DETAILED ACTION
Claim Status
Applicant’s amendment, filed on 01/28/2026, overcome the 112(a) rejection to claims 1-5 and 7-20.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1-5, 7-12, 15-18, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marystone (4 Ways to Run a Microsoft Teams Pool During Meetings) in view of Microsoft (Poll attendees during a Teams meeting), and in view of Brown (US 20080065998 A1), and in view of Levy (Hosting Welcoming Virtual Events and Meetings), and further in view of FeatureUpvote (Editing and moderating comments).
Regarding claim 1, Marystone teaches a system comprising: a non-transitory computer-readable medium; a communications interface; and a processor communicatively coupled to the non-transitory computer-readable medium and the communications interface, the processor configured to execute processor-executable instructions stored in the non-transitory computer-readable medium to: (Page 3: Running a Poll in a Microsoft Teams Meeting (e.g. software running on computers).)
establish a virtual meeting having a plurality of participants; (Page 4: Already in a meeting, Microsoft Team lets you create a poll on the fly. Page 7: meeting attendees (e.g. participants) can respond to the poll.)
receive, from a first client device, a collaborative message; (Pages 4-7: steps to create a poll and send to meeting attendees using the Microsoft Forms App for Teams.)
transmit a collaborative message request to the selected one or more participants; (Pages 4-7: steps to create a poll and send to meeting attendees using the Microsoft Forms App for Teams. Or Pages 7-9: steps to create a pool and send to meeting attendees using Polly.
receive one or more collaborative message responses from each participant of a subset of the selected one or more participants, (Page 7: Meeting attendees receiving the poll in the chat panel and be able to respond to the poll.)
at least one of the collaborative message responses comprising a message created by a corresponding participant of the one or more selected participants; (Page 7: Meeting attendees receiving the poll in the chat panel and be able to respond to the poll. A meeting attendee can click Submit Vote to send the response (e.g. collaborative message response) for the poll back to the person who created the poll.) The definition of “message” is simply a communication/piece of information sent for a recipient. The cited reference clearly teaches a response to a poll is submitted by the selected participants.
provide, to a first client device, the one or more collaborative message responses; (Page 7: A meeting attendee can click Submit Vote to send the response for the poll back to the person who created the poll (e.g. a first client device).)
receive, from the first client device, an indication to release the one or more collaborative message responses; and (Pages 5-6: Poll creator can set “share results automatically” during poll creation. Or Pages 8-9: Poll creator (e.g. first client device) using Polly can set “Results visibility after the poll is closed” and choose to manually close the poll (e.g. an indication to release) or to close the poll after a certain time period.)
transmit, to the participants, the one or more collaborative message responses. (Page 15: Poll results displayed.)
Marystone does not explicitly disclose each participant of the plurality of participants exchanging one or more audio streams via the virtual meeting; transmit, to the plurality of participants, the one or more collaborative message responses.
However, Microsoft teaches each participant of the plurality of participants exchanging one or more audio streams via the virtual meeting; (Page 4 Image 1: Microsoft Teams GUI which shows the control bar including controls to Switch on/off video and Switch on/off audio.)
transmit, to the plurality of participants, the one or more collaborative message responses. (Page 4 Image 1: Poll results from a plurality of participants are displayed.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because both Marystone and Microsoft are teaching features and functionalities from the same product Microsoft Teams.
Marystone and Microsoft do not explicitly disclose receive, from a first client device, a collaborative message and an identification of a first plurality of participants of the plurality of participants, the first plurality of participants comprising a subset of the plurality of participants; transmit the collaborative message request based on the collaborative message to the identified first plurality of participants; receive one or more collaborative message responses from each participant of a subset of the selected first plurality of participants, at least one of the collaborative message responses created by a corresponding participant of the selected first plurality of participants.
Brown teaches receive, from a first client device, a collaborative message and an identification of a first plurality of participants of the plurality of participants, the first plurality of participants comprising a subset of the plurality of participants; receive one or more collaborative message responses from each participant of a subset of the selected first plurality of participants, at least one of the collaborative message responses created by a corresponding participant of the selected first plurality of participants. ([0039]: For example, checkboxes 204 (e.g. GUI menu options) allow a conference chairperson or host to select a subset of participants for further processing. Button 206 allows a chairperson, host or screener to add the checked participants to the question and answer queue. [0043]: The chairperson or screeners may solicit extended information from individual participants including transferring participants or groups of participants to specific outside phone numbers or other audio or multimedia channels to take a donation, answer survey questions, communicate with support staff, or gather additional information. The control interface provides for the chairperson, host or screener to transfer a selected participant into a separate sub-conference.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone, Microsoft and Levy to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because the chairperson or screeners may solicit extended information from individual participants including transferring participants or groups of participants to specific outside phone numbers or other audio or multimedia channels to take a donation, answer survey questions, communicate with support staff, or gather additional information. The control interface provides for the chairperson, host or screener to transfer a selected participant into a separate sub-conference. As taught by Brown, [0043].
Marystone, Microsoft and Brown do not explicitly disclose at least one of the collaborative message responses comprising a custom message.
Levy teaches at least one of the collaborative message responses comprising a custom message. (Pages 3-4: Host can ask attendees questions, such as: “where are you dialing in from” or “what is your favorite food or activities”. Attendees can share their responses (e.g., custom message) in the event chat.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone, Microsoft and Brown to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because it is common for host to interact with meeting attendees by asking questions for the purpose of break the ice and keep attendees engaged. Taught by Levy, Pages 3-4.
Marystone, Microsoft, Brown and Levy do not explicitly disclose receive, from the first client device, a modification to the one or more collaborative message responses prior to transmitting the one or more collaborative message responses to the plurality of participants.
However, FeatureUpvote teaches receive, from the first client device, a modification to the one or more collaborative message responses prior to transmitting the one or more collaborative message responses to the plurality of participants. (Page 1 Introduction: All comments require moderator (e.g. the first client device) approval before they are made publicly visible. You might also choose to edit comments.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone, Microsoft, Brown and Levy to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because it is desirable to edit comments before they are made publicly visible to correct grammatical or spelling mistakes and to improve clarify so other user can understand the comment. As taught by FeatureUpvote, Page 1 Introduction.
Regarding claim 2, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the system of claim 1.
Marystone teaches wherein, prior to executing the instructions to receive, from the first client device, the indication to release the one or more collaborative message response, the instructions further cause the processor to execute further processor-executable instructions stored in the non-transitory computer-readable medium to: cache the one or more collaborative message responses. (Pages 5-6: Poll creator can set “share results automatically” or not during poll creation. Or Pages 8-9: Poll creator using Polly can set “Results visibility after the poll is closed” and choose to manually close the poll or to close the poll after a certain time period. The poll results are stored (e.g. cached) in memory until Poll is closed.)
Regarding claim 3, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the system of claim 1.
Marystone teaches wherein the processor is configured to execute further processor-executable instructions stored in the non-transitory computer-readable medium to: receive, from the first client device, an indication to anonymize the collaborative message responses. (Page 6: Poll creator can set “Keep responses anonymous”.)
Regarding claim 4, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the system of claim 3.
Marystone teaches anonymize the one or more collaborative message responses when received from each of the at least the subset of the plurality of participants. (Page 6: Poll creator can set “Keep responses anonymous” which mean responses from attendees are showed as anonymous.)
Regarding claim 5, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the system of claim 1.
Marystone teaches establish a chat channel during the virtual meeting, wherein the collaborative message responses are transmitted to the plurality of participants via the chat channel. (Pages 6-7: 8. Send poll to the meeting chat. 9. The poll will appear in the chat panel. Or Pages 8-9: Using Polly, the poll can be delivered in the meeting chat.
Regarding claim 7, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the system of claim 5.
Microsoft teaches wherein the first client device corresponds to at least one of a host of the virtual meeting or a moderator of the virtual meeting. (Page 1: As a meeting organizer or presenter (e.g. host), you can use Microsoft Forms to create polls.)
Same rationale applies to the rejection of independent claim 8 (method) and claim 15 (computer-readable medium) because they are substantially similar to claim 1 (system).
Regarding claim 9, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the method of claim 8.
Marystone and Microsoft teach providing, by the video conference provider, the one or more collaborative message responses to the first client device comprises providing the one or more collaborative message responses to the first client device at a first time; (Marystone - Page 7: A meeting attendee can click Submit Vote to send the response for the poll back to the person who created the poll (e.g. a first client device). Pages 8-9: Poll creator using Polly can set “Results visibility after the poll is closed” and choose to manually close the poll or to close the poll after a certain time period. The poll results are stored (e.g. cached) in memory until Poll is closed. Microsoft – Page 4: When you launch your poll, meeting attendees will see the question and answer options. Once attendees pick their answer, they’ll select submit to send the response back to poll creator.)
transmitting, by the video conference provider, the one or more collaborative message responses to the plurality of participants comprises transmitting the one or more collaborative message responses to the plurality of participants at a second time; and the second time occurs after the first time. (Microsoft Page 4 Image 1: Poll results from a plurality of participants are displayed. Poll results are displayed at the end of the flow.)
Regarding claim 10, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the method of claim 9.
Microsoft teaches wherein the second time is a time after the first client device receives the one or more collaborative message responses from a majority of the plurality of participants. (Microsoft Page 4 Image 1: Poll results (i.e. 312 votes) from a plurality of participants are displayed. Poll results are displayed at the end of the flow (e.g. the second time).)
Regarding claim 11, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the method of claim 9.
Marystone teaches determining a response time period for the collaborative message request; determining an expiration of the response time period; and transmitting the one or more collaborative message responses to the plurality of participants based on the expiration of the response time period. (Pages 8-9: Poll creator using Polly can set “Results visibility after the poll is closed” and choose to manually close the poll or set Polly to close the poll after a certain time period ranging from five minutes to three months. The poll results are displayed to public until when the Poll is closed which is due to the expiration of the response time period.)
Regarding claim 12, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the method of claim 11.
Marystone teaches wherein the expiration of the response time period is established by the second time. (Pages 8-9: Poll creator using Polly can set “Results visibility after the poll is closed” and choose to manually close the poll or set Polly to close the poll after a certain time period ranging from five minutes to three months. The poll results are displayed to public until when the Poll is closed which is due to the expiration of the response time period.)
Regarding claim 16, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15.
Marystone teaches to: transmit, to the plurality of participants, the one or more collaborative message responses via a chat channel. (Pages 6-7: 8. Send poll to the meeting chat. 9. The poll will appear in the chat panel. Or Pages 8-9: Using Polly, the poll can be delivered in the meeting chat.
Regarding claim 17, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16.
Marystone teaches wherein the one or more collaborative message responses are transmitted simultaneously via the chat channel to each of the plurality of participants. (Pages 6-7: 8. Send poll to the meeting chat. 9. The poll will appear in the chat panel (e.g. simultaneously) of all attendees. Or Pages 8-9: Using Polly, the poll can be delivered in the meeting chat.
Regarding claim 18, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16.
Microsoft teaches provide an indication within the chat channel that the one or more collaborative message response are part of a collaborative message. (Microsoft Page 4 Image 1: Poll results (i.e. 312 votes) from a plurality of participants are displayed.)
Regarding claim 20, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15.
Marystone teaches associate each of the one or more collaborative message responses with a participant of the plurality of participants; and transmit, to the plurality of participants, an identification of the participant associated with each of the one or more collaborative message responses. (Page 7 Image 1: The poll is created as “Not anonymous | Results shared” which means the results of the poll is shared with user identification.)
Claim(s) 13-14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marystone (4 Ways to Run a Microsoft Teams Pool During Meetings) in view of Microsoft (Poll attendees during a Teams meeting), and in view of Brown (US 20080065998 A1), and in view of Levy (Hosting Welcoming Virtual Events and Meetings), and in view of FeatureUpvote (Editing and moderating comments), and further in view of Gartner (My customer’s review was rejected – What now?).
Regarding claim 13, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the method of claim 8.
Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote do not explicitly disclose receiving, from the first client device, a rejection of a collaborative message response from a second client device, wherein the one or more collaborative message responses comprises the collaborative message response from the second client device.
However, Gartner teaches receiving, from the first client device, a rejection of a collaborative message response from a second client device, wherein the one or more collaborative message responses comprises the collaborative message response from the second client device. (Page 1 paragraph 3: When reviews are not approved, the reviewers will receive notification with the details on why the review was not approved. and correct their review and resubmit for reevaluation.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because there may be different reasons for a review to be rejected. It is desirable to reaches out to the reviewer to explain the reason and steps they can take to correct their review and resubmit for reevaluation. As taught by Gatner, Page 1 paragraph 3.
Regarding claim 14, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy, FeatureUpvote and Gartner teach the method of claim 13.
Gartner teaches transmitting, to the second client device, a request to submit a second collaborative message response based on the rejection of the collaborative message response from the second client device; receiving, from the second client device, the second collaborative message response; and transmitting the second collaborative message response to the plurality of participants as part of the one or more collaborative message responses. (Page 1 paragraph 3: When reviews are not approved, the reviewers will receive notification with the details on why the review was not approved and steps to correct their review and resubmit for reevaluation.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone, Microsoft, Dharmaji and FeatureUpvote to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because there may be different reasons for a review to be rejected. It is desirable to reaches out to the reviewer to explain the reason and steps they can take to correct their review and resubmit for reevaluation. As taught by Gatner, Page 1 paragraph 3.
Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marystone (4 Ways to Run a Microsoft Teams Pool During Meetings) in view of Microsoft (Poll attendees during a Teams meeting), and in view of Brown (US 20080065998 A1), and in view of Levy (Hosting Welcoming Virtual Events and Meetings), and in view of FeatureUpvote (Editing and moderating comments), and further in view of Demarest (Here’s how to enable anonymous responses and know whether yours is).
Regarding claim 19, Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote teach the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15.
Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote do not explicitly disclose receive, from a second client device, a request to transmit a collaborative message response anonymously; and anonymize the collaborative message response from the second client device prior to transmitting the collaborative message response as part of the one or more collaborative message responses to the first client device.
However, Demarest teaches receive, from a second client device, a request to transmit a collaborative message response anonymously; and anonymize the collaborative message response from the second client device prior to transmitting the collaborative message response as part of the one or more collaborative message responses to the first client device. (Page 2 paragraph 1: If your name or email address aren’t asterisked questions that require a response, your Google Form responses can be anonymous. That means a user can submit an answer without input any identification information.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Marystone, Microsoft, Brown, Levy and FeatureUpvote to include above limitations. One would have been motivated to do so because people may be concerned about the responses being traced for privacy reasons. It is desirable to allow anonymous feedback. As taught by Demarest, Page 2 paragraph 3.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments, see pages 9-10, filed 01/28/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claims 1-5 and 7-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
On pages 9-10, applicant submits that the prior art of record fail to the amended claim 1, especially “a collaborative message and an identification of a first plurality of participants of the plurality of participants, the first plurality of participants comprising a subset of the plurality of participants”. Applicant further submits “First, Brown does not describe any computing device that receives both (1) a collaborative message, and (2) an identification of a first plurality of participants of the plurality of participants as recited in claim 1. While Brown allows a user to select certain individuals to place into a question-and-answer queue, there is no corresponding collaborative message that is received.”
In response to applicant’s arguments, it is noted that Brown teaches in [0039] that “checkboxes 204 (e.g. GUI menu options) allow a conference chairperson or host to select a subset of participants for further processing. Button 206 (e.g. GUI menu options) allows a chairperson, host or screener to add the checked participants to the question and answer queue.” In addition, Brown teaches in [0043] that “The chairperson or screeners may solicit extended information from individual participants including transferring participants or groups of participants to specific multimedia channels answer survey questions (e.g., collaborative message), or gather additional information.” It is well-known in the art that survey questions are commonly presented as text messages which is equivalent to corresponding collaborative messages. Therefore, Brown teaches the amended claim limitations.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/ZI YE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2455