Visual hash tags via trending recognition activities, systems and methods

• US 9,860,601 B2
• Filed: 11/28/2016
• Issued: 01/02/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 12/13/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nant Holdings IP, LLC (NantWorks, LLC)
• Original Assignee: Nant Holdings IP, LLC (NantWorks, LLC)
• Inventors: Soon-Shiong, Patrick
• Primary Examiner(s): Sheleheda, James R
• Application Number:
  US15/362,618
• Publication Number:
  US 20170078756A1
• Time in Patent Office: 400 Days
• Field of Search: 725 51, 725112
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/41 Higher-level, semantic clustering, classification or understanding of video scenes, e.g. detection, labelling or Markovian modelling of sport events or news items segmenting video sequences G06V20/49
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/46 Extracting features or characteristics from the video content, e.g. video fingerprints, representative shots or key frames
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2353 specifically adapted to content descriptors, e.g. coding, compressing or processing of metadata
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2385 Channel allocation H04N21/266 takes precedence; Bandwidth allocation H04N21/24 takes precedence ; allocation of channels according to the instantaneous demands of the users in time-division multiplex systems H04J3/1682; admission control, resource allocation in open networks H04L12/5692; arrangements for maintenance or administration in data switching networks involving bandwidth and capacity management H04L41/0896; negotiating bandwidth in wireless networks H04W28/16
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/26603 for automatically generating descriptors from content, e.g. when it is not made available by its provider, using content analysis techniques
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2665 Gathering content from different sources, e.g. Internet and satellite
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/278 Content descriptor database or directory service for end-user access details of content or meta data based information retrieval of video data in video databases G06F16/739
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4223 Cameras H04N23/00 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44008 involving operations for analysing video streams, e.g. detecting features or characteristics in the video stream arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition of video in broadcast systems H04H60/59
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4622 Retrieving content or additional data from different sources, e.g. from a broadcast channel and the Internet web site content organization and management for information retrieval from the Internet G06F16/958; transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82; stock exchange data over packet-switching network H04L12/1804; push services including data channel over packet-switching network H04L12/1859
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4722 for requesting additional data associated with the content
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/478 Supplemental services, e.g. displaying phone caller identification, shopping application
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4788 communicating with other users, e.g. chatting arrangements for providing for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms, to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1813; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4823 using a channel name
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4826 using recommendation lists, e.g. of programs or channels sorted out according to their score
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4828 for searching program descriptors retrieval of video data G06F16/739
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6581 Reference data, e.g. a movie identifier for ordering a movie or a product identifier in a home shopping application
• 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

A system and method of treating image data as a visual hash tag are presented. A device is able to subscribe to a content channel, possibly a channel that provide social media information, by the act of recognizing related objects without requiring a user to annotate content with unnatural hash tags.

Claims

1. A digital content subscribing device comprising:

a display;

a non-transitory computer readable memory storing software instructions; and

a processor coupled with the display and the non-transitory computer readable memory, and that, upon execution of the software instructions, operates as;

a recognition module configurable to;

acquire a digital image that includes images of a plurality of objects; and

derive a set of descriptors associated with the plurality of objects from the digital image as a function of an implementation of at least one object recognition algorithm;

an object analysis module coupled with the recognition module and configurable to;

identify subsets of descriptors relevant to object features of objects in the plurality of objects;

recognize some of the plurality of objects as recognized objects as a function of the subsets of descriptors; and

weight the subsets of descriptors according to relevancy rules as a function of the recognized objects thereby forming weighted subsets of descriptors; and

a subscription agent coupled with the object analysis module and configurable to;

receive a list of content channel identifiers for the recognized objects based on a submission of the weighted subsets of descriptors as a query to a channel database;

subscribe to at least one digital content channel associated with the recognized objects based on content channel identifiers;

render, via the display, digital content from the at least one digital content channel and retrieved from a source device.

2. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital image comprises video data.

3. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital image comprises at least one of the following:

a healthcare image, a media file, and an x-ray.

4. The device of claim 1, further comprising a computing device that includes the display, the non-transitory computer readable memory, and the processor operating as the recognition module, the object analysis module, and the subscription agent.

5. The device of claim 4, wherein the computing device includes at least one of the following:

a mobile phone, a vehicle, a tablet, a phablet, a game console, a kiosk, an appliance, a set top box, a server, a computer, a virtual reality device, a projected reality device, a point-of-sales device, a vending machine, and a toy.

6. The device of claim 1, further comprising a medical device that includes the display, the non-transitory computer readable memory, and processor operating as the recognition module, the object analysis module, and the subscription agent.

7. The device of claim 1, wherein the plurality of objects comprises different objects.

8. The device of claim 1, wherein the recognized objects include at least one of the following:

a poster, a person, a vehicle, a building, a toy, a logo, an album cover, a product, a celebrity, and a symbol.

9. The device of claim 1, wherein the recognized objects include at least a portion of a patient.

10. The device of claim 9, wherein the at least a portion of a patient includes a face.

11. The device of claim 1, wherein the at least one object recognition algorithm includes one of the following algorithms:

SIFT, FREAK, FAST, DAISY, BRISK, Harris, edge detection, and MSER.

12. The device of claim 1, wherein the subsets of descriptors include at least one of the following types of descriptors:

SIFT descriptors, FREAK descriptors, FAST descriptors, DAISY descriptors, BRISK descriptors, Harris descriptors, MSER descriptors, and edge descriptors.

13. The device of claim 1, wherein the channel identifiers include at least one of the following:

a URL, a URI, an IP address, a TCP port, a UDP port, a radio station, a wireless channel, a wavelength, a GUID, and a UUID.

14. The device of claim 1, wherein the query is submitted over a network to a search engine operating as the channel database.

15. The device of claim 1, wherein a list of content channel identifiers comprises a ranked list of the content channel identifiers.

16. The device of claim 15, wherein the content channel identifiers are ranked as a function of at least one of the following:

a distance from the subsets of descriptors to corresponding indexing descriptors, a device location information, a time information, a context information, a user preference, a relationship between users, an advertiser information, a payment, and a fee schedule.

17. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital content comprises a medical feed.

18. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital content comprises biometrics.

19. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital content comprises healthcare records.

20. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital content comprises at least one of the following:

a social feed, an advertising feed, a curated feed, a programmed feed, and a peer-to-peer feed.

21. The device of claim 1, wherein the digital content comprises at least one of the following types of content:

image content, video content, advertisement content, application data, and game content.

22. The device of claim 1, wherein the subscription agent is further configurable to use the channel identifiers to subscribe to the at least one digital content channel by establishing a communication session with the source device.

23. The device of claim 22, wherein the communication session is a persistent session.

24. The device of claim 22, wherein the subscription agent is further configurable to retrieve the digital content from the source device via at least one of:

a continuous feed, a periodic feed, a push feed, and a pull feed.