System and method for modifying broadcast signals in closed circuit systems

• US 8,131,133 B2
• Filed: 04/16/2002
• Issued: 03/06/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 04/16/2002
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: David A. Roth
• Original Assignee: David A. Roth
• Inventors: Roth, David A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Tran, Thai
• Assistant Examiner(s): Wendmagegn, Girumsew
• Application Number:
  US10/123,949
• Publication Number:
  US 20030194199A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,612 Days
• Field of Search: 386/95, 386/46, 386/245, 386/250, 725/32, 725/34, 348/722, 358/908
• US Class Current: 386/249
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/10 Arrangements for replacing or switching information during the broadcast or the distribution
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2143 located in a single building, e.g. hotel, hospital or museum arrangements specially adapted for plural spots in a confined site in broadcast systems H04H20/63; adaptations for transmission by electric cable for domestic distribution in television systems H04N7/106
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/222 Secondary servers, e.g. proxy server, cable television Head-end provisioning of proxy services in data packet switching networks H04L67/56
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/235 Processing of additional data, e.g. scrambling of additional data or processing content descriptors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/26216 involving the channel capacity, e.g. network bandwidth admission control, resource allocation in open networks H04L12/5692; flow control in packet networks H04L47/10; establishing a schedule or organising the servicing of application requests taking into account QoS H04L67/61
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2668 Creating a channel for a dedicated end-user group, e.g. insertion of targeted commercials based on end-user profiles information retrieval from the Internet by querying with filtering and personalisation G06F16/9535; arrangements for replacing or switching information during the broadcast H04H20/10; push services over packet-switching network H04L12/1859; adaptation of message content in packet-switching networks H04L51/063
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4184 providing storage capabilities, e.g. memory stick
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4331 Caching operations, e.g. of an advertisement for later insertion during playback
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/458 Scheduling content for creating a personalised stream, e.g. by combining a locally stored advertisement with an incoming stream; Updating operations, e.g. for OS modules ; time-related management operations arrangements for replacing or switching information during the broadcast or during the distribution H04H20/10
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6543 for forcing some client operations, e.g. recording remote booting in general G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/0887 for the transmission of programme or channel identifying signals
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 358/908 Pause control, i.e. "commercial killers"

Abstract

A system and method are disclosed for modifying a television broadcast signal. In one embodiment, the system includes a memory that stores an alternate commercial signal, and a controller that is coupled to the memory and receives the broadcast signal. The broadcast signal includes a program signal and commercial signals. The controller substitutes the alternate commercial signal for one of the commercial signals upon determining that a first condition has been met, for example, upon the sensing two video/audio blank periods in the broadcast signal separated by a predetermined time period. In another embodiment, a broadcast signal including a series of screen signals alternating with a series of blanking signals is embedded, at an upstream location, with additional information relating to alternate commercials or commands during the blanking signals. At a downstream location, a controller processes the additional information and modifies the broadcast signal in response.

Claims

1. A system for modifying a first television signal to produce a second television signal that is displayed by a video display unit upon being received by the video display unit, the system comprising:

a plurality of displays in a locale, each display having a video input;

a memory unit that stores information corresponding to an alternate television commercial signal;

a control unit that is coupled to the memory unit and receives the first television signal, the control unit comprising an output connected to the inputs of the plurality of displays;

wherein the first television signal includes at least, during a first time period, a television program signal and, during subsequent time periods, a first commercial signal and a second commercial signal;

wherein, upon a first condition being met, the control unit substitutes the alternate commercial signal based upon the stored information for at least one of the first and second commercial signals to produce a second television signal;

wherein the control unit substitutes the alternate commercial signal for the second commercial signal;

wherein the alternate commercial signal includes display information specific to the locale; and

wherein the first condition is detection of at least one blank period within the first television signal by the control unit, wherein video and audio are in a neutral state during the at least one blank period.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the control unit includes a timer, and wherein the control unit determines that the first condition has been met by:

monitoring the first television broadcast signal for a first of the blank periods;

determining that an additional one of the blank periods occurs upon the passing of a predetermined time interval after the first of the blank periods as measured by the timer.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the predetermined time interval is selected from the group consisting of ten seconds, fifteen seconds, twenty seconds, thirty seconds, one minute.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the memory unit stores video information corresponding to a plurality of additional alternate television commercials.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the first television signal includes a plurality of additional television program signals at a plurality of additional television program times, and further includes a plurality of additional commercial signals at a plurality of additional commercial times, and wherein the television program signals alternate with a series of the additional commercial signals.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the control unit substitutes a plurality of different alternate commercial signals for at least some of the additional commercial signals.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the control unit determines which of the plurality of different alternate commercial signals to substitute for a given one of the plurality of additional commercial signals based upon at least one of a current time as determined by the timer, a current sequence, a command received by the control unit, and another defined control state.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein during the at least one blank period the first television broadcast signal is devoid of audio and video content.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the system is at least one of configured for physical attachment to the video display unit, which is a television, and configured for coupling to the video display unit by way of an additional device, wherein the additional device is one of a mixer and another device.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the memory unit is selected from the group consisting of a CD-Rom drive, a DVD drive, a floppy disk drive, a hard drive, a tape cassette player, and an alternate storage device.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the control unit includes a signal switching unit, wherein the second television signal is produced by switching off the at least one commercial signal and switching on the alternate commercial signal.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the control unit includes a buffer in which the control unit stores a segment of the first television broadcast signal upon receiving that segment;

so that the control unit is able to analyze the segment prior to substituting the alternate commercial signal for at least one of the first and second commercial signals, and wherein the second television signal is delayed with respect to the first television signal.

13. A system for modifying a first television signal to produce a second television signal that is displayed by a video display unit upon being received by the video display unit, the system comprising:

a plurality of displays in a locale, each display having a video input;

a memory unit that stores information corresponding to an alternate television commercial signal;

a control unit that is coupled to the memory unit and receives the first television signal, the control unit comprising an output connected to the inputs of the plurality of displays;

wherein the first television signal includes at least, during a first time period, a television program signal and, during subsequent time periods, a first commercial signal and a second commercial signal;

wherein, upon a first condition being met, the control unit substitutes the alternate commercial signal based upon the stored information for at least one of the first and second commercial signals to produce the second television signal;

wherein the alternate commercial signal includes display information specific to the locale; and

wherein the control unit includes a buffer in which the control unit stores a segment of the first television broadcast signal upon receiving that segment;

so that the control unit is able to analyze the segment for at least one of the first and second commercial signals prior to substituting the alternate commercial signal, and wherein the second television signal is delayed with respect to the first television signal.

14. A method of modifying a first television broadcast signal to produce at least one second television signal, the method comprising:

receiving a first television signal from a broadcasting source, wherein the first television broadcast signal includes a plurality of information signals including at least one program signal and at least one commercial signal;

monitoring the first television signal for a detectable event within the first television signal, wherein the detectable event occurs after the at least one commercial signal;

substituting an alternate commercial signal for at least one other commercial signal to produce a second television signal on a plurality of displays in a locale when the detectable event is detected from the monitored first television signal, wherein the alternate commercial signal includes display information specific to the locale; and

outputting the second television signal.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the detectable event is a second blank period within the first television signal, and wherein the method includes:

monitoring the first television signal for a first blank period within the first television broadcast signal occurring before the at least one commercial signal;

determining whether a time period between the first and second blank periods is a standard time period;

wherein, upon a determination that the time period is a standard time period, the alternate commercial signal is substituted for the at least one other commercial signal that occurs immediately after the second blank period.

16. A video display apparatus comprising:

at least one display having a video input;

a switch having a first input connected to receive a first video signal, a second input connected to receive a second video signal, and an output connected to the video input of the at least one display;

a detection device connected to monitor the first video signal and configured to identify detectable events of the first video signal, the detectable events comprising blank periods absent video or audio information;

a controller configured to control the switch to selectively transmit the first video signal and the second video signal, based upon identified detectable events of the first video signal; and

wherein the at least one display includes a number of displays in a locale and the second video signal includes display information specific to the locale.

17. The video display apparatus of claim 16 wherein the first video signal is a broadcast television signal and wherein the detection device is further configured to identify commercial periods of the broadcast television signal.

18. The video display apparatus of claim 16 wherein the controller includes at least one of a memory device having the second video signal stored thereon and a network connection to receive the second video signal.

19. The video display apparatus of claim 18 wherein the controller is programmed to output the second video signal to the at least one display via the switch in association with an identified detectable event.

20. The video display apparatus of claim 16 wherein the controller is programmed to automatically determine a standard blanking period length from identified detectable events of the detection device.

21. A method for configuring a video system to display user-selectable video signals:

receiving a first video signal into a local region;

connecting a monitoring device to the first video signal to identify commercial events of the first video signal;

receiving at least one user-selected second video signal; and

configuring a switch to output the first video signal during non-commercial events and output the at least one user-selected second video signal during at least one commercial event of the first video signal;

connecting the switch to at least one display in the local region, wherein the at least one display includes a number of displays and the at least one user-selected second video includes display information specific to the local region; and

wherein connecting the monitoring device to the first video signal includes configuring the monitoring device to identify commercial events by detecting blank periods of the first video signal, wherein the blank periods do not comprise video and audio information.

22. The method of claim 21 wherein configuring the switch includes gating the switch with a controller.

23. The method of claim 22 further comprising programming the controller to automatically determine a commercial event timing of the first video signal, based upon commercial events identified by the monitoring device.

24. The method of claim 23 further comprising programming the controller to avoid switching the switch to the at least one user-selected second video signal during non-commercial events of the first video signal.

25. The method of claim 21 wherein receiving the at least one user-selected second video signal includes at least one of receiving alternate commercials and receiving locally-relevant information.

26. The method of claim 21 further comprising configuring the switch to output the at least one user-selected second video signal during a second or subsequent commercial event of the first video signal.

27. A signal interruption system comprising:

a video input connected to receive a broadcast signal;

a detection device connected to the video input and configured to monitor the broadcast signal for blank periods in which the broadcast signals are in a black, default, or neutral state;

a memory unit connected to receive and store at least one user-selected alternate video signal via at least one of a memory device and a computer network connection;

a switch configured to control a video feed to at least one display, the switch connected to receive the broadcast signal and the alternate signal, wherein the at least one display includes a number of displays in a locale and the at least one user-selected alternate video includes display information specific to the locale; and

a controller connected to the detection device and configured to identify a period of time between a pair of the blank periods, wherein the control system is configured to control the switch to substitute the at least one user-selected alternate video signal for the broadcast signal in the video feed if the period of time between the pair of blank periods corresponds to a commercial time period.