Systems, methods, and devices for scanning broadcasts

• US 8,875,188 B2
• Filed: 02/05/2009
• Issued: 10/28/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 02/05/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: StratosAudio, Inc.
• Original Assignee: StratosAudio, Inc.
• Inventors: Christensen, Kelly M., Hansen, John Phillip, Mock, Thomas Daniel
• Primary Examiner(s): Flynn, Nathan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Castro, Alfonso
• Application Number:
  US12/366,483
• Publication Number:
  US 20090205000A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,091 Days
• Field of Search: 725/61, 725/115, 709/219
• US Class Current: 725/61
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 2300/8023 the game being played by multiple players at a common site, e.g. in an arena, theatre, shopping mall using a large public display
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/10 Indexing; Addressing; Timing or synchronising; Measuring tape travel
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/14 for monitoring programmes
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/22 Arrangements for broadcast of identical information via plural broadcast systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/24 Arrangements for distribution of identical information via broadcast system and non-broadcast system
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 2201/40 characterised in that additional data relating to the broadcast data are available via a different channel than the broadcast channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/37 for identifying segments of broadcast information, e.g. scenes or extracting programme ID
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/64 for providing detail information
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/235 Processing of additional data, e.g. scrambling of additional data or processing content descriptors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/26603 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 21/433 Content storage operation, e.g. storage operation in response to a pause request, caching operations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4343 Extraction or processing of packetized elementary streams [PES]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4345 Extraction or processing of SI, e.g. extracting service information from an MPEG stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/435 Processing of additional data, e.g. decrypting of additional data, reconstructing software from modules extracted from the transport stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8113 comprising music, e.g. song in MP3 format
• 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
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8456 by decomposing the content in the time domain, e.g. in time segments
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/16 Analogue secrecy systems; Analogue subscription systems

Abstract

The various embodiments disclosed herein provide methods, systems, and devices for capturing broadcast streams, analyzing the broadcast streams to obtain information about the media content transmitted in the broadcast streams, obtaining additional information about the media content if available, and assigning a unique event identifier specific to the instance of broadcast of the broadcast stream and/or media segment transmitted in the broadcast stream. In other embodiments, the unique event identifier is broadcasted to broadcast receiving devices. With the unique event identifier, broadcast receiving devices can access the obtained information associated with the media content.

Claims

1. A broadcast scanning system comprising:

a stream scanner module to receive a specific broadcast stream from a broadcast source and extract associated third party encoded data encoded corollary to the specific broadcast stream, wherein the specific broadcast stream comprises at least a media content;

a stream analysis module to analyze the specific broadcast stream to initiate an identification of the media content in the specific broadcast stream, wherein the initiation is based at least in part on the associated third party encoded data;

a scanning management system module to package data preparatory to a database entry comprising at least part of the analysis from the stream analysis module;

a management module to process the database entry and to generate a unique event identifier specific to an instance of reception of the associated third party encoded data;

a media storage database module to store in a media storage database at least the unique event identifier specific to the instance of reception of the associated third party encoded data and the database entry, wherein the unique event identifier specific to the instance of reception of the associated third party encoded data is database linked to the database entry;

a device monitoring module to transmit the unique identifier specific to the instance of reception of the associated third party encoded data to at least one of the plurality of broadcast receiving devices; and

one or more computers to operate the stream scanner module, stream analysis module, scanning management system module, management module, media storage database module, and device monitoring module, wherein the one or more computers comprises a computer processor and an electronic storage medium.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the unique event identifier specific to the instance of reception of the associated third party encoded data is database indexed to data that enables the unique identification of a specific instance of transmission of the media segment.