Techniques for transmitting personal data and metadata among computing devices

• US 7,653,302 B2
• Filed: 03/22/2006
• Issued: 01/26/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/24/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Syabas Technology Sendirian Berhad
• Original Assignee: Syabas Technology Incorporated
• Inventors: Blado, David Nathan, Du, Fenglei, Guntren, Hans Robert, Limberis, Alexander John
• Primary Examiner(s): PERKEY, WILLIAM B
• Application Number:
  US11/386,163
• Publication Number:
  US 20060221190A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,406 Days
• Field of Search: 348/211.2, 348/211.3, 348/231.2, 348/231.3, 348/207.1, 348/207.11, 396/310, 396/429
• US Class Current: 396/310
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/4393 Multimedia presentations, e.g. slide shows, multimedia albums
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/48 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually

Abstract

Personal data services, such as a set of Web services, are enabled that allow a user to enter personal metadata information, e.g., about likely people and/or events to be targets of a camera capture event. Then, when a user'"'"'s computing device acquires such metadata, e.g., via embedded Web services software, an intelligent user interface allows the user to enter whether any of such personal metadata information pertains to any personal data, such as a video, an audio file or an image, which is captured by the user'"'"'s computing device. The personal data including the metadata information can be automatically uploaded via one or more wired and/or wireless networks to a device that hosts a personal data service, which stores the personal data and associated metadata, providing for effective means to access and manage a user'"'"'s personal data store. The services of the invention also enable a system for identifying unknown or new metadata where existing metadata is not sufficient to describe a video, audio or image capture event. In addition, a gateway is provided that enables transfer of content from the Web services to other media service providers, such as a cable or television over Internet Protocol (“TVoIP”) video or other video on demand (“VOD”) service.

Claims

1. A system for using a camera enabled computing device for capturing media files, including video, audio and/or image data, comprising:

a first camera enabled computing device component for synchronizing with metadata information and personal information about a user of the camera enabled computing device stored on at least one service computing device that hosts personal data services, wherein said metadata information is used for tagging a media file recorded by said camera enabled computing device, and wherein the personal information comprises at least one date corresponding to one of the following;

an event in the user'"'"'s life, an event in the life of a person in the user'"'"'s family, and a holiday celebrated by the user;

a second camera enabled computing device component for displaying the metadata information, suggesting a subset of metadata information which may be appropriate for the media file based on the at least one date of the personal information about said user, and receiving input from said user of the camera enabled computing device that associates a subset of the metadata information with the media file;

a third camera enabled computing device component for uploading the media file and the associated subset of metadata information to said at least one computing device that hosts personal data services component; and

a service computing device component for receiving the uploaded media file and, when the metadata information associated with the media file is identified as unknown, presenting a request for information related to the event whereby the information provided in response to the request is stored on said at least one service and used to generate additional metadata information for subsequent synchronization with the camera enabled computing device.

2. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, wherein the metadata information includes metadata information that, when associated with the media file via the second component, designates the media file as requiring supplemental metadata information not found in the metadata information.

3. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, wherein the third component for uploading the media file includes a component for trickle uploading the media file and the associated subset of metadata information to said at least one computing device that hosts the personal data services when communicatively coupled via a connection to said at least one computing device.

4. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, further comprising:

a fourth component for allowing navigation and viewing, by the user of the camera enabled computing device, of media files stored on said at least one computing device that hosts personal data services.

5. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, wherein said second component for displaying the metadata information includes a component for receiving metadata modification input from a user and for modifying the metadata information based on the metadata modification input.

6. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, wherein the second component processes the media file or information about the media file, and based on the processing, displays a second subset of metadata information that is more likely to be input by said user as associated with the media file than the fUll set of metadata information.

7. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, further comprising:

an authentication component for authenticating the user of the camera enabled computing device or the camera enabled computing device to the at least one computing device that hosts the personal data services.

8. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, wherein the first component for synchronizing with metadata information stored on at least one computing device receives a service descriptor file from the at least one computing device that hosts personal data Web services.

9. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, further comprising:

a location determination component for determining a location of the camera enabled computing device wherein the third component uploads the media file and the location of the camera enabled device when the media file was captured.

10. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, further comprising:

a software updating component for updating software relating to said first, second or third component by receiving software data from said at least one computing device that hosts personal data services, wherein the software data is used by the software updating component in connection with updating said software.

11. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 1, wherein the second component displays metadata information based on at least one algorithm that makes suggestions for the metadata information so that the metadata information that is displayed is an intelligent subset of metadata information.

12. A camera enabled computing device according to claim 11, wherein to display the intelligent subset of metadata information, the at least one algorithm analyzes data representative of at least one of a past keyword entered by a user, a past media capture date, a past media capture time, a past media capture location, a current date, a current time, a current location and user account information.

13. A user interface for a camera enabled computing device, comprising:

a display for displaying information or rendering media data pertaining to a current media file captured by the camera enabled computing device; and

at least one input control for displaying a set of metadata tags that are unique to a user of the camera enabled computing device, the at least one input control comprising a selector for selecting a subset of the set of metadata tags and associating the subset of metadata tags with the current media file, wherein the at least one input control is configured to suggest a subset of metadata information which may be appropriate for the media file based on at least one date of personal information about said user, wherein the at least one date of personal information comprises at least one date corresponding to one of the following;

an event in the user'"'"'s life, an event in the life of a person in the user'"'"'s family, and a holiday celebrated by the user;

whereby the current media file and the subset of metadata tags are automatically uploaded to a personal data server via a network according to at least one pre-determined upload setting on the camera enabled computing device, wherein the set of metadata tags includes an unknown metadata tag that designates the media file as requiring a metadata tag not stored in the set of metadata tags whereby the unknown tag causes a service to present a request for information related to the event whereby the information provided in response to the request is stored on said at least one service and used to generate additional metadata information for subsequent display by the camera enabled computing device.

14. A user interface according to claim 13, wherein the at least one input control includes an input control for designating recipients for the current media file, wherein the current media file is automatically made accessible by the designated recipients.

15. A user interface according to claim 13, wherein the at least one pre-determined upload setting includes a frequency that specifies how often to initiate upload operations for the camera enabled computing device.

16. A user interface according to claim 13, wherein the at least one input control includes at least one dropdown list of the set of metadata tags.

17. A method for downloading metadata to a camera enabled computing device and receiving capture data from the camera enabled computing device, comprising:

receiving personal information about a user of the camera enabled computing device, wherein the personal information comprises at least one date corresponding to one of the following;

an event in the user'"'"'s life, an event in the life of a person in the user'"'"'s family, and

a holiday celebrated by the user;

receiving a request from the camera enabled computing device for metadata information to apply to capture events recorded by the camera enabled computing device;

transmitting metadata information to the camera enabled computing device and the at least one date of the personal information, wherein said camera enabled computing device is configured to suggest a subset of metadata information which may be appropriate for the media file based on the at least one date of the personal information; and

automatically receiving capture data from the camera enabled computing device, wherein the capture data includes data representative of a subset of said metadata information, wherein said subset is previously assigned to the capture data by a user of the capture enabled computing device; and

in response to an unknown metadata designation, the at least one computing device provides a notification to the user that an event has unknown metadata associated with it whereby the service generates additional metadata information.

18. A method according to claim 17, wherein the transmitting includes transmitting metadata information to the camera enabled computing device that has since been input and stored as metadata information since the metadata information was previously transmitted to the camera enabled computing device.

19. A method according to claim 17, further comprising:

automatically authorizing a third party to view the capture data.

20. A method according to claim 17, further comprising transmitting the capture data to an independent media service provider for rendering by the independent media service provider.

21. A method according to claim 17, further comprising automatically organizing the capture data into a media storage collection based on the subset of metadata information.

22. A computing device comprising means for performing the steps of claim 17.