Method for receiving and displaying thematic audio-visual programme sequences, and receiver therefor

• US 8,726,307 B2
• Filed: 06/27/2001
• Issued: 05/13/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: InterDigital Madison Patent Holdings (InterDigital, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Thomson Licensing (Vantiva SA)
• Inventors: Legallais, Yvon, Perrot, Sebastien, Schmouker, Philippe
• Primary Examiner(s): Chokshi, Pinkal R
• Application Number:
  US10/311,726
• Publication Number:
  US 20040031047A1
• Time in Patent Office: 4,703 Days
• Field of Search: 725 32- 36, 725/131, 725/139, 725/151, 725/42, 725/43, 725/41, 725/134, 725/142, 386/239
• US Class Current: 725/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/106 Receiver-side switching
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/46 for recognising users' preferences
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/433 Content storage operation, e.g. storage operation in response to a pause request, caching operations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4345 Extraction or processing of SI, e.g. extracting service information from an MPEG stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44016 involving splicing one content stream with another content stream, e.g. for substituting a video clip
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4532 involving end-user characteristics, e.g. viewer profile, preferences monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306; processing of user preferences or user profiles in wireless networks H04W8/18
• 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 21/47 End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4755 for defining user preferences, e.g. favourite actors or genre retrieval personalisation and generation of user profiles for the retrieval of video data G06F16/739; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/84 Generation or processing of descriptive data, e.g. content descriptors systems specially adapted for using meta-information in broadcast systems H04H60/73

Abstract

The invention consists of a process for receiving and for screening audiovisual transmissions broadcast by a network. The transmissions consisting of events and of short transmissions possessing a distinctive element, these short transmissions being broadcast by services identifiable by this distinctive element. At a certain moment specified by the broadcaster, a sequence is transmitted on the network, it is replaced at the level of the display of the receiver by another sequence extracted from a service broadcasting short transmissions. The choice of this service is made at the receiver level. To avoid the appearance of a black screen between the network'"'"'s transmitted sequences and the short transmissions, the receiver dispatches a filler transmission to the screen.

The invention also consists of a digital television receiver for implementing the process.

Claims

1. Process for screening audiovisual transmissions transmitted by a center and received by a television receiver, transmissions of events being broadcast on a first broadcasting service and being selectable by a user, said events being interrupted by at least one transmission of a first sequence, the at least one transmission of a first sequence being broadcast on the first broadcasting service, the process comprising at the receiver:

screening a part of said event broadcast before an interruption of the event by a transmission of the first sequence,

screening a filler transmission following the screening of the part of said event broadcast before the interruption of the event by a transmission of the first sequence, the screening of the filler transmission being not synchronized with the screening of the part of said event broadcast, the filler transmission being a still picture accompanied by looped sound content, the still picture and the sound content being recorded in the receiver,

screening a portion of a transmission of a second sequence being broadcast on a second broadcasting service selected by the receiver, said second sequence comprising a plurality of flash events, said screening commencing at the starting point of a flash event of said plurality of flash events, the transmission of the second sequence being not synchronized with the transmissions of the first sequences and stopping the screening of the filler transmission at the time the screening of a flash event is commencing, and wherein the second sequence is selected in response to a user assigned percentage, the user assigned percentage relating to a distribution of content topics;

screening a part of said event which is broadcast after the transmission of the first sequence on the first broadcasting service is finished.

2. Process for screening audiovisual transmissions according to claim 1, comprising a prior step of screening a filler transmission, the filler transmission being screened following the screening of the end of a flash event of said plurality of flash events of said portion of the second sequence and stopping at the start of the screening of the event transmission at the end of the event interruption, the filler transmission being a still picture accompanied by looped sound content, the still picture and the sound content being recorded in the receiver.

3. Process for screening audiovisual transmissions according to claim 1, characterized in that an audiovisual or visual document used to produce the filler transmission is extracted from a specific broadcasting service before being recorded.

4. Process for screening audiovisual transmissions according to claim 3, characterized in that the audiovisual or visual document used to produce the filler transmission is regularly recorded in the memory of the receiver.

5. Process for screening audiovisual transmissions according to claim 1 wherein the second sequence comprising information flashes having a short duration compared to the events.

6. Process for screening audiovisual transmissions according to claim 5, characterized in that the information flashes have a duration of 10 seconds up to minutes.