Detection of media links in broadcast signals

• US 7,421,723 B2
• Filed: 09/19/2001
• Issued: 09/02/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 01/07/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Nielsen Company (US), LLC
• Original Assignee: Nielsen Media Research, Inc. (Nielsen Holdings plc)
• Inventors: Feininger, William A., Smithpeters, Craig M., Harkness, David H., Lu, Daozheng
• Primary Examiner(s): Salce; Jason P
• Application Number:
  US09/955,691
• Publication Number:
  US 20020059633A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,540 Days
• Field of Search: 725/9, 725/11, 725/13, 725 14- 20, 725/51, 725/112, 725/115
• US Class Current: 725/14
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/14 for monitoring programmes
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/28 Arrangements for simultaneous broadcast of plural pieces of information
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/93 which locates resources of other pieces of information, e.g. URL [Uniform Resource Locator]
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 2201/90 characterised by the use of signatures
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/37 for identifying segments of broadcast information, e.g. scenes or extracting programme ID
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/40 for identifying broadcast time
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/43 for identifying broadcast channels
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/56 Arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition covered by groups H04H60/29-H04H60/54
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44204 Monitoring of content usage, e.g. the number of times a movie has been viewed, copied or the amount which has been watched monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; protecting generic digital content where the protection is independent of the precise nature of the content G06F21/10; arrangements for monitoring the use made of the broadcast services in broadcast systems H04H60/31
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6582 Data stored in the client, e.g. viewing habits, hardware capabilities, credit card number arrangements where receivers interact with the broadcast H04H20/38
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8352 involving content or source identification data, e.g. Unique Material Identifier [UMID]

Abstract

A detection apparatus includes a tuner tuned to the program and a meter coupled to the tuner and arranged to detect content ancillary information from the program tuned by the tuner. The content ancillary information may be a media link, closed captioning information, or the like. The meter may also be arranged to extract a broadcast signature from the program. A comparator compares the broadcast signature to a reference signature selected from a library of reference signatures based upon the content ancillary information. Broadcast signatures from unknown programs may be clustered at least partially on the basis of the content ancillary information.

Claims

1. A program identification system comprising:

a tuner tunable to at least one of a plurality of channels;

a meter coupled to the tuner, wherein the meter is arranged to detect a media link embedded in a program carried in a channel tuned by the tuner and to extract a broadcast signature from the program; and

a comparator arranged to generate a subset of reference signatures from a library of reference signatures based upon the media link, and to compare the broadcast signature extracted by the meter to the subset of reference signatures.

2. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein the media link is a URL.

3. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein the media link is a code referenced to a URL.

4. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein the media link is a trigger.

5. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein, if the broadcast signature does not have an embedded media link, the comparator is arranged to generate a second subset of reference signatures from the library of reference signatures based upon a hash code, and to compare the broadcast signature extracted by the meter to the second subset of reference signatures.

6. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein the reference signature includes an identification of the program.

7. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein the broadcast signature includes the channel and a time at which the broadcast signature is extracted.

8. The program identification system of claim 7 wherein the reference signature includes an identification of the program.

9. The program identification system of claim 1 wherein the media link is a hyperlink.