Facebook, Inc.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Aug 3, 2021

2020001747 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 3, 2021)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
14/583,311 12/26/2014 Benjamin Leon Grol-Prokopczyk 1360F0042 6906
110828 7590 08/03/2021
Kacvinsky Daisak Bluni PLLC (1360)
2601 Weston Parkway
Suite 103
Cary, NC 27513
EXAMINER
BOUSTANY, JIHAD KAMAL
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2459
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/03/2021 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
Docketing@kdbfirm.com
kpotts@kdbfirm.com
mfitzsimmons@kdbfirm.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte BENJAMIN LEON GROL-PROKOPCZYK,
DAVID HARRY GARCIA, and LIOR BERRY
Appeal 2020-001747
Application 14/583,311
Technology Center 2400
BEFORE JAMES B. ARPIN, GREGG I. ANDERSON, and
AMBER L. HAGY, Administrative Patent Judges.
ANDERSON, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–21, all of the pending claims. We
have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

1 Appellant refers to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a).
Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Facebook, Inc. Appeal Brief
(“Appeal Br.”) 2, filed September 24, 2019.
Appeal 2020-001747
Application 14/583,311
2
CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
The claims are directed to Techniques for Prompting Communication
Among Users of a Social Network. Spec.,2 Title. The Specification
describes a need for users of a social network to communicate by “a
messaging application associated with the social network.” Id. ¶ 32.
“Communications may be between individual users, or may be conducted as
group messages including a plurality of users.” Id. Information, like a
trending news story, may be of interest to one or more other users and be
used to “‘spark’ a conversation between users.” Id. The users may not
know that other users are interested in the news story. Id. Similarly, a
special event, like a birthday, may be of interest, and a reminder may be
provided along with the ability to send a message. Id.
Claim 1, along with claims 8 and 15, is an independent claim. Claim
1, reproduced below, is illustrative:
1. A computer-implemented method, comprising:

detecting user interactions of a plurality of users in a social
graph with an information unit in the social graph;

storing an association between each user and the information
unit based on the interactions between each user and the
information unit;

determining correlations between the users, the correlations
based on one or more coefficients describing the stored
association between each user and the information unit,

2 “Spec.” refers to the Specification filed December 26, 2014; “Final Act.” to
refer to the Final Office Action mailed July 10, 2019; “Ans.” refers to the
Examiner’s Answer mailed November 5, 2019; and “Reply Br.” refers to the
Reply Brief filed January 6, 2020.

Appeal 2020-001747
Application 14/583,311
3
each coefficient calculated based on one or more weighted
factors, the factors including actions of each user while
interacting with the information unit and a social graph
relationship between each user and the information unit;

displaying a badge prompting a particular user to
communicate with one or more other users regarding the
information unit based on the correlations, the badge
comprising a graphic representation of the information
unit on which the correlations between the users was
determined; and

initiating a communication with the one or more other users,
by a messaging component, in response to a selection of
the prompt by the particular user.
Appeal Br. 10.
REFERENCES
The Examiner relies on the following references:
Name Reference Date
Spiegel US Patent No. 8,060,463 B1 Nov. 15, 2011
Shartzer US Patent App. Pub. 2014/0181690 A1 June 26, 2014
REJECTION
Claims 1–21 are rejected as obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103 over the
combined teachings of Spiegel and Shartzer. Final Act. 3–16.
OPINION
The Examiner finds independent claim 1 is representative of
independent claims 1, 8, and 15. Ans. 3. Appellant does not dispute the
finding and argues its arguments regarding claim 1 “apply equally to claims
8 and 15.” . Appeal Br. 4. We also analyze the arguments as they relate to
claim 1. The following issues are raised in the Appeal Brief.
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Application 14/583,311
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Issue 1: Does Spiegel teach or suggest “determining correlations
between the users, the correlations based on one or more coefficients
describing the stored association between each user and the information
unit, each coefficient calculated based on one or more weighted factors, the
factors including actions of each user while interacting with the information
unit and a social graph relationship between each user and the information
unit” (“determining limitation”), as recited in claim 1? Appeal Br. 4–6;
Reply Br. 2–3.

The Examiner finds the “determining limitation” is taught or
suggested by Spiegel’s teaching of “recording the user-generated events in a
repository of event data in association with the particular user performing
the interaction.” Final Act. 3 (citing Spiegel, 3:34–49). Appellant disputes
the Examiner’s finding and argues Spiegel fails to “teach coefficients that
describe a stored association between users and information units.” Appeal
Br. 4 (heading A.). According to Appellant, Spiegel teaches “similarity
between specific pairs of users” and “degrees to which the items are
purchased or otherwise selected by two users are similar.” Id. at 4–5 (citing
Spiegel, 5:50–51, 5:45–46). Appellant concludes, “there is no teaching of
coefficients describing the relationship between each user and an
information unit (i.e. between a user and an item).” Id. at 5 (emphasis
omitted).
In the Answer, the Examiner responds by pointing out that Spiegel
applies weights to user actions. Ans. 4. For example, weights may be based
on the price of a purchased item, which weights are “clearly an association
between the user performing the action and the information unit (the
product),” which is the claimed “coefficient.” Id. (citing Spiegel, 5:66–6:17,
3:34–49). The Examiner finds that the popularity level of a purchased item
may, in addition to price, form a basis for assigning a weight “based upon
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Application 14/583,311
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one or more types of user actions ‘of a population of users.’” Id. at 4–5
(citing Spiegel, 6:13–17). The Examiner finds:
One of ordinary skill in the art would understand that if every
user “of the population of users” directly affects the weighting of
each individual action, “a social graph relationship” (between
each individual user and the community) to each “the item” is
clearly a factor in the weighting of the event.
Id. at 5.
In its Reply, Appellant argues, “Spiegel lacks a teaching of
determining correlations between the users based on their relationship with
the common information unit and using the correlations to indicate a
potential interest of the users communicating with each other regarding the
common information unit.” Reply Br. 2. Appellant further argues Spiegel
teaches only an association between the user and the information unit. Id. at
2–3. Appellant points to the example of an event, like a concert, where two
users are related to the concert, or “information unit,” and communicate
based on that event and not based on the relationship between the users. Id.
at 3.
We are not persuaded that Spiegel does not teach or suggest the
determining limitation because it “lacks a teaching of determining
correlations between the users.” See Reply Br. 2. As the Examiner finds, all
three elements of the determining limitation are taught by Spiegel. Ans. 4–
5. The three elements are: 1) a “stored association between each user and
the information unit”; 2) a weighted coefficient for different factors; and
3) the weighted factors include “actions of each user while interacting with
the information unit” and a social graph reflecting the relationship between
the user and the information unit. Id.
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As to the third element, we are not persuaded by Appellant’s
argument based on the Specification’s description of a “social graph”
depicting that “relationships between information units (represented by
nodes in the graph) are represented by edges between the nodes.” See
Appeal Br. 5–6 (citing Spec. ¶ 76). We agree with the Examiner that this
feature is not recited in claim 1. Ans. 5.
We are also not persuaded by Appellant’s overarching argument that
Spiegel “lacks a teaching of determining correlations between the users
based on their relationship with the common information unit and using the
correlations to indicate a potential interest of the users communicating with
each other regarding the common information unit.” Reply Br. 2. Spiegel
describes how the “collected browse/search event data is one type of
information that may be taken into consideration in matching users with
other users and/or user communities.” Spiegel, 3:34–49 (emphasis added).
As a result of the matching, the users may contact each other, as the
Examiner finds is illustrated in Spiegel Figure 2B. See Final Act. 4. We
agree with the Examiner that “Spiegel teaches using every conceivable
relationship . . . between each user and every other user with a particular
information unit as part of the weighting factor, since every single user’s
event with the item attributes to the weight of each individual event.” Ans. 6
(emphasis added) (citing Spiegel, 6:13–17). We agree with the Examiner’s
finding that Spiegel teaches “determining correlations between users.” See
Final Act. 4; Ans. 4–5. We are, therefore, not persuaded of Examiner error
in the finding that Spiegel teaches or suggests the “determining limitation.”
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Issue 2: Does the combination of Spiegel and Shartzer teach or
suggest “displaying a badge prompting a particular user to communicate
with one or more other users regarding the information unit based on the
correlations, the badge comprising a graphic representation of the
information unit on which the correlations between the users was
determined” (“displaying a badge limitation”), as recited in claim 1?
Appeal Br. 6–7.

The Examiner finds the “displaying a badge limitation” is taught or
suggested by Spiegel’s Figure 2B,3 which, along with other disclosures from
Spiegel, teaches “[i]f a searcher clicks on ‘why selected,’ the matching
service returns a web page (not shown) with information about why this user
was selected to recommend.” Final Act. 4 (citing Spiegel, 9:3–16, Fig. 2B);
see also id. (citing Spiegel, 3:3–49, 6:24–37). Appellant responds:
However, the claims of the present application specifically state
that the badge itself provides a graphic indication of the
information unit which correlates the users. For example, the
sports icons shown as reference 704-a in FIG. 7A of the
application indicates that the users have been correlated based on
an interest in a sports-related information item. Just by glancing
at this badge, the user is able to see that the uses are correlated
by their interest in an article (i.e., an information unit) relating to
sports. However, the “why selected?” link shown in FIG. 2B of
Spiegel is unable to convey the same information unless the link
is selected, whereupon an additional webpage is displayed
showing the reason for the selection of the user.
Appeal Br. 6. The Examiner reproduces Figure 2B of Spiegel and finds that
the recited “badge” displays unique user names as well as a location for each

3 Fig. 2B “illustrates an example search results page for a people search.”
Spiegel, 2:28–29.
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user, which is the recited “information unit,” and thus reads on Spiegel’s
search results page. Ans. 8–9 (citing Spiegel, 6:24–37, 9:3–16, Fig. 2B).
Appellant also argues Spiegel’s “why selected” link is not a prompt.
Appeal Br. 6. Rather, according to Appellant, the link is a web page
showing why a user was selected and will not “initiate a communication
between the users.” Id. at 6–7. The Examiner finds that Appellant does not
explain why “selecting” as taught by Spiegel is not a “prompt” as recited.
Ans. 8–9.
Appellant’s last argument is directed to the recited “graphical
representation.” Appeal Br. 7. Appellant agrees that Shartzer, which is
relied on by the Examiner, “teaches graphical elements representative of a
user interest.” Id.; see also Final Act. 5 (citing Shartzer ¶ 27 for “graphical
representation” element). Appellant argues, however, that Shartzer does not
teach “that the graphical representation of the badge be representative of a
particular information unit in the social graph which correlates to users
together.” Id. The Examiner responds that Spiegel is relied on for the
correlation between users and information units, and that Appellant’s
argument does not respond to the combined teachings of Spiegel with
Shartzer. Ans. 9–10.
We are not persuaded by the Appellant’s arguments. Appellant does
not respond persuasively to the Examiner’s findings with respect to the
“displaying a badge limitation.” See generally Reply Br.; Final Act. 5; Ans.
8–10. We adopt the Examiner’s findings here, and we are persuaded that the
combined teachings of Spiegel and Shartzer teaches the “displaying a badge
limitation.”

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Application 14/583,311
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Issue 3: Does Spiegel teach or suggest “initiating a communication
with the one or more other users, by a messaging component, in response to
a selection of the prompt by the particular user” (“initiating limitation”), as
recited in claim 1? Appeal Br. 7–8.

The Examiner finds the “initiating limitation” is taught or suggested
by Spiegel’s teaching of “notifying users and providing a messaging option
to communicate [] making a selection on a user to contact accesses a form to
send a message and conveying that message to the selected user.” Final
Act. 4–5 (citing Spiegel, 6:24–37, 9:17–25). Appellant argues the initiating
limitation requires that “the graphic displayed by the badge be a
representation of the information unit on which the correlation between the
users was determined.” Appeal Br. 7. Further, Appellant argues Spiegel
does not teach that “the graphical representation of the badge be
representative of a particular information unit in the social graph which
correlates [two] users together.” Id.
We agree with the Examiner’s findings and adopt them for this
decision. See Ans. 10. As discussed above in connection with the
“displaying a badge limitation,” Spiegel’s Figure 2B illustrates a prompt for
communication between two users when the “why selected?” link is
selected. As discussed above, the location of particular users is an example
of a shared event that “prompts communication between two users.” See id.
Appellant does not respond persuasively to the Examiner’s findings
with respect to the “initiating limitation. See generally Reply Br. We adopt
the Examiner’s findings here, and we are persuaded that Spiegel teaches or
suggests the “initiating communication limitation.”
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CONCLUSION
As discussed above, independent claim 1 is representative, and the
analysis above applies to independent claims 8 and 15. The rejection of
claims 1, 8, and 15 is sustained. None of dependent claims 2–7, 9–14, and
16–21 is separately argued; and the rejection of those claims is also
sustained. We sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1–21 as obvious
over the combined teachings of Spiegel and Shartzer.
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–21 103 Spiegel, Shartzer 1–21
TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv).
AFFIRMED