U.S. patent application number 15/696660 was filed with the patent office on 2018-01-11 for systems and methods for achieving ad avoidance by selectively switching media streams.
The applicant listed for this patent is Rovi Guides, Inc.. Invention is credited to William L. Thomas, Ti-Shiang Wang.
Application Number | 20180014046 15/696660 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 59295319 |
Filed Date | 2018-01-11 |
United States Patent
Application |
20180014046 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
Wang; Ti-Shiang ; et
al. |
January 11, 2018 |
SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR ACHIEVING AD AVOIDANCE BY SELECTIVELY
SWITCHING MEDIA STREAMS
Abstract
Systems and methods are disclosed herein for avoiding playback
of an advertisement by selectively switching between media streams.
To this end, a media guidance application receives a plurality of
media streams from different sources, switches to a first media
stream and plays back a first media asset of the first media
stream, and determines that an end to playback of the first media
asset is imminent. The media guidance application then determines
whether a second media stream of the plurality of media streams is
within a threshold amount of time of playing back a beginning of a
second media asset, and if the second media stream is within the
threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning of the
second media asset, the media guidance application switches from
the first media stream to the second media stream and plays back
the second media asset.
Inventors: |
Wang; Ti-Shiang; (Lexington,
MA) ; Thomas; William L.; (Evergreen, CO) |
|
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
Rovi Guides, Inc. |
San Carlos |
NY |
US |
|
|
Family ID: |
59295319 |
Appl. No.: |
15/696660 |
Filed: |
September 6, 2017 |
Related U.S. Patent Documents
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Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
|
|
15197348 |
Jun 29, 2016 |
9788024 |
|
|
15696660 |
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Current U.S.
Class: |
1/1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
H04N 21/2387 20130101;
H04N 21/26258 20130101; H04N 21/44016 20130101; H04N 21/812
20130101; H04N 21/4383 20130101; H04N 21/234 20130101; H04N 21/4532
20130101; H04N 21/23424 20130101; H04N 21/47217 20130101; H04N
21/23406 20130101; H04N 21/44004 20130101; H04N 21/278 20130101;
H04N 21/458 20130101; H04N 21/4622 20130101 |
International
Class: |
H04N 21/234 20110101
H04N021/234; H04N 21/472 20110101 H04N021/472; H04N 21/458 20110101
H04N021/458; H04N 21/44 20110101 H04N021/44; H04N 21/438 20110101
H04N021/438; H04N 21/262 20110101 H04N021/262; H04N 21/2387
20110101 H04N021/2387; H04N 21/81 20110101 H04N021/81; H04N 21/45
20110101 H04N021/45 |
Claims
1-50. (canceled)
51. A method for avoiding playback of an advertisement by
selectively switching between media streams, the method comprising:
receiving a plurality of media streams, wherein each media stream
of the plurality of media streams is received from a different
source; switching to a first media stream of the plurality of media
streams; playing back a first media asset of the first media
stream; determining that an end to playback of the first media
asset is imminent; in response to determining that the end to the
playback of the first media asset is imminent, determining whether
a second media stream of the plurality of media streams is within a
threshold amount of time of playing back a beginning of a second
media asset; and in response to determining that the second media
stream is within the threshold amount of time of playing back the
beginning of the second media asset: determining that a first
portion of playback of the first media asset overlaps with a second
portion of playback of the second media asset; buffering the second
portion of playback of the second media asset; detecting an end to
the playback of the first media asset; and in response to detecting
the end of the playback of the first media asset, playing back the
second media asset from a beginning of the second portion of the
second media stream.
52. The method of claim 51, wherein the determining whether the
second media stream of the plurality of media streams is within the
threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning of the
second media asset comprises: determining a type of the second
media asset; and configuring the threshold amount of time based on
the type of the second media asset.
53. The method of claim 51, further comprising: accessing a profile
of a user to whom the first media stream is being played back;
determining, based on data of the profile, whether the user prefers
the first media asset or the second media asset; in response to
determining that the user prefers the first media asset to the
second media asset, continuing playing back the first media stream
until detecting the end of the first media asset.
54. The method of claim 53, further comprising: in response to
determining that the user prefers the second media asset to the
first media asset, playing back the second media stream from the
beginning of the second portion in response to determining that the
end to playback of the first media asset is imminent but prior to
detecting the end of the firsts media asset
55. The method of claim 53, further comprising: determining that
the second media stream and a third media stream of the plurality
of media streams are both within the threshold amount of time of
playing back the beginning of the second media asset and a
beginning of the third media asset from the third media stream;
determining, based on data of the profile, whether the user prefers
the second media asset or the third media asset; and selecting one
of the second media stream and the third media stream based on user
preference as a candidate to switch the first media stream to.
56. The method of claim 51, wherein determining that the end to the
playback of the first media asset is imminent comprises:
determining an identity of the first media asset; determining a
length of the first media asset by, using a database, looking up
the length in an entry of the database that corresponds to the
identity; determining, based on the length, whether a threshold
amount of the first media asset has yet to be played back; and in
response to determining that the threshold amount of first media
asset has yet to be played back, determining that the end to the
playback of the first media asset is imminent.
57. The method of claim 51, wherein determining that the end to the
playback of the first media asset is imminent comprises: detecting
a trigger signal in the first media stream; and in response to
detecting the trigger signal, determining that the end to the
playback of the first media asset is imminent.
58. The method of claim 57, further comprising: determining, based
on a user profile, whether a user prefers to play back an entirety
of a given media even if user does not prefer the given media to a
different media; and in response to determining that the user
prefers to play back the entirety of the given media even if the
user does not prefer the given media to the different media,
refraining from performing the action that affects playback of at
least one of the first media stream and the second media
stream.
59. The method of claim 51, further comprising: determining that
the second media stream is not within the threshold amount of time
of playing back the beginning of the second media stream; in
response to determining that the second media stream is not within
the threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning of the
second media stream: determining whether any media stream of the
plurality of media streams is playing back non-advertisement media;
and in response to determining that a media stream is playing back
the non-advertisement media, upon playback of the first media
stream ending, switching from the first media stream to the media
stream that is playing back the non-advertisement media.
60. The method of claim 59, further comprising: determining that no
media stream of the plurality of media streams is playing back
non-advertisement media; and in response to determining that no
media stream of the plurality of media streams is playing back
non-advertisement media: switching from the first media stream to a
media source that is not a media stream; and playing back a third
media stream from the media source that is not the media
stream.
61. A system for avoiding playback of an advertisement by
selectively switching between media streams, the system comprising:
a memory unit; communication circuitry; display circuitry; and
control circuitry configured to: receive, via the communication
circuitry, a plurality of media streams, wherein each media stream
of the plurality of media streams is received from a different
source; switch to a first media stream of the plurality of media
streams; play back, via the display circuitry, a first media asset
of the first media stream; determine that an end to playback of the
first media asset is imminent; in response to determining that the
end to the playback of the first media asset is imminent, determine
whether a second media stream of the plurality of media streams is
within a threshold amount of time of playing back a beginning of a
second media asset; and in response to determining that the second
media stream is within the threshold amount of time of playing back
the beginning of the second media asset: determine that a first
portion of playback of the first media asset overlaps with a second
portion of playback of the second media asset; buffer, at the
memory unit, the second portion of playback of the second media
asset; detect an end to the playback of the first media asset; and
in response to detecting the end of the playback of the first media
asset, play back, via the display circuitry, the second media asset
from a beginning of the second portion of the second media
stream.
62. The system of claim 61, wherein the control circuitry, when
determining whether the second media stream of the plurality of
media streams is within the threshold amount of time of playing
back the beginning of the second media asset is configured to:
determine a type of the second media asset; and configure the
threshold amount of time based on the type of the second media
asset.
63. The system of claim 61, wherein the control circuitry is
further configured to: access a profile of a user to whom the first
media stream is being played back; determine, based on data of the
profile, whether the user prefers the first media asset or the
second media asset; in response to determining that the user
prefers the first media asset to the second media asset, continue
playing back the first media stream until detecting the end of the
first media asset.
64. The system of claim 63, wherein the control circuitry is
further configured to: in response to determining that the user
prefers the second media asset to the first media asset, play back
the second media stream from the beginning of the second portion in
response to determining that the end to playback of the first media
asset is imminent but prior to detecting the end of the firsts
media asset
65. The system of claim 63, wherein the control circuitry is
further configured to: determine that the second media stream and a
third media stream of the plurality of media streams are both
within the threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning
of the second media asset and a beginning of the third media asset
from the third media stream; determine, based on data of the
profile, whether the user prefers the second media asset or the
third media asset; and select one of the second media stream and
the third media stream based on user preference as a candidate to
switch the first media stream to.
66. The system of claim 61, wherein the control circuitry, when
determining that the end to the playback of the first media asset
is imminent, is further configured to: determine an identity of the
first media asset; determine a length of the first media asset by,
using a database, looking up the length in an entry of the database
that corresponds to the identity; determine, based on the length,
whether a threshold amount of the first media asset has yet to be
played back; and in response to determining that the threshold
amount of first media asset has yet to be played back, determine
that the end to the playback of the first media asset is
imminent.
67. The system of claim 61, wherein the control circuitry, when
determining that the end to the playback of the first media asset
is imminent, is further configured to: detect a trigger signal in
the first media stream; and in response to detecting the trigger
signal, determine that the end to the playback of the first media
asset is imminent.
68. The system of claim 67, wherein the control circuitry is
further configured to: determine, based on a user profile, whether
a user prefers to play back an entirety of a given media even if
user does not prefer the given media to a different media; and in
response to determining that the user prefers to play back the
entirety of the given media even if the user does not prefer the
given media to the different media, refrain from performing the
action that affects playback of at least one of the first media
stream and the second media stream.
69. The system of claim 61, wherein the control circuitry is
further configured to: determine that the second media stream is
not within the threshold amount of time of playing back the
beginning of the second media stream; in response to determining
that the second media stream is not within the threshold amount of
time of playing back the beginning of the second media stream:
determine whether any media stream of the plurality of media
streams is playing back non-advertisement media; and in response to
determining that a media stream is playing back the
non-advertisement media, upon playback of the first media stream
ending, switch from the first media stream to the media stream that
is playing back the non-advertisement media.
70. The system of claim 69, wherein the control circuitry is
further configured to: determine that no media stream of the
plurality of media streams is playing back non-advertisement media;
and in response to determining that no media stream of the
plurality of media streams is playing back non-advertisement media:
switch from the first media stream to a media source that is not a
media stream; and play back a third media stream from the media
source that is not the media stream.
Description
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0001] Streaming media has become prevalent in users' lives. Over
the course of time, the types of sources from which users stream
media has grown from simple broadcast sources (e.g., over the air
television or radio) to a myriad of other sources, like
over-the-top ("OTT") streaming media providers, Internet media
distributers, Internet radio stations, and the like.
[0002] As streaming media increases in popularity, streaming media
providers seek to increase revenue by embedding advertisements in
the media streams (e.g., as commercials that are inserted in
between playback of portions of a given program or song). Consumers
have responded negatively to such advertising, as it is disruptive
to the media consumption experience. Thus, technology was developed
to either remove advertisements or make advertisements skippable in
recorded versions of streaming media, or to offer users alternative
content to an advertisement when an advertisement is detected in
streaming media. In many cases, however, users may not wish to have
to record media in order to avoid advertisements, and instead would
like to consume the media when it is aired. Moreover, advertisers
and media streaming sources have begun implementing sophisticated
technology to disable mechanisms for removing advertisements, thus
rendering efforts to thwart avoidance of viewing an advertisement
by way of recording or inserting substitute content moot.
SUMMARY
[0003] Systems and methods are provided herein for avoiding
advertisements by way of actively and intelligently switching
between media streaming sources when playback of an advertisement
is imminent or has occurred. The active switching process ensures
that playback of non-advertisement content seamlessly occurs, while
simultaneously ensuring that schema implemented by media content
sources and third parties for forcing consumption of advertisement
content is thwarted.
[0004] To this end, systems and methods are provided herein for
avoiding playback of an advertisement by selectively switching
between media streams. In some embodiments, a media guidance
application may be executed by control circuitry of a user
equipment. The media guidance application may receive a plurality
of media streams, wherein each media stream of the plurality of
media streams is received from a different source. For example, the
media guidance application may receive streams of multimedia, like
music (and may potentially also receive advertisements) from an FM
radio station, an Internet radio station (e.g., Pandora), or an OTT
music streaming provider. The media guidance application may be a
master application that manages and switches between the received
streams of multimedia, like music.
[0005] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
switch to a first media stream of the plurality of media streams
(e.g., the Internet radio station), and may play back a first media
asset of the first media stream, such as a song that is presently
being played back by the first media stream.
[0006] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that an end to playback of the first media asset is
imminent. In some embodiments, this determination may be performed
by first determining an identity of the first media asset. For
example, the media guidance application may reference metadata
transmitted with the first media asset, and the metadata may
indicate the title of the first media asset. The media guidance
application may then determine a length of the first media by,
using a database, looking up the length in an entry of the database
that corresponds to the identity. For example, an entry in a
database may indicate a length of the media asset.
[0007] The media guidance application may go on to determine, based
on the length, whether a threshold amount of the first media asset
has yet to be played back. For example, the threshold may be a
default setting, e.g., 15 seconds, where, if 15 seconds or less
remains in the media asset, then the end of the media asset is
near. Thus, the media guidance application, in response to
determining that the threshold amount of first media asset has yet
to be played back (e.g., there are fewer than 15 seconds remaining
in the media asset), may determine that the end to the playback of
the first media is imminent.
[0008] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that the end to the playback of the first media asset is
imminent by detecting a trigger signal in the first media stream,
and, in response to detecting the trigger signal, determining that
the end to the playback of the first media asset is imminent. For
example, the media guidance application may detect an explicit
signal that informs the media guidance application that the end to
the playback of the first media asset is imminent, or may detect
noise or background audio or color (e.g., a black screen) that
indicates that a transition to an advertisement is occurring.
[0009] In some embodiments, the media guidance application, in
response to determining that the end to the playback of the first
media asset is imminent, may determine whether a second media
stream of the plurality of media streams is within a threshold
amount of time of playing back a beginning of a second media asset.
For example, the media guidance application may determine that a
second media asset will begin streaming on a second media stream in
the next ten seconds, or has begun streaming within the last ten
seconds. In response to determining that the second media stream is
within the threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning
of the second media asset, the media guidance application may
switch from the first media stream to the second media stream, and
may play back the second media asset.
[0010] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
access a profile of a user to whom the first media asset is being
played back. For example, the preferences of the user may be loaded
from a local or remote memory. These preference may, for example,
arise from historical consumption data (e.g., multimedia that the
user commonly consumes), or may arise from explicit user input
(e.g., a user inputting data that states a preference for
particular multimedia). The media guidance application may
determine, based on data of the profile, whether the user prefers
the first media asset or the second media asset, and may perform an
action that affects playback of at least one of the first media
asset and the second media asset based on the determination of
whether the user prefers the first media asset or the second media
asset.
[0011] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
detect that a portion of the playback of the first media asset
overlaps with a portion of the playback of the second media asset,
and may determine that that the user prefers the first media asset
to the second media asset. Thus, when performing the action that
affects playback of at least one of the first media asset and the
second media asset the media guidance application, in response to
determining that the user prefers the first media asset, may buffer
the portion of the playback of the second media asset, may detect
an end to the playback of the first media asset, and may, in
response to detecting the end to the playback of the first media
asset, play back the second media asset from a beginning of the
buffered portion. For example, the media guidance application may
avoid chopping or cutting off the last few seconds of a song that
is playing of the first media stream because the user enjoys
listening to the song, and may thus buffer the second media asset
until such a time that the song ends, at which time the second
media asset may be played back from its beginning without the user
missing out on the overlapping portion.
[0012] Similarly, in some embodiments, the media guidance
application may determine that the user prefers the second media
asset to the first media asset. Accordingly, when the media
guidance application performs the action that affects playback of
at least one of the first media asset and the second media asset,
the media guidance application may, in response to determining that
the user prefers the second media asset, switch from the first
media stream to the second media stream prior to detecting an end
to the playback of the first media asset. For example, the media
guidance application may chop the last few seconds of the first
media asset, and may immediately move on to playback of the second
media asset, thus moving to the song that the user prefers
immediately.
[0013] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine, based on the user profile, whether a user prefers to
play back an entirety of a given media asset even if user does not
prefer the given media asset to a different media asset. For
example, the user may dislike any song to be chopped, and may thus
disable a setting that allows for chops, or may enable a setting
that prevents chops. As another example, while the user may prefer
the second media asset to the first media asset, the user may also
sufficiently be interested in the first media asset to wish for the
first media asset to not be cut off, and may thus implement the
above-mentioned buffering mechanism for the second media asset even
though the second media asset is preferred. Thus, in response to
determining that the user prefers to play back the entirety of the
given media even if the user does not prefer the given media asset
to the different media asset, the media guidance application may
refrain from performing the action that affects playback of at
least one of the first media asset and the second media asset.
[0014] In some embodiments, the media guidance application, when
determining whether the second media stream of the plurality of
media streams is within a threshold amount of time of playing back
a beginning of a second media asset comprises, may determine that
the second media stream is within the threshold amount of time of
playing back the beginning of the second media asset, and may also
determine that a third media stream of the plurality of media
streams is within the threshold amount of time of playing back the
beginning of a third media asset. Thus, the media guidance
application may have multiple choices of media streams to switch
to.
[0015] In response to determining that the second media stream is
within the threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning
of the second media asset, and also in response to determining that
the third media stream of the plurality of media streams is within
the threshold amount of time of playing back the beginning of the
third media asset, the media guidance application may determine,
based on a profile of a user to whom the first media asset is being
played back, that the user prefers the third media asset to the
second media asset, and, may responsively switch from the first
media stream to the third media stream. Thus, the media guidance
application may select a media stream of several candidate media
streams that is playing back a media asset (e.g., song) that the
user prefers most.
[0016] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that the second media stream is not within the threshold
amount of time of playing back the beginning of the second media
asset, and thus, that the second media stream is not a viable
stream to switch to. Thus, in response to determining that the
second media stream is not within the threshold amount of time of
playing back the beginning of the second media asset, the media
guidance application may determine whether any media stream of the
plurality of media streams is playing back non-advertisement media,
and may, in response to determining that a media stream is playing
back the non-advertisement media, upon playback of the first media
asset ending, switch from the first media stream to the media
stream that is playing back the non-advertisement media. By doing
so, the media guidance application may ensure a seamless switching
to non-advertisement media, even if the non-advertisement media is
not played back from substantially its beginning.
[0017] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that no media stream of the plurality of media streams is
playing back non-advertisement media (e.g., because every media
stream is playing back an advertisement). In response to
determining that no media stream of the plurality of media streams
is playing back non-advertisement media, the media guidance
application may switch from the first media stream to a media
source that is not a media stream, and may play back a third media
asset from the media source that is not the media stream. For
example, the media guidance application may switch to a
locally-stored media, such as a song stored on the user equipment,
or a video stored on a digital video recorder (DVR).
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0018] FIG. 1 depicts an illustrative embodiment of a switching
diagram that depicts how a media guidance application may switch
between different media streams, in accordance with some
embodiments of the disclosure;
[0019] FIG. 2 shows an illustrative embodiment of a display screen
that may be used to provide media guidance application listings and
other media guidance information, in accordance with some
embodiments of the disclosure;
[0020] FIG. 3 shows another illustrative embodiment of a display
screen that may be used to provide media guidance application
listings, in accordance with some embodiments of the
disclosure;
[0021] FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an illustrative user equipment
(UE) device in accordance with some embodiments of the
disclosure;
[0022] FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an illustrative media system in
accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;
[0023] FIG. 6 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for
seamlessly switching between media sources to avoid advertisement
content, in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;
and
[0024] FIG. 7 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for
leveraging profile information in order to switch between media
sources in a manner tailored to a specific user, in accordance with
some embodiments of the disclosure.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0025] FIG. 1 depicts an illustrative embodiment of a switching
diagram that depicts how a media guidance application may switch
between different media streams, in accordance with some
embodiments of the disclosure. The media guidance application may
be executed by control circuitry of user equipment, as is described
in further detail below with respect to FIGS. 2-5. Media streams
101, 102, 103, 104, and 105 may be any type of media content
source, such as a broadcast television or radio source, an OTT
media source, Internet source (e.g., Internet radio), or any other
media content source described below with respect to FIGS. 2-5.
[0026] Media assets 111-115, 131-135, and 141-145, while depicted
as songs, may be any media assets described below with respect to
FIGS. 2-5. Advertisements 121-125 and 151-155 may be any
advertisements, as described below with respect to FIGS. 2-5. While
the term "advertisement" is used to describe advertisements 121-125
and 151-155, this term is not limited to advertisements, and may
additionally refer to any media that is not consistent with a main
use of a media stream. For example, a main use of a media stream
provided by a radio service is playback of music or of a talk show;
thus, chatter by disk jockeys, games, quizzes, entertainment
updates, self-promotion spots, song dedications, or other non-music
content is inconsistent with the main use of the media stream
provided by the radio service. Thus, the term "advertisement" as
used in this disclosure may equally refer to any such content that
is not an advertisement, but is nevertheless inconsistent with the
main use of a given media stream.
[0027] The media assets and advertisements described with respect
to FIG. 1 are received by way of media streams 101-105. When a
media asset or advertisement of FIG. 1 is referred to this may
interchangeably refer to the actual media content or advertisement
content itself, or the slot of time in which the media asset or
advertisement content is being provided through its respective
media source.
[0028] As depicted in FIG. 1, the media guidance application may
receive streams of multimedia, such as music (and may potentially
also receive advertisements) from multiple media content sources -
namely, media streams 101-105, which, as described above and below,
may be an FM radio station, an Internet radio station (e.g.,
Pandora), an OTT music streaming provider, and the like. The media
guidance application may be a master application that manages and
switches between the received streams of music. The word master
application, as used herein, refers to an application that acts as
a master with respect to other applications (sometimes referred to
as "slave applications" herein). As a master, the master
application may provide commands to the slave applications and/or
to control circuitry of the user equipment that executes the master
application, which the commanded entity shall execute. For example,
the master application may command a slave application (e.g., a
satellite radio station application) to change a station to which
it is tuned. The master application may silence a slave application
and run it to the background, and switch to a different slave
application to which volume is enabled and which will be commanded
to run in the foreground. The master application may enable and
transmit any command that effects media guidance or media playback
as described herein.
[0029] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
switch to a first media stream of the plurality of media streams
(e.g., the Internet radio station). For example, the media guidance
application may tune or switch to media stream 101. This may be
done by switching from a dormant state (e.g., the master
application is not effecting media consumption/playback at all) to
an active state (the master application is now effecting media
consumption/playback). Alternatively, this may be done by the media
guidance application switching from a different media source (e.g.,
media stream 104) to media stream 101.
[0030] The media guidance application may switch to media stream
101 through any known mechanism for accessing an application or
media stream, such as activating an application from which media
stream 101 is received from a dormant state. If the application
from which media stream 101 is received is active but is being run
as a background application (e.g., where the media stream is
received and processed by the user equipment, but is not played
back), the media guidance application may run the application as a
foreground application (such that media stream 101 is actually
played back). In some embodiments, an application from which media
stream 101 is received may run on a different user equipment from
the user equipment on which the media guidance application is
executed. For example, if a user is in a car, the media guidance
application may command an FM radio attached to the car to power on
and tune to a frequency corresponding to media stream 101. In any
of these manners, and any other manner of which media stream 101
may be made accessible to the media guidance application, the media
guidance application may play back media asset 111, which is a
first media asset of the first media stream. As depicted, media
asset 111 is a song by the musical artists, for example, the
Rolling Stones.
[0031] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that an end to playback of media asset 111 is imminent.
In some embodiments, this determination may be performed by the
media guidance application first determining an identity of media
asset 111 (e.g., to determine a length of media asset 111, which
can then be used to determine at what time media asset 111 will
end). There are many ways in which to determine an identity of
media asset 111, several of which will be detailed herein, but the
disclosure contemplates any way to determine an identity of media
asset 111.
[0032] In some embodiments, media asset 111 is a television
broadcast, and is broadcast with auxiliary information, such as
information in the vertical blanking interval ("VBI") of the
broadcast itself, and/or auxiliary information transmitted in an
auxiliary signal, such as an Internet signal. The auxiliary
information may include any information describing media asset 111,
such as its length, title, when it is to broadcast, and the like.
The media guidance application may process this auxiliary
information in any known manner (several known manners are
discussed below with respect to FIGS. 2-5). Similarly, in some
embodiments, media asset 111 may be broadcast over a radio station,
and Radio Data System ("RDS") data may be sent with media asset
111. The RDS data is similar to that described above with respect
to information auxiliary to a television broadcast, and may be
processed by the media guidance application in similar ways. In
some embodiments, media assets 111-115, 131-135, and 141-145 may be
broadcast on a schedule, and the auxiliary information may be
downloaded to a schedule database periodically, which the media
guidance application may reference to learn of the auxiliary
information.
[0033] In some embodiments, auxiliary and/or RDS data may be
inaccessible or incomplete. Thus, in order to determine the length
of media asset 111, the media guidance application may reference
metadata transmitted with media asset 111 (e.g., the auxiliary or
RDS data), and the metadata may indicate not indicate the length of
media asset 111. In this instance, the media guidance application
may learn the length of media asset 111 by learning some other
identifying metadata relating to media asset 111, such as the title
of the first media asset. The media guidance application may then
determine a length of media asset 111 by using the identifying
attribute (e.g., title) to look up the media asset in an entry of
the database that corresponds to that attribute. In some
embodiments, no metadata will be broadcast with media asset 111.
Thus, the media guidance application may learn an identifying
attribute of media asset 111 by sampling a portion of media asset
111 and comparing characteristics of the sampled portion to a
database to learn the identity of media asset 111. This process,
known in the art as fingerprinting, may be used to identify a media
asset based on audio data or visual data alone. Using any of these
techniques, the media guidance application may leverage an entry in
a database that relates to media asset 111 to learn a length of the
media asset.
[0034] The media guidance application may go on to determine, based
on the length, whether a threshold amount of media asset 111 has
yet to be played back. This threshold may be a number reflective of
a maximum a unit of time (e.g., a number of a seconds) before a
media asset is definitively about to end. The media guidance
application (or an editor programming the media guidance
application) may set the threshold differently for different types
of media assets. For example, a thirty-minute television or
on-demand program may be deemed to be about to end if five minutes
are remaining, but a 3-minute song may be deemed about to end if
only 15 seconds are remaining. The media guidance application may
dynamically determine the threshold (e.g., as a function of the
total length (such as, set the threshold to be 5% of the total
time)), or the threshold may be assigned by default, by an editor
or determined by a user's instruction or preference. When the media
guidance application determines that the threshold amount of first
media asset has yet to be played back, the media guidance
application may determine that the end to the playback of the first
media is imminent.
[0035] In some embodiments, metadata, auxiliary data, and length is
not used by the media guidance application to determine that the
end to the playback of the first media asset is imminent. Instead,
the media guidance application may simply detect a trigger signal
in media stream 101, and, in response to detecting the trigger
signal, the media guidance application may determine that the end
to the playback of the first media asset is imminent. A trigger
signal, as used herein, may be any signal (e.g., interrupt) that
expressly or impliedly indicates to the media guidance application
that a media asset is about to end. An example of an implied
indication may be, for example, when the media guidance application
detects noise or background audio or color (e.g., a black screen
that separates a program from a commercial) that indicates that a
transition to an advertisement is occurring.
[0036] In some embodiments, the media guidance application, in
response to determining that the end to the playback of media asset
111 is imminent, may determine whether a different media stream
from media streams 102-105 is within a threshold amount of time of
playing back a beginning of a second media asset. In other words,
the media guidance application may determine whether any of media
assets 112-115 either just recently began playing back, or are
imminently going to have their playback begin, by streams 102-105.
This threshold may be set in any manner described in the foregoing
(e.g., as a function of how long a given media asset is, by an
editor, or by a user's instruction or preference). Looking at FIG.
1, media asset 111 ends at time t2. At time t2 (or just before time
t2, when time t2 is imminently approaching, as described above),
the media guidance application may determine that media asset 115,
which as depicted in FIG. 1 is a song by the rock band Queen, has
recently begun at time t1. The media guidance application may
compare t2 to t1, and may determine that t1 is within a threshold
amount of time of t2. Thus, the media guidance application may
responsively switch from media stream 101 to media stream 105 in
order to play back media asset 115.
[0037] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
access a profile of a user to whom the media asset 111 is being
played back. The profile, defined in further detail below with
respect to FIGS. 2-5, may be a collection of preferences relating
to a user. The profile may be stored locally to memory of the user
equipment executing the media guidance application, or may be
stored remote to the user equipment at a database, such as a media
guidance data source or media content source, each of which are
described in further detail below with respect to FIGS. 2-5. Among
other things, the preference may be any attribute corresponding to
multimedia. In the example of music, preferences may be, for
example, genre (soft rock, heavy metal, live, unplugged), era
(60's, 70's, 80's, 90's), or any other attribute corresponding of
music. Similarly, for video, preferences may be genre or type
(sitcom, drama), live video versus recorded video, video with a
certain actor, or any other attribute. Preferences may be input by
a user expressly, or may be learned by monitoring the user's
activity. Preferences are discussed in further detail below with
respect to FIGS. 2-5. The media guidance application may load the
preferences of the user from the profile, whether it is stored on a
local or remote memory, by transmitting a request to the memory for
retrieving the preferences.
[0038] The media guidance application may determine, based on data
of the profile, whether the user prefers the media asset 111 to a
different media asset being broadcast by one of media streams
102-105. Based on this determination, the media guidance
application may perform an action that affects playback of at least
one of media asset 111 and media assets played by others of media
streams 102-105. Some non-limiting examples of potential actions
that affect playback are described below.
[0039] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
detect that a portion of the playback of the media asset 111
overlaps with a portion of the playback of a media asset to be
switched to (e.g., media asset 115). For example, between t1 and
t2, as depicted in FIG. 1, media asset 111 and media asset 115 have
overlapping playback portions. Thus, the media guidance action may
take a number of actions. For example, the media guidance
application may immediately switch to media asset 115 at t1,
effectively chopping the last part of media asset 111 from
playback. As an alterative, the media guidance application may be
enabled to buffer media asset 115 from t1, either to t2 or until
media asset 111 has completed playback, and then may begin playback
of media asset 115 from its beginning by leveraging the buffer. As
another alternative, the media guidance application may play media
asset 111 until time t2, and may chop the beginning of media asset
115 and simply switch to media stream 105 at t2, thus causing media
asset 115 to begin playback from an intermediate position of the
media asset. These possibilities are each explored in further
detail below.
[0040] Following from the above, the media guidance application may
determine (e.g., at time t1, time t2, or at a time when the end of
media asset 111 is imminent) that the user prefers the media asset
111 to, e.g., media asset 115. Thus, when performing the action
that affects playback of at least one of the media asset 111 and
media asset 115 the media guidance application, in response to
determining that the user prefers the first media asset, may buffer
the portion of the playback of the second media asset (e.g., from
time t1, either to t2 or until media asset 111 has completed
playback, or from the time of the determination of t2). In some
embodiments, this buffering may always occur. In some embodiments,
the media guidance application may first determine, based on the
user profile, whether the user is likely to enjoy media asset 115
notwithstanding that the user prefers media asset 111 to media
asset 115, and may trigger this buffering when the user is likely
to enjoy media asset 115. When the media guidance application
detects an end to the playback of the first media asset (e.g., at
time t2), the media guidance application may go on to play back
media asset 115 from a beginning of the buffered portion. In this
way, the media guidance application may avoid chopping or cutting
off the last few seconds of, e.g., a song that is playing on media
stream 101 because the user enjoys listening to that song, and may
thus buffer media asset 115 until such a time that the song (i.e.,
media asset 111) ends, at which time the media asset 115 may be
played back from its beginning without the user missing out on the
overlapping portion.
[0041] Alternative to the foregoing, the media guidance application
may determine that the user prefers the second media asset (e.g.,
media asset 115) to media asset 111. Accordingly, the action that
affects playback of at least one of the first media asset and the
second media asset comprises may be the media guidance application,
in response to determining that the user prefers the second media
asset, switching from media stream 101 to media stream 105 prior to
detecting an end to the playback of media asset 111. For example,
the media guidance application may chop the last few seconds of the
first media asset (e.g., the portion of media asset 111 that would
have been played back between times t1 and t2, the portion of media
asset 111 that would have been played back between when the media
guidance application determined that the end to media asset 111 was
imminent, and the like), and may move on to playback of the media
asset 115, thus quickly moving to the media asset that the user
prefers, potentially immediately. The timing of the media guidance
application implementing these playback operations is described in
further detail below.
[0042] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine, based on the user profile, whether a user prefers to
play back an entirety of a given media asset even if user does not
prefer the given media asset to a different media. For example, the
user may dislike any song or video to be chopped, and may thus
disable a setting that allows for chops, or may enable a setting
that prevents chops. This setting may be expressly enabled by the
user (e.g., by way of a setup process using the media guidance
application). Alternatively, the media guidance application may
provide an option to undo a chop and switch back to a previous
media stream, and the media guidance application may monitor the
user's habits with respect to this option. If the user always or
routinely reverts to a previous media stream after a song is
chopped, the media guidance application may refrain from chopping
songs in the future.
[0043] As another example, while the user may prefer the second
media asset (e.g., media asset 115) to the media asset 111, the
user may also sufficiently be interested in the first media asset
to wish for the first media asset not to be cut off, and may thus
implement the above-mentioned buffering mechanism for media asset
111 even though media asset 115 is preferred. The media guidance
application may determine whether a user does not prefer cutoffs
for a single song based on a relative level of preference of a user
for a song relative to a threshold. For example, if the user's
profile reflects a sufficient amount of attributes of media assets
that the user enjoys (e.g., artist, style, genre, etc.) are in
common with media asset 111, then the media guidance application
may refrain from chopping media asset 111 even if a different song
(e.g., media asset 115) is simultaneously playing back. Thus, in
response to determining that the user prefers to play back the
entirety of the given media asset even if the user does not prefer
the given media to the different media asset, the media guidance
application may refrain from performing an action that affects
playback of the given media asset (e.g., media asset 111).
[0044] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may have
multiple choices of which of media streams 102-105 to switch away
to when media asset 111's end is imminent (e.g., because media
assets from at least two of media streams 102-105 either have just
started or are just about to start). In such a scenario, the media
guidance application may determine, based on a profile of a user to
whom media asset 111 is being played back, that the user prefers
the third media asset (e.g., media asset 114) to the second media
asset (e.g., media asset 115), and, may responsively switch from
media stream 101 to the media stream 104. Thus, the media guidance
application may select a media stream of several candidate media
streams that is playing back a media asset (e.g., song) that the
user prefers most. As described above, this switching may or may
not may involve a chopping of either media asset 111 or 114, and
may or may not involve a buffering of media asset 114. Optionally,
the media guidance application may also buffer media asset 115 and
play back media asset 115 at the conclusion of playback of media
asset 114.
[0045] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that none of media streams 102-105 are about to begin
playback of a media asset when media asset 111's playback has an
imminent end, and that none of media streams 102-105 have just
recently begun playback of a media asset. In order to avoid
advertisement media, the media guidance application may, in this
scenario, determine whether any of media streams 102-105 is playing
back non-advertisement media, and may, in response to determining
that a media stream is playing back the non-advertisement media,
upon playback of the first media asset ending, switch from the
first media stream to the media stream that is playing back the
non-advertisement media. By doing so, the media guidance
application may ensure a seamless switching to non-advertisement
media, even if the non-advertisement media is not played back from
substantially its beginning. The determination of whether a given
media stream is playing non-advertisement media or advertisement
media may be made by way of any of the above-described markers -
including VBI information, RDS information, and the like.
[0046] In some embodiments, the media guidance application may
determine that no media stream of the plurality of media streams is
playing back non-advertisement media (e.g., because every media
stream is playing back an advertisement). This determination may be
performed when an end of a media asset is determined to be
imminent, as described above. In response to determining that no
media stream of the plurality of media streams is playing back
non-advertisement media, the media guidance application (e.g., at
the end of playback of media asset 111 at time t2) may switch from
the media stream 101 to a media source that is not a media stream,
and may play back a third media asset from the media source that is
not the media stream. The media source may be any local or remote
source , such as a CD or DVD player, a BLU-RAY player, a DVR
device, or any other local or remote storage device that contains a
stored media asset which will be played back in response to a
command (e.g., the media guidance application commanding a CD
player to play back the CD's third track). In this manner, the user
will seamlessly be switched to playback of a media asset and will
avoid being subjected to advertisement media notwithstanding that
no media stream is playing non-advertisement media.
[0047] The amount of content available to users in any given
content delivery system can be substantial. Consequently, many
users desire a form of media guidance through an interface that
allows users to efficiently navigate content selections and easily
identify content that they may desire. An application that provides
such guidance is referred to herein as an interactive media
guidance application or, sometimes, a media guidance application or
a guidance application.
[0048] Interactive media guidance applications may take various
forms depending on the content for which they provide guidance. One
typical type of media guidance application is an interactive
television program guide. Interactive television program guides
(sometimes referred to as electronic program guides) are well-known
guidance applications that, among other things, allow users to
navigate among and locate many types of content or media assets.
Interactive media guidance applications may generate graphical user
interface screens that enable a user to navigate among, locate and
select content. As referred to herein, the terms "media asset" and
"content" should be understood to mean an electronically consumable
user asset, such as television programming, as well as pay-per-view
programs, on-demand programs (as in video-on-demand (VOD) systems),
Internet content (e.g., streaming content, downloadable content,
Webcasts, etc.), video clips, audio, content information, pictures,
rotating images, documents, playlists, websites, articles, books,
electronic books, blogs, advertisements, chat sessions, social
media, applications, games, and/or any other media or multimedia
and/or combination of the same. Guidance applications also allow
users to navigate among and locate content. As referred to herein,
the term "multimedia" should be understood to mean content that
utilizes at least two different content forms described above, for
example, text, audio, images, video, or interactivity content
forms. Content may be recorded, played, displayed or accessed by
user equipment devices, but can also be part of a live
performance.
[0049] The media guidance application and/or any instructions for
performing any of the embodiments discussed herein may be encoded
on computer readable media. Computer readable media includes any
media capable of storing data. The computer readable media may be
transitory, including, but not limited to, propagating electrical
or electromagnetic signals, or may be non-transitory including, but
not limited to, volatile and non-volatile computer memory or
storage devices such as a hard disk, floppy disk, USB drive, DVD,
CD, media cards, register memory, processor caches, Random Access
Memory ("RAM"), etc.
[0050] With the advent of the Internet, mobile computing, and
high-speed wireless networks, users are accessing media on user
equipment devices on which they traditionally did not. As referred
to herein, the phrase "user equipment device," "user equipment,"
"user device," "electronic device," "electronic equipment," "media
equipment device," or "media device" should be understood to mean
any device for accessing the content described above, such as a
television, a Smart TV, a set-top box, an integrated receiver
decoder (IRD) for handling satellite television, a digital storage
device, a digital media receiver (DMR), a digital media adapter
(DMA), a streaming media device, a DVD player, a DVD recorder, a
connected DVD, a local media server, a BLU-RAY player, a BLU-RAY
recorder, a personal computer (PC), a laptop computer, a tablet
computer, a WebTV box, a personal computer television (PC/TV), a PC
media server, a PC media center, a hand-held computer, a stationary
telephone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a mobile telephone,
a portable video player, a portable music player, a portable gaming
machine, a smart phone, or any other television equipment,
computing equipment, or wireless device, and/or combination of the
same. In some embodiments, the user equipment device may have a
front facing screen and a rear facing screen, multiple front
screens, or multiple angled screens. In some embodiments, the user
equipment device may have a front facing camera and/or a rear
facing camera. On these user equipment devices, users may be able
to navigate among and locate the same content available through a
television. Consequently, media guidance may be available on these
devices, as well. The guidance provided may be for content
available only through a television, for content available only
through one or more of other types of user equipment devices, or
for content available both through a television and one or more of
the other types of user equipment devices. The media guidance
applications may be provided as on-line applications (i.e.,
provided on a web-site), or as stand-alone applications or clients
on user equipment devices. Various devices and platforms that may
implement media guidance applications are described in more detail
below.
[0051] One of the functions of the media guidance application is to
provide media guidance data to users. As referred to herein, the
phrase "media guidance data" or "guidance data" should be
understood to mean any data related to content or data used in
operating the guidance application. For example, the guidance data
may include program information, guidance application settings,
user preferences, user profile information, media listings,
media-related information (e.g., broadcast times, broadcast
channels, titles, descriptions, ratings information (e.g., parental
control ratings, critic's ratings, etc.), genre or category
information, actor information, logo data for broadcasters' or
providers' logos, etc.), media format (e.g., standard definition,
high definition, 3D, etc.), advertisement information (e.g., text,
images, media clips, etc.), on-demand information, blogs, websites,
and any other type of guidance data that is helpful for a user to
navigate among and locate desired content selections.
[0052] FIGS. 2-3 show illustrative display screens that may be used
to provide media guidance data. The display screens shown in FIGS.
2-3 may be implemented on any suitable user equipment device or
platform. While the displays of FIGS. 2-3 are illustrated as full
screen displays, they may also be fully or partially overlaid over
content being displayed. A user may indicate a desire to access
content information by selecting a selectable option provided in a
display screen (e.g., a menu option, a listings option, an icon, a
hyperlink, etc.) or pressing a dedicated button (e.g., a GUIDE
button) on a remote control or other user input interface or
device. In response to the user's indication, the media guidance
application may provide a display screen with media guidance data
organized in one of several ways, such as by time and channel in a
grid, by time, by channel, by source, by content type, by category
(e.g., movies, sports, news, children, or other categories of
programming), or other predefined, user-defined, or other
organization criteria.
[0053] FIG. 2 shows illustrative grid of a program listings display
200 arranged by time and channel that also enables access to
different types of content in a single display. Display 200 may
include grid 202 with: (1) a column of channel/content type
identifiers 204, where each channel/content type identifier (which
is a cell in the column) identifies a different channel or content
type available; and (2) a row of time identifiers 206, where each
time identifier (which is a cell in the row) identifies a time
block of programming. Grid 202 also includes cells of program
listings, such as program listing 208, where each listing provides
the title of the program provided on the listing's associated
channel and time. With a user input device, a user can select
program listings by moving highlight region 210. Information
relating to the program listing selected by highlight region 210
may be provided in program information region 212. Region 212 may
include, for example, the program title, the program description,
the time the program is provided (if applicable), the channel the
program is on (if applicable), the program's rating, and other
desired information.
[0054] In addition to providing access to linear programming (e.g.,
content that is scheduled to be transmitted to a plurality of user
equipment devices at a predetermined time and is provided according
to a schedule), the media guidance application also provides access
to non-linear programming (e.g., content accessible to a user
equipment device at any time and is not provided according to a
schedule). Non-linear programming may include content from
different content sources including on-demand content (e.g., VOD),
Internet content (e.g., streaming media, downloadable media, etc.),
locally stored content (e.g., content stored on any user equipment
device described above or other storage device), or other
time-independent content. On-demand content may include movies or
any other content provided by a particular content provider (e.g.,
HBO On Demand providing "The Sopranos" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm").
HBO ON DEMAND is a service mark owned by Time Warner Company L.P.
et al. and THE SOPRANOS and CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM are trademarks
owned by the Home Box Office, Inc. Internet content may include web
events, such as a chat session or Webcast, or content available
on-demand as streaming content or downloadable content through an
Internet web site or other Internet access (e.g. FTP).
[0055] Grid 202 may provide media guidance data for non-linear
programming including on-demand listing 214, recorded content
listing 216, and Internet content listing 218. A display combining
media guidance data for content from different types of content
sources is sometimes referred to as a "mixed-media" display.
Various permutations of the types of media guidance data that may
be displayed that are different than display 200 may be based on
user selection or guidance application definition (e.g., a display
of only recorded and broadcast listings, only on-demand and
broadcast listings, etc.). As illustrated, listings 214, 216, and
218 are shown as spanning the entire time block displayed in grid
202 to indicate that selection of these listings may provide access
to a display dedicated to on-demand listings, recorded listings, or
Internet listings, respectively. In some embodiments, listings for
these content types may be included directly in grid 202.
Additional media guidance data may be displayed in response to the
user selecting one of the navigational icons 220. (Pressing an
arrow key on a user input device may affect the display in a
similar manner as selecting navigational icons 220.)
[0056] Display 200 may also include video region 222, advertisement
224, and options region 226.
[0057] Video region 222 may allow the user to view and/or preview
programs that are currently available, will be available, or were
available to the user. The content of video region 222 may
correspond to, or be independent from, one of the listings
displayed in grid 202. Grid displays including a video region are
sometimes referred to as picture-in-guide (PIG) displays. PIG
displays and their functionalities are described in greater detail
in Satterfield et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,564,378, issued May 13, 2003
and Yuen et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,239,794, issued May 29, 2001, which
are hereby incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.
PIG displays may be included in other media guidance application
display screens of the embodiments described herein.
[0058] Advertisement 224 may provide an advertisement for content
that, depending on a viewer's access rights (e.g., for subscription
programming), is currently available for viewing, will be available
for viewing in the future, or may never become available for
viewing, and may correspond to or be unrelated to one or more of
the content listings in grid 202. Advertisement 224 may also be for
products or services related or unrelated to the content displayed
in grid 202. Advertisement 224 may be selectable and provide
further information about content, provide information about a
product or a service, enable purchasing of content, a product, or a
service, provide content relating to the advertisement, etc.
Advertisement 224 may be targeted based on a user's
profile/preferences, monitored user activity, the type of display
provided, or on other suitable targeted advertisement bases.
[0059] While advertisement 224 is shown as rectangular or banner
shaped, advertisements may be provided in any suitable size, shape,
and location in a guidance application display. For example,
advertisement 224 may be provided as a rectangular shape that is
horizontally adjacent to grid 202. This is sometimes referred to as
a panel advertisement. In addition, advertisements may be overlaid
over content or a guidance application display or embedded within a
display. Advertisements may also include text, images, rotating
images, video clips, or other types of content described above.
Advertisements may be stored in a user equipment device having a
guidance application, in a database connected to the user
equipment, in a remote location (including streaming media
servers), or on other storage means, or a combination of these
locations. Providing advertisements in a media guidance application
is discussed in greater detail in, for example, Knudson et al.,
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2003/0110499, filed Jan.
17, 2003; Ward, III et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,756,997, issued Jun. 29,
2004; and Schein et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,388,714, issued May 14,
2002, which are hereby incorporated by reference herein in their
entireties. It will be appreciated that advertisements may be
included in other media guidance application display screens of the
embodiments described herein.
[0060] Options region 226 may allow the user to access different
types of content, media guidance application displays, and/or media
guidance application features. Options region 226 may be part of
display 200 (and other display screens described herein), or may be
invoked by a user by selecting an on-screen option or pressing a
dedicated or assignable button on a user input device. The
selectable options within options region 226 may concern features
related to program listings in grid 202 or may include options
available from a main menu display. Features related to program
listings may include searching for other air times or ways of
receiving a program, recording a program, enabling series recording
of a program, setting program and/or channel as a favorite,
purchasing a program, or other features. Options available from a
main menu display may include search options, VOD options, parental
control options, Internet options, cloud-based options, device
synchronization options, second screen device options, options to
access various types of media guidance data displays, options to
subscribe to a premium service, options to edit a user's profile,
options to access a browse overlay, or other options.
[0061] The media guidance application may be personalized based on
a user's preferences. A personalized media guidance application
allows a user to customize displays and features to create a
personalized "experience" with the media guidance application. This
personalized experience may be created by allowing a user to input
these customizations and/or by the media guidance application
monitoring user activity to determine various user preferences.
Users may access their personalized guidance application by logging
in or otherwise identifying themselves to the guidance application.
Customization of the media guidance application may be made in
accordance with a user profile. The customizations may include
varying presentation schemes (e.g., color scheme of displays, font
size of text, etc.), aspects of content listings displayed (e.g.,
only HDTV or only 3D programming, user-specified broadcast channels
based on favorite channel selections, re-ordering the display of
channels, recommended content, etc.), desired recording features
(e.g., recording or series recordings for particular users,
recording quality, etc.), parental control settings, customized
presentation of Internet content (e.g., presentation of social
media content, e-mail, electronically delivered articles, etc.) and
other desired customizations.
[0062] The media guidance application may allow a user to provide
user profile information or may automatically compile user profile
information. The media guidance application may, for example,
monitor the content the user accesses and/or other interactions the
user may have with the guidance application. Additionally, the
media guidance application may obtain all or part of other user
profiles that are related to a particular user (e.g., from other
web sites on the Internet the user accesses, such as
www.allrovi.com, from other media guidance applications the user
accesses, from other interactive applications the user accesses,
from another user equipment device of the user, etc.), and/or
obtain information about the user from other sources that the media
guidance application may access. As a result, a user can be
provided with a unified guidance application experience across the
user's different user equipment devices. This type of user
experience is described in greater detail below in connection with
FIG. 5. Additional personalized media guidance application features
are described in greater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. Patent
Application Publication No. 2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005,
Boyer et al., U.S. Pat. No. 7,165,098, issued Jan. 16, 2007, and
Ellis et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2002/0174430,
filed Feb. 21, 2002, which are hereby incorporated by reference
herein in their entireties.
[0063] Another display arrangement for providing media guidance is
shown in FIG. 3. Display 300 is a mosaic display that includes
selectable options 302 for media stream recommendations, which may
be organized based on content type, genre, and/or other
organization criteria. While the media stream recommendations are
for audio stream sources, any type of media stream may be
recommended in selectable options 302. In display 300, Podcasts
option 304 is presently selected, thus providing listings 306, 308,
310, and 312 as related to Podcasts. In display 300 the listings
may provide graphical images including cover art, still images from
the content, video clip previews, live video from the content, or
other types of content that indicate to a user the content being
described by the media guidance data in the listing. Each of the
graphical listings may also be accompanied by text to provide
further information about the content associated with the listing.
For example, listing 308 may include more than one portion,
including a media portion and text portion. Media portions and/or
text portions may be selectable to view content in full-screen or
to view information related to the content displayed in a media
portion (e.g., to view listings for the channel that the video is
displayed on).
[0064] The listings in display 300 are of different sizes (i.e.,
listing 306 is larger than listings 308, 310, and 312), but if
desired, all the listings may be the same size. Listings may be of
different sizes or graphically accentuated to indicate degrees of
interest to the user or to emphasize certain content, as desired by
the content provider or based on user preferences. Various systems
and methods for graphically accentuating content listings are
discussed in, for example, Yates, U.S. Patent Application
Publication No. 2010/0153885, filed Nov. 12, 2009, which is hereby
incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
[0065] Users may access content and the media guidance application
(and its display screens described above and below) from one or
more of their user equipment devices. FIG. 4 shows a generalized
embodiment of illustrative user equipment device 400. More specific
implementations of user equipment devices are discussed below in
connection with FIG. 5. User equipment device 400 may receive
content and data via input/output (hereinafter "I/O") path 402. I/O
path 402 may provide content (e.g., broadcast programming,
on-demand programming, Internet content, content available over a
local area network (LAN) or wide area network (WAN), and/or other
content) and data to control circuitry 404, which includes
processing circuitry 406 and storage 408. Control circuitry 404 may
be used to send and receive commands, requests, and other suitable
data using I/O path 402. I/O path 402 may connect control circuitry
404 (and specifically processing circuitry 406) to one or more
communications paths (described below). I/O functions may be
provided by one or more of these communications paths, but are
shown as a single path in FIG. 4 to avoid overcomplicating the
drawing.
[0066] Control circuitry 404 may be based on any suitable
processing circuitry such as processing circuitry 406. As referred
to herein, processing circuitry should be understood to mean
circuitry based on one or more microprocessors, microcontrollers,
digital signal processors, programmable logic devices,
field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), application-specific
integrated circuits (ASICs), etc., and may include a multi-core
processor (e.g., dual-core, quad-core, hexa-core, or any suitable
number of cores) or supercomputer. In some embodiments, processing
circuitry may be distributed across multiple separate processors or
processing units, for example, multiple of the same type of
processing units (e.g., two Intel Core i7 processors) or multiple
different processors (e.g., an Intel Core i5 processor and an Intel
Core i7 processor). In some embodiments, control circuitry 404
executes instructions for a media guidance application stored in
memory (i.e., storage 408). Specifically, control circuitry 404 may
be instructed by the media guidance application to perform the
functions discussed above and below. For example, the media
guidance application may provide instructions to control circuitry
404 to generate the media guidance displays. In some
implementations, any action performed by control circuitry 404 may
be based on instructions received from the media guidance
application.
[0067] In client-server based embodiments, control circuitry 404
may include communications circuitry suitable for communicating
with a guidance application server or other networks or servers.
The instructions for carrying out the above mentioned functionality
may be stored on the guidance application server. Communications
circuitry may include a cable modem, an integrated services digital
network (ISDN) modem, a digital subscriber line (DSL) modem, a
telephone modem, Ethernet card, or a wireless modem for
communications with other equipment, or any other suitable
communications circuitry. Such communications may involve the
Internet or any other suitable communications networks or paths
(which is described in more detail in connection with FIG. 5). In
addition, communications circuitry may include circuitry that
enables peer-to-peer communication of user equipment devices, or
communication of user equipment devices in locations remote from
each other (described in more detail below).
[0068] Memory may be an electronic storage device provided as
storage 408 that is part of control circuitry 404. As referred to
herein, the phrase "electronic storage device" or "storage device"
should be understood to mean any device for storing electronic
data, computer software, or firmware, such as random-access memory,
read-only memory, hard drives, optical drives, digital video disc
(DVD) recorders, compact disc (CD) recorders, BLU-RAY disc (BD)
recorders, BLU-RAY 3D disc recorders, digital video recorders (DVR,
sometimes called a personal video recorder, or PVR), solid state
devices, quantum storage devices, gaming consoles, gaming media, or
any other suitable fixed or removable storage devices, and/or any
combination of the same. Storage 408 may be used to store various
types of content described herein as well as media guidance data
described above. Nonvolatile memory may also be used (e.g., to
launch a boot-up routine and other instructions). Cloud-based
storage, described in relation to FIG. 5, may be used to supplement
storage 408 or instead of storage 408.
[0069] Control circuitry 404 may include video generating circuitry
and tuning circuitry, such as one or more analog tuners, one or
more MPEG-2 decoders or other digital decoding circuitry,
high-definition tuners, or any other suitable tuning or video
circuits or combinations of such circuits. Encoding circuitry
(e.g., for converting over-the-air, analog, or digital signals to
MPEG signals for storage) may also be provided. Control circuitry
404 may also include scaler circuitry for upconverting and
downconverting content into the preferred output format of the user
equipment 400. Circuitry 404 may also include digital-to-analog
converter circuitry and analog-to-digital converter circuitry for
converting between digital and analog signals. The tuning and
encoding circuitry may be used by the user equipment device to
receive and to display, to play, or to record content. The tuning
and encoding circuitry may also be used to receive guidance data.
The circuitry described herein, including for example, the tuning,
video generating, encoding, decoding, encrypting, decrypting,
scaler, and analog/digital circuitry, may be implemented using
software running on one or more general purpose or specialized
processors. Multiple tuners may be provided to handle simultaneous
tuning functions (e.g., watch and record functions,
picture-in-picture (PIP) functions, multiple-tuner recording,
etc.). If storage 408 is provided as a separate device from user
equipment 400, the tuning and encoding circuitry (including
multiple tuners) may be associated with storage 408.
[0070] A user may send instructions to control circuitry 404 using
user input interface 410. User input interface 410 may be any
suitable user interface, such as a remote control, mouse,
trackball, keypad, keyboard, touch screen, touchpad, stylus input,
joystick, voice recognition interface, or other user input
interfaces. Display 412 may be provided as a stand-alone device or
integrated with other elements of user equipment device 400. For
example, display 412 may be a touchscreen or touch-sensitive
display. In such circumstances, user input interface 410 may be
integrated with or combined with display 412. Display 412 may be
one or more of a monitor, a television, a liquid crystal display
(LCD) for a mobile device, amorphous silicon display, low
temperature poly silicon display, electronic ink display,
electrophoretic display, active matrix display, electro-wetting
display, electrofluidic display, cathode ray tube display,
light-emitting diode display, electroluminescent display, plasma
display panel, high-performance addressing display, thin-film
transistor display, organic light-emitting diode display,
surface-conduction electron-emitter display (SED), laser
television, carbon nanotubes, quantum dot display, interferometric
modulator display, or any other suitable equipment for displaying
visual images. In some embodiments, display 412 may be
HDTV-capable. In some embodiments, display 412 may be a 3D display,
and the interactive media guidance application and any suitable
content may be displayed in 3D. A video card or graphics card may
generate the output to the display 412. The video card may offer
various functions such as accelerated rendering of 3D scenes and 2D
graphics, MPEG-2/MPEG-4 decoding, TV output, or the ability to
connect multiple monitors. The video card may be any processing
circuitry described above in relation to control circuitry 404. The
video card may be integrated with the control circuitry 404.
Speakers 414 may be provided as integrated with other elements of
user equipment device 400 or may be stand-alone units. The audio
component of videos and other content displayed on display 412 may
be played through speakers 414. In some embodiments, the audio may
be distributed to a receiver (not shown), which processes and
outputs the audio via speakers 414.
[0071] The guidance application may be implemented using any
suitable architecture. For example, it may be a stand-alone
application wholly-implemented on user equipment device 400. In
such an approach, instructions of the application are stored
locally (e.g., in storage 408), and data for use by the application
is downloaded on a periodic basis (e.g., from an out-of-band feed,
from an Internet resource, or using another suitable approach).
Control circuitry 404 may retrieve instructions of the application
from storage 408 and process the instructions to generate any of
the displays discussed herein. Based on the processed instructions,
control circuitry 404 may determine what action to perform when
input is received from input interface 410. For example, movement
of a cursor on a display up/down may be indicated by the processed
instructions when input interface 410 indicates that an up/down
button was selected.
[0072] In some embodiments, the media guidance application is a
client-server based application. Data for use by a thick or thin
client implemented on user equipment device 400 is retrieved
on-demand by issuing requests to a server remote to the user
equipment device 400. In one example of a client-server based
guidance application, control circuitry 404 runs a web browser that
interprets web pages provided by a remote server. For example, the
remote server may store the instructions for the application in a
storage device. The remote server may process the stored
instructions using circuitry (e.g., control circuitry 404) and
generate the displays discussed above and below. The client device
may receive the displays generated by the remote server and may
display the content of the displays locally on equipment device
400. This way, the processing of the instructions is performed
remotely by the server while the resulting displays are provided
locally on equipment device 400. Equipment device 400 may receive
inputs from the user via input interface 410 and transmit those
inputs to the remote server for processing and generating the
corresponding displays. For example, equipment device 400 may
transmit a communication to the remote server indicating that an
up/down button was selected via input interface 410. The remote
server may process instructions in accordance with that input and
generate a display of the application corresponding to the input
(e.g., a display that moves a cursor up/down). The generated
display is then transmitted to equipment device 400 for
presentation to the user.
[0073] In some embodiments, the media guidance application is
downloaded and interpreted or otherwise run by an interpreter or
virtual machine (run by control circuitry 404). In some
embodiments, the guidance application may be encoded in the ETV
Binary Interchange Format (EBIF), received by control circuitry 404
as part of a suitable feed, and interpreted by a user agent running
on control circuitry 404. For example, the guidance application may
be an EBIF application. In some embodiments, the guidance
application may be defined by a series of JAVA-based files that are
received and run by a local virtual machine or other suitable
middleware executed by control circuitry 404. In some of such
embodiments (e.g., those employing MPEG-2 or other digital media
encoding schemes), the guidance application may be, for example,
encoded and transmitted in an MPEG-2 object carousel with the MPEG
audio and video packets of a program.
[0074] User equipment device 400 of FIG. 4 can be implemented in
system 500 of FIG. 5 as user television equipment 502, user
computer equipment 504, wireless user communications device 506, or
any other type of user equipment suitable for accessing content,
such as a non-portable gaming machine, a radio (e.g., a radio in a
car), and any device that is capable of playing back over-the-air
broadcasting (e.g., music, voice, or video broadcasting). For
simplicity, these devices may be referred to herein collectively as
user equipment or user equipment devices, and may be substantially
similar to user equipment devices described above. User equipment
devices, on which a media guidance application may be implemented,
may function as a standalone device or may be part of a network of
devices. Various network configurations of devices may be
implemented and are discussed in more detail below.
[0075] A user equipment device utilizing at least some of the
system features described above in connection with FIG. 4 may not
be classified solely as user television equipment 502, user
computer equipment 504, or a wireless user communications device
506. For example, user television equipment 502 may, like some user
computer equipment 504, be Internet-enabled allowing for access to
Internet content, while user computer equipment 504 may, like some
user television equipment 502, include a tuner allowing for access
to television programming. The media guidance application may have
the same layout on various different types of user equipment or may
be tailored to the display capabilities of the user equipment. For
example, on user computer equipment 504, the guidance application
may be provided as a web site accessed by a web browser. In another
example, the guidance application may be scaled down for wireless
user communications devices 506.
[0076] In system 500, there is typically more than one of each type
of user equipment device but only one of each is shown in FIG. 5 to
avoid overcomplicating the drawing. In addition, each user may
utilize more than one type of user equipment device and also more
than one of each type of user equipment device.
[0077] In some embodiments, a user equipment device (e.g., user
television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504, wireless
user communications device 506) may be referred to as a "second
screen device." For example, a second screen device may supplement
content presented on a first user equipment device. The content
presented on the second screen device may be any suitable content
that supplements the content presented on the first device. In some
embodiments, the second screen device provides an interface for
adjusting settings and display preferences of the first device. In
some embodiments, the second screen device is configured for
interacting with other second screen devices or for interacting
with a social network. The second screen device can be located in
the same room as the first device, a different room from the first
device but in the same house or building, or in a different
building from the first device.
[0078] The user may also set various settings to maintain
consistent media guidance application settings across in-home
devices and remote devices. Settings include those described
herein, as well as channel and program favorites, programming
preferences that the guidance application utilizes to make
programming recommendations, display preferences, and other
desirable guidance settings. For example, if a user sets a channel
as a favorite on, for example, the web site www.allrovi.com on
their personal computer at their office, the same channel would
appear as a favorite on the user's in-home devices (e.g., user
television equipment and user computer equipment) as well as the
user's mobile devices, if desired. Therefore, changes made on one
user equipment device can change the guidance experience on another
user equipment device, regardless of whether they are the same or a
different type of user equipment device. In addition, the changes
made may be based on settings input by a user, as well as user
activity monitored by the guidance application.
[0079] The user equipment devices may be coupled to communications
network 514. Namely, user television equipment 502, user computer
equipment 504, and wireless user communications device 506 are
coupled to communications network 514 via communications paths 508,
510, and 512, respectively. Communications network 514 may be one
or more networks including the Internet, a mobile phone network,
mobile voice or data network (e.g., a 4G or LTE network), cable
network, public switched telephone network, or other types of
communications network or combinations of communications networks.
Paths 508, 510, and 512 may separately or together include one or
more communications paths, such as, a satellite path, a fiber-optic
path, a cable path, a path that supports Internet communications
(e.g., IPTV), free-space connections (e.g., for broadcast or other
wireless signals), or any other suitable wired or wireless
communications path or combination of such paths. Path 512 is drawn
with dotted lines to indicate that in the exemplary embodiment
shown in FIG. 5 it is a wireless path and paths 508 and 510 are
drawn as solid lines to indicate they are wired paths (although
these paths may be wireless paths, if desired). Communications with
the user equipment devices may be provided by one or more of these
communications paths, but are shown as a single path in FIG. 5 to
avoid overcomplicating the drawing.
[0080] Although communications paths are not drawn between user
equipment devices, these devices may communicate directly with each
other via communication paths, such as those described above in
connection with paths 508, 510, and 512, as well as other
short-range point-to-point communication paths, such as USB cables,
IEEE 1394 cables, wireless paths (e.g., Bluetooth, infrared, IEEE
802-11x, etc.), or other short-range communication via wired or
wireless paths. BLUETOOTH is a certification mark owned by
Bluetooth SIG, INC. The user equipment devices may also communicate
with each other directly through an indirect path via
communications network 514.
[0081] System 500 includes content source 516 and media guidance
data source 518 coupled to communications network 514 via
communication paths 520 and 522, respectively. Paths 520 and 522
may include any of the communication paths described above in
connection with paths 508, 510, and 512. Communications with the
content source 516 and media guidance data source 518 may be
exchanged over one or more communications paths, but are shown as a
single path in FIG. 5 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing. In
addition, there may be more than one of each of content source 516
and media guidance data source 518, but only one of each is shown
in FIG. 5 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing. (The different
types of each of these sources are discussed below.) If desired,
content source 516 and media guidance data source 518 may be
integrated as one source device. Although communications between
sources 516 and 518 with user equipment devices 502, 504, and 506
are shown as through communications network 514, in some
embodiments, sources 516 and 518 may communicate directly with user
equipment devices 502, 504, and 506 via communication paths (not
shown) such as those described above in connection with paths 508,
510, and 512.
[0082] Content source 516 may include one or more types of content
distribution equipment including a television distribution
facility, cable system headend, satellite distribution facility,
programming sources (e.g., television broadcasters, such as NBC,
ABC, HBO, etc.), intermediate distribution facilities and/or
servers, Internet providers, on-demand media servers, and other
content providers. NBC is a trademark owned by the National
Broadcasting Company, Inc., ABC is a trademark owned by the
American Broadcasting Company, Inc., and HBO is a trademark owned
by the Home Box Office, Inc. Content source 516 may be the
originator of content (e.g., a television broadcaster, a Webcast
provider, etc.) or may not be the originator of content (e.g., an
on-demand content provider, an Internet provider of content of
broadcast programs for downloading, etc.). Content source 516 may
include cable sources, satellite providers, on-demand providers,
Internet providers, over-the-top content providers, or other
providers of content. Content source 516 may also include a remote
media server used to store different types of content (including
video content selected by a user), in a location remote from any of
the user equipment devices. Systems and methods for remote storage
of content, and providing remotely stored content to user equipment
are discussed in greater detail in connection with Ellis et al.,
U.S. Pat. No. 7,761,892, issued Jul. 20, 2010, which is hereby
incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
[0083] Media guidance data source 518 may provide media guidance
data, such as the media guidance data described above. Media
guidance data may be provided to the user equipment devices using
any suitable approach. In some embodiments, the guidance
application may be a stand-alone interactive television program
guide that receives program guide data via a data feed (e.g., a
continuous feed or trickle feed). Program schedule data and other
guidance data may be provided to the user equipment on a television
channel sideband, using an in-band digital signal, using an
out-of-band digital signal, or by any other suitable data
transmission technique. Program schedule data and other media
guidance data may be provided to user equipment on multiple analog
or digital television channels.
[0084] In some embodiments, guidance data from media guidance data
source 518 may be provided to users' equipment using a
client-server approach. For example, a user equipment device may
pull media guidance data from a server, or a server may push media
guidance data to a user equipment device. In some embodiments, a
guidance application client residing on the user's equipment may
initiate sessions with source 518 to obtain guidance data when
needed, e.g., when the guidance data is out of date or when the
user equipment device receives a request from the user to receive
data. Media guidance may be provided to the user equipment with any
suitable frequency (e.g., continuously, daily, a user-specified
period of time, a system-specified period of time, in response to a
request from user equipment, etc.). Media guidance data source 518
may provide user equipment devices 502, 504, and 506 the media
guidance application itself or software updates for the media
guidance application.
[0085] In some embodiments, the media guidance data may include
viewer data. For example, the viewer data may include current
and/or historical user activity information (e.g., what content the
user typically watches, what times of day the user watches content,
whether the user interacts with a social network, at what times the
user interacts with a social network to post information, what
types of content the user typically watches (e.g., pay TV or free
TV), mood, brain activity information, etc.). The media guidance
data may also include subscription data. For example, the
subscription data may identify to which sources or services a given
user subscribes and/or to which sources or services the given user
has previously subscribed but later terminated access (e.g.,
whether the user subscribes to premium channels, whether the user
has added a premium level of services, whether the user has
increased Internet speed). In some embodiments, the viewer data
and/or the subscription data may identify patterns of a given user
for a period of more than one year. The media guidance data may
include a model (e.g., a survivor model) used for generating a
score that indicates a likelihood a given user will terminate
access to a service/source. For example, the media guidance
application may process the viewer data with the subscription data
using the model to generate a value or score that indicates a
likelihood of whether the given user will terminate access to a
particular service or source. In particular, a higher score may
indicate a higher level of confidence that the user will terminate
access to a particular service or source. Based on the score, the
media guidance application may generate promotions and
advertisements that entice the user to keep the particular service
or source indicated by the score as one to which the user will
likely terminate access.
[0086] Media guidance applications may be, for example, stand-alone
applications implemented on user equipment devices. For example,
the media guidance application may be implemented as software or a
set of executable instructions which may be stored in storage 408,
and executed by control circuitry 404 of a user equipment device
400. In some embodiments, media guidance applications may be
client-server applications where only a client application resides
on the user equipment device, and server application resides on a
remote server. For example, media guidance applications may be
implemented partially as a client application on control circuitry
404 of user equipment device 400 and partially on a remote server
as a server application (e.g., media guidance data source 518)
running on control circuitry of the remote server. When executed by
control circuitry of the remote server (such as media guidance data
source 518), the media guidance application may instruct the
control circuitry to generate the guidance application displays and
transmit the generated displays to the user equipment devices. The
server application may instruct the control circuitry of the media
guidance data source 518 to transmit data for storage on the user
equipment. The client application may instruct control circuitry of
the receiving user equipment to generate the guidance application
displays.
[0087] Content and/or media guidance data delivered to user
equipment devices 502, 504, and 506 may be over-the-top (OTT)
content. OTT content delivery allows Internet-enabled user devices,
including any user equipment device described above, to receive
content that is transferred over the Internet, including any
content described above, in addition to content received over cable
or satellite connections. OTT content is delivered via an Internet
connection provided by an Internet service provider (ISP), but a
third party distributes the content. The ISP may not be responsible
for the viewing abilities, copyrights, or redistribution of the
content, and may only transfer IP packets provided by the OTT
content provider. Examples of OTT content providers include
YOUTUBE, NETFLIX, and HULU, which provide audio and video via IP
packets. Youtube is a trademark owned by Google Inc., Netflix is a
trademark owned by Netflix Inc., and Hulu is a trademark owned by
Hulu, LLC. OTT content providers may additionally or alternatively
provide media guidance data described above. In addition to content
and/or media guidance data, providers of OTT content can distribute
media guidance applications (e.g., web-based applications or
cloud-based applications), or the content can be displayed by media
guidance applications stored on the user equipment device.
[0088] Media guidance system 500 is intended to illustrate a number
of approaches, or network configurations, by which user equipment
devices and sources of content and guidance data may communicate
with each other for the purpose of accessing content and providing
media guidance. The embodiments described herein may be applied in
any one or a subset of these approaches, or in a system employing
other approaches for delivering content and providing media
guidance. The following four approaches provide specific
illustrations of the generalized example of FIG. 5.
[0089] In one approach, user equipment devices may communicate with
each other within a home network. User equipment devices can
communicate with each other directly via short-range point-to-point
communication schemes described above, via indirect paths through a
hub or other similar device provided on a home network, or via
communications network 514. Each of the multiple individuals in a
single home may operate different user equipment devices on the
home network. As a result, it may be desirable for various media
guidance information or settings to be communicated between the
different user equipment devices. For example, it may be desirable
for users to maintain consistent media guidance application
settings on different user equipment devices within a home network,
as described in greater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. Patent
Publication No. 2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005. Different types
of user equipment devices in a home network may also communicate
with each other to transmit content. For example, a user may
transmit content from user computer equipment to a portable video
player or portable music player.
[0090] In a second approach, users may have multiple types of user
equipment by which they access content and obtain media guidance.
For example, some users may have home networks that are accessed by
in-home and mobile devices. Users may control in-home devices via a
media guidance application implemented on a remote device. For
example, users may access an online media guidance application on a
website via a personal computer at their office, or a mobile device
such as a PDA or web-enabled mobile telephone. The user may set
various settings (e.g., recordings, reminders, or other settings)
on the online guidance application to control the user's in-home
equipment. The online guide may control the user's equipment
directly, or by communicating with a media guidance application on
the user's in-home equipment. Various systems and methods for user
equipment devices communicating, where the user equipment devices
are in locations remote from each other, is discussed in, for
example, Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 8,046,801, issued Oct. 25,
2011, which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its
entirety.
[0091] In a third approach, users of user equipment devices inside
and outside a home can use their media guidance application to
communicate directly with content source 516 to access content.
Specifically, within a home, users of user television equipment 502
and user computer equipment 504 may access the media guidance
application to navigate among and locate desirable content. Users
may also access the media guidance application outside of the home
using wireless user communications devices 506 to navigate among
and locate desirable content.
[0092] In a fourth approach, user equipment devices may operate in
a cloud computing environment to access cloud services. In a cloud
computing environment, various types of computing services for
content sharing, storage or distribution (e.g., video sharing sites
or social networking sites) are provided by a collection of
network-accessible computing and storage resources, referred to as
"the cloud." For example, the cloud can include a collection of
server computing devices, which may be located centrally or at
distributed locations, that provide cloud-based services to various
types of users and devices connected via a network such as the
Internet via communications network 514. These cloud resources may
include one or more content sources 516 and one or more media
guidance data sources 518. In addition or in the alternative, the
remote computing sites may include other user equipment devices,
such as user television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504,
and wireless user communications device 506. For example, the other
user equipment devices may provide access to a stored copy of a
video or a streamed video. In such embodiments, user equipment
devices may operate in a peer-to-peer manner without communicating
with a central server.
[0093] The cloud provides access to services, such as content
storage, content sharing, or social networking services, among
other examples, as well as access to any content described above,
for user equipment devices. Services can be provided in the cloud
through cloud computing service providers, or through other
providers of online services. For example, the cloud-based services
can include a content storage service, a content sharing site, a
social networking site, or other services via which user-sourced
content is distributed for viewing by others on connected devices.
These cloud-based services may allow a user equipment device to
store content to the cloud and to receive content from the cloud
rather than storing content locally and accessing locally-stored
content.
[0094] A user may use various content capture devices, such as
camcorders, digital cameras with video mode, audio recorders,
mobile phones, and handheld computing devices, to record content.
The user can upload content to a content storage service on the
cloud either directly, for example, from user computer equipment
504 or wireless user communications device 506 having content
capture feature. Alternatively, the user can first transfer the
content to a user equipment device, such as user computer equipment
504. The user equipment device storing the content uploads the
content to the cloud using a data transmission service on
communications network 514. In some embodiments, the user equipment
device itself is a cloud resource, and other user equipment devices
can access the content directly from the user equipment device on
which the user stored the content.
[0095] Cloud resources may be accessed by a user equipment device
using, for example, a web browser, a media guidance application, a
desktop application, a mobile application, and/or any combination
of access applications of the same. The user equipment device may
be a cloud client that relies on cloud computing for application
delivery, or the user equipment device may have some functionality
without access to cloud resources. For example, some applications
running on the user equipment device may be cloud applications,
i.e., applications delivered as a service over the Internet, while
other applications may be stored and run on the user equipment
device. In some embodiments, a user device may receive content from
multiple cloud resources simultaneously. For example, a user device
can stream audio from one cloud resource while downloading content
from a second cloud resource. Or a user device can download content
from multiple cloud resources for more efficient downloading. In
some embodiments, user equipment devices can use cloud resources
for processing operations such as the processing operations
performed by processing circuitry described in relation to FIG.
4.
[0096] As referred herein, the term "in response to" refers to
initiated as a result of. For example, a first action being
performed in response to a second action may include interstitial
steps between the first action and the second action. As referred
herein, the term "directly in response to" refers to caused by. For
example, a first action being performed directly in response to a
second action may not include interstitial steps between the first
action and the second action.
[0097] FIG. 6 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for
seamlessly switching between media sources to avoid advertisement
content, in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure.
Process 600 begins at 602, where a user equipment (e.g., user
television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504, wireless
user communications device 506, or any other type of user equipment
suitable for accessing content) may use its control circuitry
(e.g., control circuitry 404) to execute a media guidance
application. The media guidance application may receive a plurality
of media streams (e.g., media streams 101-105), where each media
stream is received from a different source (e.g., different radio
stations, different platforms (OTT provider, on-demand, Internet
radio, etc.)), as described above. The different sources may each
be any source described with respect to media content source
516.
[0098] Process 600 continues to 604, where the media guidance
application may switch to a first media stream of the plurality of
media streams. For example, the media guidance application may
switch to media stream 101 from a default or dormant state, or from
a different media stream (e.g., media stream 103), or in any manner
described above. Process 600 may then continue to 606, where the
media guidance application may play back a first media asset of the
first media stream, such as media asset 111. The media guidance
application may play back the media asset at the same user
equipment that executes the media guidance application, or at a
different user equipment. The media asset may be played back using
display 412 or speakers 414.
[0099] Process 600 then continues to 608, where the media guidance
application may determine whether an end to playback of the first
media asset is imminent. This determination may be performed in any
manner described above. If an end to playback is not imminent,
playback described with reference to 606 continues. If an end to
playback is imminent, process 600 continue to 610, where the media
guidance application determines whether a second media stream of
the plurality of media streams is within a threshold amount of time
of playing back a beginning of a second media asset. For example,
as described above, the media guidance application may determine
whether any of media streams 102-105 have just started or are just
about to begin playback of a media asset. If the determination is
in the affirmative, process 600 continues to 612, and if the
determination is in the negative, process 600 continues to 616. The
scope of the disclosure includes the notion of excluding either the
elements of process 600 associated with a negative or positive
determination, where a determination associated with excluded
elements will not result in execution of those elements. This is
indicated in FIG. 6 by a box with dashed lines.
[0100] At 612, the media guidance application may switch from the
first media stream (e.g., media stream 101) to the second media
stream (e.g., media stream 105), in any manner described above. At
614, the media guidance application may play back the second media
asset (e.g., media asset 115). Thus, playback of advertisement
media 121 is avoided by switching before a beginning of
advertisement media 121's playback.
[0101] If no media streams are playing a media asset that has just
begun, as determined at 610, process 600 proceeds to 616, where the
media guidance application may determine whether any media stream
of the plurality of media streams is playing back non-advertisement
media. If the determination is in the affirmative, process 600
continues to 618, where, upon playback of the first media asset
(e.g., media asset 111) ending, the media guidance application may
switch from the first media stream (e.g., media stream 101) to the
media stream that is playing back the non-advertisement media
(e.g., media stream 104, playing back media asset 124).
[0102] If however, the determination of 616 is in the negative, the
media guidance application may switch from the first media stream
to a media source that is not a media stream, and may play back a
third media asset from the media source that is not the media
stream. For example, as described above, the media guidance
application may access a song or video stored at a local hard drive
or DVR device in order to avoid playback of advertisement
media.
[0103] FIG. 7 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for
leveraging profile information in order to switch between media
sources in a manner tailored to a specific user, in accordance with
some embodiments of the disclosure. Process 700 begins at 702,
where a media guidance application may access a profile of a user
to whom the first media asset is being played back. As described
above, the profile may be stored locally to the user equipment
(e.g., at storage 408), or remote to the user equipment (e.g., at
media guidance data source 518 or media content source 516,
accessed by way of communications network 514).
[0104] Process 700 may continue to 704, where the media guidance
application may determine whether the user prefers a first media
asset that is presently being played back (e.g., media asset 111)
to a second media asset whose playback has recently begun (e.g.,
media asset 115). If the user prefers the first media asset,
process 700 continues to 706, and if the user prefers the second
media asset, process 700 continues to 718. Any of the following
elements of process 700 are optional and may be omitted.
[0105] At 706, the media guidance application may determine whether
buffering of media assets is enabled (e.g., either by default or
user-set settings, or based on a dynamic determination based on
user habits, as described above). If buffering is in fact enabled,
the media guidance application may proceed to 708, and if it is not
enabled (or if it is unavailable), the media guidance application
may proceed to 714.
[0106] At 708, the media guidance application may buffer the
portion of the playback of the second media asset that overlaps
with a remainder of media asset 111, thus ensuring that the user
will not miss any or much of media asset 115. Process 700 may then
proceed to 710, where the media guidance application detects an end
to playback of media asset 111, and may go on to 712, where the
media guidance application plays back media asset 115 from a
beginning of the buffered portion. These elements may be performed
consistent with any manner described above.
[0107] At 714 (where media asset buffering is not enabled), the
media guidance application may detect an end to the playback of the
first media asset, and may play back the second media asset from an
intermediate position of the second media asset that coincides with
a time at which playback of the first media asset ended. As an
example, at time t2, which is when media asset 111 ends, a portion
of media asset 115 has already elapsed. That portion will not be
played back to the user because buffering will not occur, and
playback of media asset 115 will occur at time t2.
[0108] Process 700 may continue to 718 (from 704), where the media
guidance application may determine whether the user prefers to play
back an entirety of a given media asset even if user does not
prefer the given media to a different media. For example, the user
may not like when a song or video is chopped even when an
alternative song or video he likes more is available. If the user
does not prefer to play back an entirety of a given media asset,
process 700 may continue to 720, where the media guidance
application may switch from media stream 101 to media stream 105
prior to detecting an end to the playback of media asset 111 (e.g.,
at time t1). However, if the user does prefer to play back an
entirety of the given media asset, process 700 may continue to 722,
where media asset 115 may optionally be buffered, and then to 724,
where the media guidance application may refrain from playing back
media asset 115 until an end to playback of the first media asset
is detected (e.g., until time t2).
[0109] It should be noted that processes 600-700 or any step
thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of the devices
shown in FIGS. 4-5, and any device that effects the functions
related to FIG. 1 that are described above. For example, any of
processes 600-700 may be executed by control circuitry 404 (FIG. 4)
as instructed by control circuitry implemented on user equipment
502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5) in order to switch between media
streams. In addition, one or more steps of processes 600-700 may be
incorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any other
process or embodiment.
[0110] It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of each of
FIGS. 6-7 may be used with any other embodiment of this disclosure.
In addition, the steps and descriptions described in relation to
FIGS. 6-7 may be done in alternative orders or in parallel to
further the purposes of this disclosure. For example, each of these
steps may be performed in any order or in parallel or substantially
simultaneously to reduce lag or increase the speed of the system or
method. Furthermore, it should be noted that any of the devices or
equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 1 and 4-5 could be used to
perform one or more of the steps in FIGS. 6-7.
[0111] It will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art
that methods involved in the present invention may be embodied in a
computer program product that includes a computer-usable and/or
readable medium. For example, such a computer-usable medium may
consist of a read-only memory device, such as a CD-ROM disk or
conventional ROM device, or a random access memory, such as a hard
drive device or a computer diskette, having a computer-readable
program code stored thereon. It should also be understood that
methods, techniques, and processes involved in the present
invention may be executed using processing circuitry. For instance,
switching between media streams 101-105 may be performed, e.g., by
processing circuitry 406 of FIG. 4.
[0112] The processing circuitry, for instance, may be a general
purpose processor, a customized integrated circuit (e.g., an ASIC),
or a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) within user equipment
400, media content source 516, or media guidance data source 518.
For example, a profile, as described herein, may be stored in, and
retrieved from, storage 408 of FIG. 4, or media guidance data
source 518 of FIG. 5. Furthermore, processing circuitry, or a
computer program, may update settings associated with a user, such
as profile settings, stored within storage 408 of FIG. 4 or media
guidance data source 518 of FIG. 5.
[0113] The processes discussed above are intended to be
illustrative and not limiting. One skilled in the art would
appreciate that the steps of the processes discussed herein may be
omitted, modified, combined, and/or rearranged, and any additional
steps may be performed without departing from the scope of the
invention. More generally, the above disclosure is meant to be
exemplary and not limiting. Only the claims that follow are meant
to set bounds as to what the present invention includes.
Furthermore, it should be noted that the features and limitations
described in any one embodiment may be applied to any other
embodiment herein, and flowcharts or examples relating to one
embodiment may be combined with any other embodiment in a suitable
manner, done in different orders, or done in parallel. In addition,
the systems and methods described herein may be performed in real
time. It should also be noted, the systems and/or methods described
above may be applied to, or used in accordance with, other systems
and/or methods.
[0114] While some portions of this disclosure may make reference to
"convention" or "related art," any such reference is merely for the
purpose of providing context to the invention(s) of the instant
disclosure, and does not form any admission as to what constitutes
the state of the art. Moreover, for the avoidance of doubt, while
the disclosure is generally described with respect to songs, this
is for illustrative purposes, the media assets may be any media
asset described herein, including videos.
* * * * *
References