Selection and presentation of context-relevant supplemental content and advertising

• US 7,769,756 B2
• Filed: 03/08/2007
• Issued: 08/03/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/07/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sling Media LLC (Dish Network Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Sling Media Incorporated (Dish Network Corporation)
• Inventors: Krikorian, Jason, Krikorian, Blake, Meckler, Brian
• Primary Examiner(s): LEROUX, ETIENNE PIERRE
• Application Number:
  US11/683,862
• Publication Number:
  US 20070234213A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,244 Days
• Field of Search: 707/1, 707/104.1, 707/736, 725/60, 705/14
• US Class Current: 707/736
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/80 characterised by transmission among terminal devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/611 for multicast or broadcast systems for broadcast or conference H04L12/18; arrangements for broadcast or distribution combined with broadcast H04H20/00; arrangements for broadcast applications with a direct linkage to broadcast information or to broadcast space-time H04H60/00; selective distribution of broadcast services, e.g. multimedia broadcast multicast service [MBMS], H04W4/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/613 for the control of the source by the destination control signals issued by the client directed to the server or network components specially adapted for selective content distribution H04N21/637
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/70 Media network packetisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/762 at the source reformatting of additional data in video distribution servers H04N21/2355
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/102 characterised by the element, parameter or selection affected or controlled by the adaptive coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/107 between spatial and temporal predictive coding, e.g. picture refresh
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/115 Selection of the code volume for a coding unit prior to coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/117 Filters, e.g. for pre-processing or post-processing sub-band filter banks H04N19/635
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/132 Sampling, masking or truncation of coding units, e.g. adaptive resampling, frame skipping, frame interpolation or high-frequency transform coefficient masking
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/137 Motion inside a coding unit, e.g. average field, frame or block difference
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/14 Coding unit complexity, e.g. amount of activity or edge presence estimation H04N19/146 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/152 by measuring the fullness of the transmission buffer
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/162 User input
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/164 Feedback from the receiver or from the transmission channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/172 the region being a picture, frame or field
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/182 the unit being a pixel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/188 the unit being a video data packet, e.g. a network abstraction layer [NAL] unit
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/40 using video transcoding, i.e. partial or full decoding of a coded input stream followed by re-encoding of the decoded output stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/61 : in combination with predictive coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/80 : Details of filtering operations specially adapted for video compression, e.g. for pixel interpolation H04N19/635, H04N19/86 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/85 : using pre-processing or post-processing specially adapted for video compression
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23406 : involving management of server-side video buffer
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/235 : Processing of additional data, e.g. scrambling of additional data or processing content descriptors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23614 : Multiplexing of additional data and video streams arrangements for simultaneous broadcast of plural pieces of information H04H20/28
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2362 : Generation or processing of Service Information [SI]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25891 : being end-user preferences retrieval of video data in a video database based on user preferences G06F16/739; arrangements for recognizing users' preferences H04H60/46; 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 21/4126 : The peripheral being portable, e.g. PDAs or mobile phones
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/43074 : of additional data with content streams on the same device, e.g. of EPG data or interactive icon with a TV program
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4325 : by playing back content from the storage medium reproduction of recorded television signals H04N5/76; reproduction of recorded television signals H04N9/79
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4331 : Caching operations, e.g. of an advertisement for later insertion during playback
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/435 : Processing of additional data, e.g. decrypting of additional data, reconstructing software from modules extracted from the transport stream
• 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 21/4383 : Accessing a communication channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4384 : involving operations to reduce the access time, e.g. fast-tuning for reducing channel switching latency
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4394 : involving operations for analysing the audio stream, e.g. detecting features or characteristics in audio streams arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition of audio in broadcast systems H04H60/58
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44004 : involving video buffer management, e.g. video decoder buffer or video display buffer
• 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 21/4402 : involving reformatting operations of video signals for household redistribution, storage or real-time display details of conversion of video standards at pixel level H04N7/01; video transcoding H04N19/40; adapting incoming signals to the display format of the display terminal G09G5/005; media handling at the source in data packet switching networks H04L65/764
• 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 21/4622 : 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 21/632 : using a connection between clients on a wide area network, e.g. setting up a peer-to-peer communication via Internet for retrieving video segments from the hard-disk of other client devices broadcast-related systems characterised by transmission among terminal devices H04H60/80; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6587 : Control parameters, e.g. trick play commands, viewpoint selection
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 : involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8133 : specifically related to the content, e.g. biography of the actors in a movie, detailed information about an article seen in a video program
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8173 : End-user applications, e.g. Web browser, game
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8186 : specially adapted to be executed by a peripheral of the client device, e.g. by a reprogrammable remote control
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8405 : represented by keywords
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8586 : by using a URL processing chained hypermedia data for information retrieval G06F16/94; information retrieval from the Internet by using URLs G06F16/955; URL in broadcast information H04H20/93; Web-based protocols H04L67/02

Abstract

Media content is paired with context-relevant supplemental content, and the media and supplemental content are provided to a user. A media stream containing the media content may be received from a source system, and context information about the media content is determined from information about the media stream. The supplemental content may be selected based on the determined context information. This may enable a business model in which third parties can register advertising or other supplemental content and specify the criteria that cause it to be combined with the media content.

Claims

1. A method executable by a media player, the method comprising:

receiving a media stream of media content at the media player;

determining, using the media player, context information from the media content of the received media stream;

identifying supplemental content by the media player, the supplemental content being related to the context information; and

providing the media content and the supplemental content for presentation.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the supplemental content comprises a link to a web page.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the supplemental content comprises an advertisement.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the supplemental content comprises scrolling text related to the media content.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the supplemental content is presented on a media player as an overlay to the media content.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the supplemental content is embedded in an interface of the media player.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the supplemental content is presented via launching an application separate from the media player.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the media stream comprises a broadcast program, and determining the context information about the media stream comprises examining an electronic programming guide to identify the broadcast program.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the media stream is received from a base station of a placeshifting system.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining the supplemental content from a remote server.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

storing the supplemental content on a local storage of a system on which the media player is running; and

obtaining the supplemental content from the local storage.

12. The method of claim 1 wherein the media content comprises metadata provided within the media stream, and wherein the determining comprises analyzing the metadata.

13. The method of claim 1 wherein the media content comprises closed captioning information contained within the media stream, and wherein the determining comprises analyzing the closed captioning information.

14. The method of claim 1 wherein the media content comprises audio information contained within the media stream and wherein the determining comprises performing a voice recognition to identify spoken words in the media content.

15. The method of claim 1 wherein the media content comprises text messages displayed graphically within the media stream, and wherein the determining comprises performing an optical character recognition of the text messages.

16. The method of claim 1 wherein the media content comprises graphical objects contained within the media stream and wherein the determining comprises recognizing the graphical objects within the media content.

17. The method of claim 1 wherein the determining comprises analyzing the media content in real time as the media stream is received.

18. The method of claim 1 wherein the determining comprises analyzing the media content in real time.

19. The method of claim 1 further comprising providing the supplemental content and the media content for simultaneous presentation.

20. The method of claim 1 wherein the supplemental content is further selected based upon information about a user of the media player.

21. The method of claim 1 wherein the supplemental content is further selected based upon information about the media player.

22. The method of claim 1 wherein the supplemental content is further selected based upon a location of a user of the media player.

23. The method of claim 1 wherein the providing comprises displaying the supplemental content and the media content on the media player.

24. The method of claim 1 wherein the context information is content-relevant context information.

25. The method of claim 1 wherein the receiving comprises receiving the media stream at a placeshifting device, and further comprising transmitting the supplemental content and the media content to a media player.

26. The method of claim 1 wherein the receiving comprises receiving the media stream at a placeshifting device, wherein the determining and identifying are performed by the placeshifting device, and further comprising transmitting the supplemental content and the media content from the placeshifting device to a media player.

27. The method of claim 1 wherein the receiving comprises receiving the media stream at a media player, and further comprising presenting the supplemental content and the media content on the media player.

28. The method of claim 1 wherein the receiving comprises receiving the media stream at a media player, wherein the determining and identifying are performed by the media player, and further comprising presenting the supplemental content and the media content on the media player.

29. The method of claim 1 wherein the determining comprises analyzing the media content received within the media stream.

30. A method executable by a context system that processes media content that is selected by a viewer and placeshifted to a media player, the method comprising:

receiving a media stream at the context system, wherein the media stream comprises the media content selected by the viewer;

using the context system, determining context information from the media content of the received media stream;

selecting supplemental content based at least in part on the context information; and

transmitting the media content and the supplemental content from the context system to the media player for presentation to the viewer.

32. The method of claim 30, wherein the supplemental content comprises an advertisement.

33. The method of claim 30, wherein determining the context information comprises examining metadata received with the media stream.

34. The method of claim 30, wherein the context information about the media stream is determined by analyzing text transcripts of an audio portion of the media stream.

35. The method of claim 30, wherein the context information about the media stream is determined by analyzing an audio signal of the media stream.

36. The method of claim 35, wherein the audio signal comprises an audio signal in a subaudible tone.

37. The method of claim 30, wherein determining the context information about the media stream comprises referencing an electronic program guide to identify a broadcast program associated with the media stream.

38. The method of claim 30, further comprising:

combining the supplemental content and the media stream into a combined stream at the context system; and

transmitting the combined stream from the context system to a destination system.

39. The method of claim 30, further comprising:

combining the supplemental content and the media stream into a combined stream.

40. The method of claim 30, further comprising:

sending the supplemental content to a first output device and sending the media stream to a second output device, the first and second output devices being different.

41. The method of claim 30, further comprising synchronously presenting the media stream and the supplemental content.

42. The method of claim 30, further comprising synchronously presenting the media stream and the supplemental content.

43. The method of claim 30, wherein the supplemental content is selected based at least in part on usage-relevant context information.

44. The method of claim 43, wherein the usage-relevant context information includes at least one of a configuration and a capability of the media player.

45. The method of claim 43, wherein the usage-relevant context information includes information about the viewer.

46. The method of claim 43, wherein the usage-relevant context information includes at least one of a location of the media player and a time when the media stream is presented.

47. The method of claim 30, wherein the media stream comprises audio and video information.

48. The method of claim 30, wherein the supplemental content is presented as an overlay on the media stream.

49. The method of claim 30, wherein the supplemental content is presented as a web page.

50. The method of claim 30, wherein the supplemental content is presented as scrolling text on the media stream.

51. The method of claim 30 further comprising transmitting the supplemental content and the media content to a media player.

52. The method of claim 30 wherein the determining comprises analyzing the media content received within the media stream.

53. The method of claim 30 further comprising providing the supplemental content and the media content to a destination system.

54. The method of claim 30 wherein the receiving comprises receiving the media stream at a media player, and further comprising presenting the supplemental content and the media content on the media player.

31. The method of 30, wherein the context system is a placeshifting device.

55. A computer program product comprising a computer-readable medium containing computer program code for performing the method comprising:

receiving media content for presentation by a media player;

determining context information from the received media content using the media player;

identifying supplemental content using the media player, the supplemental content being related to the context information; and

presenting the supplemental content and the media content on the media player.

56. The computer program product of claim 55 wherein the determining comprises analyzing the media content received within the media stream.

57. A computer program product to process media content that is selected by a viewer and that is place shifted from a source system to a destination system, the computer program product comprising a computer-readable medium containing computer program code for performing the method comprising:

receiving a media stream from the source system that comprises the media content selected by a viewer;

determining context information from the media content of the received media stream;

selecting supplemental content based at least in part on the context information; and

providing the supplemental content and the media content to the destination system for presentation to the viewer.

58. The computer program product of claim 57 wherein the determining and selecting are performed by a placeshifting device, and wherein the providing comprises transmitting the supplemental content and the media content to the destination system.

59. The computer program product of claim 57 wherein the determining comprises analyzing the media content received within the media stream.

60. A method executable by a data processing system that processes media content that is selected by a viewer and placeshifted to a media player, the method comprising:

receiving a media stream comprising the media content selected by the viewer at a data processing system;

determining context information by analyzing the media content received within the media stream at the data processing system;

selecting supplemental content using the data processing system, wherein the supplemental content is based on the context information; and

transmitting the supplemental content and the media content from the data processing system over a network to the media player for presentation to the viewer.

61. The method of claim 60 wherein the context information is content-relevant context information.