/65 for using the result on users' side

Abstract

The present invention provides a system of providing broadcast informations, comprising: a receiving processing unit for receiving both program and advertisement informations broadcasted and for extracting only the advertisement information therefrom; a reproducing unit being connected to the receiving processing unit for fetching both the program and advertisement informations from the receiving processing unit and for re-producing both the program and advertisement informations; an accumulating unit being connected to the receiving processing unit for fetching only the extracted advertisement information from the receiving processing unit and for accumulating the advertisement information; and a control unit being operable by an operator and being connected to both the accumulating unit and the reproducing unit for fetching at least operator-selected one of the accumulated advertisement informations from the accumulating unit and for transferring the at least operator-selected advertisement information to the reproducing unit for enabling the reproducing unit to re-produce the at least operator-selected advertisement information.

Claims

1. A system of providing broadcast informations, comprising:

a receiving processing unit constructed so as to receive both program and advertisement broadcast information, the receiving processing unit producing a combined output that contains both the program and advertisement information, as well as an ad-only output that contains only the advertisement information;

an accumulating unit that receives and accumulates the ad-only output from the receiving processing unit;

a control unit that is operable by an operator and connected to the accumulating unit, the control unit being responsive to operator input to fetch operator-selected said advertisement information from the accumulating unit and generate the operator-selected advertisement information as an output, the control unit also generating as an output reproducing instructions based on the operator input; and

a reproducing unit that receives as inputs the combined output from the receiving processing unit and the operator-selected advertisement information and reproducing instructions from the control unit;

wherein the reproducing unit produces at a single output for the operator either the combined output or the operator-selected advertisement information in accordance with the operator input.

2. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the control unit controls the reproducing unit to discontinue a current production of combined output and in place re-produce the operator-selected advertisement information upon receipt of an interruption instruction from the operator.

3. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the receiving processing unit recognizes an identification code allocated to the broadcast advertisement information for extracting only the advertisement information from the program and advertisement broadcast information.

4. The system as claimed in claim 3, wherein the program and advertisement information are broadcast via one of radio-broadcasting and television-broadcasting.

5. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the receiving processing unit recognizes a predetermined frequency signal allocated to the advertisement information for extracting only the advertisement information from the program and advertisement broadcast information.

6. The system as claimed in claim 5, wherein the program and advertisement information are broadcast via one of radio-broadcasting and television-broadcasting.

7. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the control unit fetches the operator-selected advertisement informations from the accumulating unit in accordance with a predetermined description of an attribute for producing the advertisement information.

8. The system as claimed in claim 7, wherein the predetermined description of an attribute is a first type attribute to produce the advertisement information always included with broadcasts of a predetermined broadcast program.

9. The system as claimed in claim 8, wherein the advertisement information is produced repeatedly in accordance with the first type attribute.

10. The system as claimed in claim 7, wherein the predetermined description of attribute is a second type attribute to produce one time the advertisement information at a predetermined normal speed until reaching an end of the advertisement information.

11. The system as claimed in claim 10, wherein the advertisement information is produced repeatedly in accordance with the second type attribute.

12. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the reproducing unit comprises at least one of a voice output unit, a display unit and a printing unit.

13. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the receiving processing unit distinguishes the extracted advertisement information into both guidance information which corresponds to only an initial part of the extracted advertisement information and full information which corresponds to an entirety of the extracted advertisement information, and the accumulating unit accumulates the guidance information and the full information separately, and the control unit transfers the guidance information to the producing unit to produce the guidance information to wait for an operator'"'"'s request for producing the full information, before the control unit transfers the full information to the producing unit to produce the full information only upon receipt of the operator'"'"'s request.

14. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the control unit selectively controls the producing unit to produce the advertisement information at a normal speed, to discontinue the production temporarily, to discontinue the production permanently, to turn back toward a beginning of the advertisement information, to produce the advertisement information at a higher speed than the normal speed, to turn back frames of the advertisement information, to advance forward the frames of the advertisement information, and to repeat producing the advertisement information.

15. The system as claimed in claim 14, wherein the control unit comprises an indicator panel arranged to be directly touched by the operator.

16. The system as claimed in claim 14, wherein the control unit comprises a wireless remote controller.

17. The system as claimed in claim 14, wherein the control unit comprises a wired remote controller.

18. The system as claimed in claim 14, wherein the control unit comprises a voice access controller having a voice-recognition processor.

19. The system as claimed in claim 1, further comprising a timer connected to the control unit for counting a time from the accumulation of the advertisement information and informing the control unit of a counting time to enable the control unit to instruct the producing unit to produce the advertisement information when a predetermined time has passed from the accumulation of the advertisement information.

20. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller has an additional function of a timer for counting a time from the accumulation of the advertisement information to instruct the producing unit to produce the advertisement information when a predetermined time has passed from the accumulation of the advertisement information.

21. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the system is loaded on a vehicle.

22. The system of claim 1, wherein the program and advertisement broadcast information received by the receiving processing unit is digital, the combined output is analog, and the ad-only output is digital.

23. The system of claim 22, wherein the operator-selected advertisement information sent from the control unit to the reproducing unit is sent digitally.

24. The system of claim 1, wherein the accumulating unit is arranged as a memory stack, so that newly added said ad-only output is stored on a top of the memory stack, and oldest said ad-only output is stored at a bottom of the memory stack is disposed of if the memory stack is full when it is time to add a new said ad-only output.