Ex Parte Hale et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

May 23, 2013

10692513 (P.T.A.B. May. 23, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD

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Ex parte GREG B. HALE, PHU V. NGUYEN, and WILLIAM G.
WIEDEFELD
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Appeal 2010-011407
Application 10/692,513
Technology Center 2400
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Before KARL D. EASTHOM, JOSIAH C. COCKS, and
RAMA G. ELLURU, Administrative Patent Judges.

EASTHOM, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the Examiner’s
decision to reject claims 22-44 and 46-79. We have jurisdiction under 35
U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
According to the Specification, “[t]he present invention relates
generally to . . . stream[ing] digital data to portable devices in a mass
audience or in [a] designated broadcast area.” (Spec. ¶ 0002.) Examples
include streaming a foreign language translation or captioning for the
hearing impaired to one or more portable devices during a video presentation
on a larger screen, such as, for example, a large screen at a movie theater.
(See Spec. ¶¶ 0004-0007.) “The transmission will synchronize the portable
device with the presentation or presentations [on the large screen] for
captioning, language translation, previews, games, control of devices and/or
similar applications.” (Spec. ¶ 0007.)
Representative claim 22 follows:
A method of providing content data to a viewer of a
media presentation in conjunction with the media presentation,
comprising:

providing a viewer of the media presentation with a
portable device, the portable device being remote from the
presentation of the media presentation and capable of receiving
wireless communications and displaying content data relating to
the media presentation;

transmitting content data to the portable device;

accumulating content data in the cache memory of the
portable device;

transmitting at least one time prompt to the portable
device, the time prompt triggering the content data to be
displayed on the portable device such that the content data is
displayed in synchronization with the presentation of a
corresponding portion of the media presentation; and

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displaying the content data on the portable device.

(See Claims Appx. 1 (emphasis added to highlight disputed claim phrase).)

Claims 22-44 and 46-79 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Chen et al., US 2002/0122137 A1 (Sept. 5, 2002) and
Toguri, US 2002/0053085 A1 (May 2, 2002).1

DISCUSSION
Appellants direct attention to independent claims 22 and 46 with
substantially the same arguments directed thereto. (See Br. 11-20.)
Accordingly, claim 22 is deemed to represent the claims on appeal.
Appellants maintain that the claimed combination fails to render
obvious the “at least one time prompt” recited in claim 22, which, according
to claim 22, triggers synchronized content at a portable device with a media
presentation (which implicitly occurs elsewhere, for example, on a large
movie screen): “transmitting at least one time prompt to the portable device,
the time prompt triggering the content data to be displayed on the portable
device such that the content data is displayed in synchronization with the

1 Appellants style some of the claim rejections as based on Chen in view of
Toguri, and the remainder as based on Toguri in view of Chen. (See Br. 10.)
Appellants’ arguments and the relevant factual inquiries involved indicate
that the order of the references is “merely a matter of presentation” for
purposes of this appeal. See In re Mouttet, 686 F.3d 1322, 1333 (Fed. Cir.
2012) (citations omitted) (“[W]here the relevant factual inquiries underlying
an obviousness determination are otherwise clear, characterization by the
examiner of prior art as ‘primary’ and ‘secondary’ is merely a matter of
presentation with no legal significance.”).
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presentation of a corresponding portion of the media presentation.” (See Br.
16, 22.)
With respect to claim 22, the Examiner relies on Chen to teach most
of the elements recited in the claimed method. (See Ans. 3-5.) For example,
the Examiner relies on Chen’s teaching of providing media content to
portable TCDs (television companion devices) 120. (See Chen, Abstract,
Fig. 1; Ans. 3-4 (citing Chen, Fig. 3).) Chen discloses a method of
displaying a media presentation, such as a football game, on a large media
device, such as TV 100. (See Chen, Fig. 1; ¶¶ 0009, 0029.) Chen defines a
TV as “a device which receives a signal consisting of one or more video
channels and one or more types of information streams including audio,
data, text and graphics and which outputs one or more of these streams.”
(Chen,¶ 0009.)
These streams 191 or portions 185 thereof emanate from the
broadcaster to the TV 100 and then out of the TV to selective TCDs 120.
(See Chen, Figs. 2, 3.) For example, Chen’s system broadcasts the same
football game, or another program, such as a documentary, synchronously
to several portable TCDs 120, which may be in a teleconferencing room or a
bar with the TV 100. (See Chen, ¶¶ 0028, 0034, 0035; Fig. 1.) Chen’s
streams 185 include typical MPEG-2 data packets of computer content and
include, for example, TV menus, statistics, player portraits, Spanish
commentary of a soccer game, and other information relevant to a particular
event being broadcasted, such as a soccer game. (See Chen, ¶¶ 0028, 0035,
0038, 0056.)
The Examiner relies on Toguri to teach accumulating media which
includes AV (audio visual) and metadata content in a cache in a
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synchronized fashion for display in a modified portable TCD 120 of Chen.
(See Ans. 4, 17.) “[T]he portable device is met by the TCD of Chen . . . .
The Examiner reasons that it would have been obvious to combine the
functionality of [Toguri’s] overall terminal [8, 9, 10, (see Toguri’s Fig. 1)]
with a portable device such as the TCD of Chen.” (See Ans. 17.)
Appellants’ argument that Toguri’s synchronization does not occur at
the portable device 10 in Toguri does not address the Examiner’s rationale.
The Examiner’s rationale involves modifying Chen’s TCD so that it would
have synchronizing and storing functionality therein based on Toguri’s
specific teachings and Chen’s suggestions or implicit teachings. (Compare
Br. 15 with Ans. 4, 17.)
The Examiner also relies on Toguri’s “reproduction time,” pursuant to
one alternative rationale, to suggest the “time prompt” trigger for
synchronizing data as set forth in claim 22. (Ans. 4, 16, 17 (discussing
Toguri, ¶¶ 79, 100, 102).) The Examiner alternatively points to Toguri’s
“start position” and “end position.” (Ans. 17-18 (citing Toguri, ¶¶ 0103,
0105).) Appellants do not address this latter finding. At cited paragraph
102, Toguri, like Chen, discloses data packets, for example, MPEG picture
and MP3 audio data packets.
The Examiner further relies on Chen’s automatic execution of the
display of content, including statistics, player portraits, and trivia, with a
synchronized display of related underlying media in data streams as teaching
or suggesting the disputed time prompts. The Examiner alternatively relies
on Chen’s “event identifiers” as teaching or suggesting the disputed time
prompts based on similar rationale. (See Ans. 5 (citing Chen, ¶¶ 28, 29, 55,
57)).
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Part of the Examiner’s rationale follows:
Although Chen lacks specific disclosure of caching and
timing operations, he does teach that the presentation of streams
may be executed automatically [para. 29], implying the need
for timing information to provide a trigger. Chen also uses
event identifiers to select and display auxiliary streams [paras.
55, 57]. These synchronization techniques would suggest to
one of ordinary skill that a time prompt could also be used to
trigger the display of corresponding auxiliary information as
taught by Toguri. Therefore, the combination of Chen and
Toguri is an obvious [sic] in order to synchronize primary
content and metadata, for example to display player portraits or
statistics at a relevant time in a televised sporting event [see
Chen, para. 28] or to synchronize questions and answers in a
play-along trivia game [see Chen, para. 59].
(Ans. 5.)
Appellants’ Brief focuses primarily, if not exclusively, on the
Examiner’s reliance on Toguri’s “reproduction time.” (See Br. 11-22
(addressing the final rejection).) Appellants do not address the Examiner’s
alternative rationales, quoted supra, that Chen “teach[es] the presentation of
streams may be executed automatically . . . implying the need for timing
information to provide a trigger” or the rationale involving the “event
identifiers,” i.e., at least two implied time prompts as part and parcel of the
“synchronization techniques.”
The data packets in Chen and Toguri contain audio and video data and
hence necessarily must be synchronized together. Appellants do not appear
to dispute that finding. Claim 22 is broad enough to read on the presentation
of the same multimedia content at the TV 100 and portable TCD 120 in
Chen, where, for example, the audio, or other content, at TCD 120
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necessarily is related to and synchronized with the video at Chen’s TV 100.
Given that the two media involve synchronized packet data, as the Examiner
finds and without a sufficient challenge by Appellants, they necessarily have
some type of time prompts within the packets to allow an ordering of the
packets for a coherent production involving the multimedia.
In other words, Appellants do not show error in the Examiner’s
general finding that multimedia data at the TCD and TV, which is packet
data, necessarily includes timing information to synchronize the different
packets together automatically for normal content presentation of the
packets. For example, video packets containing visual information for a
football game on TV 100 read on the “corresponding portion of the media
presentation” of claim 22. Audio, player profiles, menus, or other statistical
data packets at TCD 120 read on the displayed “content data” at the
“portable device.” The latter packets necessarily or suggestively would be
triggered based on imbedded time information in the video packets and the
latter packets.
In contrast, the Specification describes merely sending only an audio
(or text) associated content of a broadcast to a portable device. As such, that
content may require some type of additional timing prompt to synchronize
the audio (or text) because the video, being presented elsewhere, would not
be available as a timing trigger at the portable device. (See Spec. ¶¶ 10, 20,
24, 36; Fig. 1.) However, notwithstanding the disclosure, claim 22 does not
preclude sending audio or other data packets together with video packets
(i.e., the whole show) to a portable device TCD, as Chen discloses. As
explained above, skilled engineering artisans in the art of data packet
transmission, such as audio and video MPEG or other packets, would have
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been aware that these types of packets contain the necessary timing
information. Otherwise, without such timing information in the packets, the
packets typically could not be combined in an ordered manner as necessary
to create an audio visual show with other synchronized content.
Appellants’ Brief relies on paragraph 0038 of the Specification to
support the “time prompt” and “triggering” elements as recited in the
disputed claim step. (See Br. 6.) However, that cited paragraph only
generically refers to some type of timing mechanism without employing the
terms “time prompt” or “triggering.” Paragraph 0036 provides more detail
about timing, albeit, not clear detail: “The optional Start Time value acts as
a packet sequence number . . . . As packets are received, the user device will
buffer content into its memory in sequence based on start time. As the user
receives synchronizing codes, it will pull content from the sequential
memory . . . .” (Spec. ¶ 0036.) In any event, it appears, without more detail
offered by Appellants, that either the “synchronizing codes” or the “packet
sequence number” or some interaction therebetween may support the recited
“time prompt triggering” phrase in claim 22. Appellants do not contend that
they invented the method of ordering packets using packet sequence
numbers to create synchronized multimedia.
As discussed above, the Examiner relies on Toguri’s teaching that a
terminal 9 receives and integrates AV contents and metadata and “integrally
and synchronously outputs the received data to the terminal output unit 10.”
(Toguri, ¶ 0021.) Appellants admit that Toguri teaches synchronization:
All the synchronization and integration of data is done at
Terminal 9 and not at the terminal output unit 10. The terminal
output unit 10 does have multiple displays, but receives all the
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data to be displayed and/or the audio data to be played via
speakers at the same time together.
(Br. 15, 22.)
As indicated supra, the Examiner employs this synchronization
teaching to suggest employing similar synchronization functionality in
Chen’s portable device. The Examiner generally reasons that some
mechanism necessarily exists in prior art systems, such as those of Toguri
and Chen, to order the different packets in a time sequence for a meaningful
display presentation of the different types of information. Appellants do not
address in more than a cursory fashion the thrust of the Examiner’s rationale.
It follows that Appellants do not rebut that rationale.
Appellants similarly admit that “[t]iming information may necessarily
be transmitted to the device via the internet, but this timing information is
well known in the art of transmitting data via networks, and is not the same
kind of timing information Appellant[s] claim[].” (Br. 22.) This statement,
other arguments by Appellants, and vague reliance on the Specification, do
not show how the claimed time prompt patentably distinguishes over Chen
or the combination of Chen and Toguri.
Appellants also do not address the alternative finding by the Examiner
that Chen’s event “Identifer[s] 201A, 202A, 203A” satisfy the disputed time
prompt. (See Ans. 5 (citing Chen ¶¶ 55, 57).) Chen’s disclosure generally
teaches that viewers in a bar can watch and listen to different shows
simultaneously on a large TV 100 and portable TCDs 120. (See Chen,
Abstract, Fig. 1, ¶¶ 52-57).) According to Chen, a TCD can store an
identifier such as “FIRE” or “ATLANTA FOOTBALL.” Therefore,
according to suggestions flowing from Chen, if, for example, a TCD user is
watching a news program on the TCD while other bar patrons are watching a
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football game (prior to the Atlanta football game) on the large TV 100, at
some time before the Atlanta football game starts, the TCD will pick the
identifier “ATLANTA” out of one of the many broadcast streams and match
it to a stored profile item for “ATLANTA” in the portable TCD. In
response, the TCD will switch from the news program to the “ATLANTA”
game. (See id. at ¶ 55, 52-57.)
Accordingly, the Examiner’s alternative reliance on Chen’s event
identifiers to teach or suggest time prompts for triggering “ATLANTA”
football content at a portable device such as a TCD, where the content is
associated with (football) media on another TV screen, has prima facie
support in the record. Appellants fail to address, much less explain, why the
cited event identifier in Chen does not teach or suggest the disputed time
prompt recited in claim 22.
The Board cannot discern from Appellants’ arguments on this record a
patentable distinction between claim 22 and the combined teachings. See In
re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1056 (Fed. Cir. 1997) (“It is the applicant’s
burden to precisely define their invention, not the PTO’s.”); In re Baxter
Travenol Labs, 952 F.2d 388, 391 (Fed. Cir. 1991) (“It is not the function of
this court to examine the claims in greater detail than argued by
appellant . . . .”). Appellants do not present separate patentability arguments
for the remaining claims. Based on the foregoing discussion, Appellants fail
to show error in the rejection of claims 22-44 and 46-79.
DECISION
The Examiner’s decision to reject claims 22-44 and 46-79 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).
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AFFIRMED

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