Prioritizing media content requests

• US 9,720,642 B2
• Filed: 09/12/2014
• Issued: 08/01/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 06/04/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sonos, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Sonos, Inc.
• Inventors: Corbin, Keith
• Primary Examiner(s): Tsang, Fan
• Assistant Examiner(s): SIEGEL, DAVID F
• Application Number:
  US14/485,602
• Publication Number:
  US 20150355878A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,054 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 15/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/178 Techniques for file synchronisation in file systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/64 Browsing; Visualisation therefor generation of a list or set of audio data G06F16/638
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/686 using information manually generated, e.g. tags, keywords, comments, title or artist information, time, location or usage information, user ratings
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/165 Management of the audio stream, e.g. setting of volume, audio stream path
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4881 Scheduling strategies for dispatcher, e.g. round robin, multi-level priority queues
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/43615 Interfacing a Home Network, e.g. for connecting the client to a plurality of peripherals home Audio Video Interoperability [HAVI] data switching networks H04L12/2805
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4518 involving characteristics of one or more peripherals, e.g. peripheral type, software version, amount of memory available or display capabilities
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4583 Automatically resolving scheduling conflicts, e.g. when a recording by reservation has been programmed for two programs in the same time slot
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47202 for requesting content on demand, e.g. video on demand
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4825 using a list of items to be played back in a given order, e.g. playlists
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6125 involving transmission via Internet transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8113 comprising music, e.g. song in MP3 format
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 2227/005 Audio distribution systems for home, i.e. multi-room use
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 27/00 Public address systems circuits for preventing acoustic reaction H04R3/02; circuits for distributing signals to loudspeakers H04R3/12; monitoring or testing arrangements for public address systems H04R29/007; amplifiers H03F

Abstract

Examples described herein may include a first playback device sending a first request for first media content to a computing system associated with a media service provider and a second playback device sending a second request for second media content to the computing system. The first and second playback devices may be associated with an account of the media service provider. The computing system may determine whether either or both of the first and second playback devices are allowed to receive the respective requested media content based on information included in the first request and the second request. Such information included in the requests may characterize playback operations respectively associated with the requests and/or may indicate a time at which the respective playback devices last received a playback command.

Claims

1. A media playback system comprising:

a processor; and

a computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that when executed by the media playback system cause the media playback system to perform functions comprising;

detecting (i) a command for a first playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and (ii) a command for a second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations;

determining that (i) the one or more first playback operations will occur in a first sequence and (ii) the one or more second playback operations will occur in a second sequence;

determining that a given first playback operation of the one or more first playback operations will occur concurrently with a given second playback operation of the one or more second playback operations;

determining that the given first playback operation has a higher priority than the given second playback operation based on respective times when the command for the first playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and the command for the second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations were detected; and

in response to determining that the given first playback operation has the higher priority than the given second playback operation, sending, to a computing system, a request to provide media content related to the given first playback operation to the first playback device.

2. The media playback system of claim 1, the functions further comprising:

after sending the request to provide media content related to the given first playback operation, determining that a next playback operation of the one or more first playback operations is to be performed next according to the first sequence;

determining that the next playback operation of the first sequence will occur concurrently with the given second playback operation of the second sequence;

determining that the next playback operation has a higher priority than the given second playback operation based on respective times when the command for the first playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and the command for the second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations were detected; and

sending a second request to provide media content related to the next playback operation to the first playback device.

3. The media playback system of claim 1, wherein the first sequence of one or more first playback operations comprises (i) a playback operation related to media content stored within the media playback system and (ii) a playback operation related to media content that is stored outside of the media playback system.

4. The media playback system of claim 1, wherein the request indicates that the given first playback operation is associated with a given one of two or more priority levels.

5. The media playback system of claim 4, wherein the given one of two or more priority levels is higher than all of the other two or more priority levels and the request further indicates that the given first playback operation is an operation that is to be executed by the media playback system before executing any other given first playback operation of the first sequence and the given second playback operation of the second sequence.

6. The media playback system of claim 1, the functions further comprising:

receiving the media content from the computing system; and

initiating the given first playback operation that is related to the received media content.

19. The media playback system of claim 1, wherein determining that the given first playback operation has a higher priority than the given second playback operation based on respective times when the command for the first playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and the command for the second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations were detected comprises:

determining that the command for the first playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations was detected after the command for the second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations.

7. A method comprising:

detecting (i) a command for a first playback device of a media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and (ii) a command for a second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations;

determining that (i) the one or more first playback operations will occur in a first sequence and (ii) the one or more second playback operations will occur in a second sequence;

determining that a given first playback operation of the one or more first playback operations will occur concurrently with a given second playback operation of the one or more second playback operations;

determining that the given first playback operation has a higher priority than the given second playback operation based on respective times when the command for the first playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and the command for the second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations were detected; and

in response to determining that the given first playback operation has the higher priority than the given second playback operation, sending, by the media playback system to a computing system, a request to provide media content related to the given first playback operation to the first playback device.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

after sending the request to provide media content related to the given first playback operation, determining that a second playback operation of the one or more second playback operations is to be performed next according to the second sequence;

determining that the next playback operation of the first sequence will occur concurrently with the given second playback operation of the second sequence;

determining that the next playback operation has a higher priority than the given second playback operation based on respective times when the command for one or more first playback devices of the media playback system to perform one or more first playback operations and the command for one or more second playback devices of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations were detected; and

sending a second request to provide media content related to the next playback operation to the first playback device.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the first sequence of one or more first playback operations comprises (i) a playback operation related to media content stored within the media playback system and (ii) a playback operation related to media content that is stored outside the media playback system.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein the request indicates that the given first playback operation is associated with a given one of two or more priority levels.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the given one of two or more priority levels is higher than all of the other two or more priority levels and the request further indicates that the given first playback operation is an operation that is to be executed by the media playback system before executing any other given first playback operation of the first sequence and the given second playback operation of the second sequence.

12. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

receiving the media content from the computing system; and

initiating the given first playback operation that is related to the received media content.

13. A computing system associated with a media service provider, the computing system comprising:

a processor; and

a computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that when executed by the computing system cause the computing system to perform functions comprising;

receiving, from a first playback device of a media playback system, a first request for first media content, wherein the first request indicates information characterizing one or more first playback operations, the information indicating when a command to perform the one or more first playback operations was received, and wherein the first playback device is associated with a particular account of the media service provider;

receiving, from a second playback device of the media playback system, a second request for second media content, wherein the second request indicates information characterizing one or more second playback operations, the information indicating when a command to perform the one or more second playback operations was received, and wherein the second playback device is associated with the particular account of the media service provider;

determining that a given first playback operation of the one or more first playback operations will occur concurrently with a given second playback operation of the one or more second playback operations;

determining that the given first playback operation has a higher priority than the given second playback operation based on respective times when the command for the first playback device of the media playback system to perform the one or more first playback operations and the command for the second playback device of the media playback system to perform one or more second playback operations were received; and

after determining that the given first playback operation has the higher priority than the given second playback operation, sending the first media content to the first playback device.

14. The computing system of claim 13, the functions further comprising:

prior to sending the first media content to the first playback device, sending, by the computing system, the second media content to the second playback device;

determining that sending the first media content to the first playback device would cause the particular account of the media service provider to concurrently receive more media streams than the particular account is allowed to receive; and

stopping, by the computing system, sending the second media content to the second playback device based on determining that sending the first media content to the first playback device would cause the particular account of the media service provider to concurrently receive more media streams than the particular account is allowed to receive.

15. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the first media content and the second media content are the same media content.

16. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the first request includes information indicating that the given first playback operation is to be performed first among a first sequence of the one or more first playback operations, and wherein the second request includes information indicating that the given second playback operation is to be performed after at least one other playback operation of a second sequence of the one or more second playback operations.

17. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the given first playback operation comprises commencing playback of the first media content at a first predetermined time and the given second playback operation comprises commencing playback of the second media content at a second predetermined time, and wherein determining that the given first playback operation will occur concurrently with the given second playback operation comprises:

determining that playback of the first media content at the first predetermined time will occur concurrently with playback of the second media content at the second predetermined time.

18. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the given second playback operation comprises commencing playback of the second media content after completing playback of a third media content that preceded the second media content in a playback queue of the second playback device.