DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Response to Amendment
Receipt is acknowledged of applicants’ amendment filed May 12, 2026. Claim 5 has been canceled without prejudice. Claims 1-4 are pending and an action on the merits is as follows.
Objection to the specification has been withdrawn.
Objections to claims 1, 2, 4 and 5 have been withdrawn.
Rejections of claims 1-5 under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph have been withdrawn.
Rejections of claims 1-5 under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph have been withdrawn.
Applicants’ arguments with respect to claims have been considered and are addressed below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. Claim 1 recites “acquire a result of scoring relating to a user’s singing … in the past”, “acquire pitch information representing pitches of notes”, “acquire a result of scoring relating to a user’s singing of a target music piece” and “output recommendation information”. The claimed limitations are directed to a process, which under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, e.g. at least one processor, a learning model and setting keys. If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, then it falls within the “Mental Processes” grouping of abstract ideas.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The only additional elements described in the claims are at least one processor, a learning model, and setting keys, which are described at a high-level of generality such that they amount to no more than mere components and instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component and known processing algorithms to perform the process. Accordingly, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Accordingly, the claims are directed to an abstract idea.
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the at least one processor which acquires the result of scoring relating to a user’s singing in the past, acquires pitch information representing pitches of notes, acquires a result of scoring relating to a user’s singing of a target music piece and outputs recommendation information is considered a generic computer component without requiring any additional specific elements to apply the exception. Likewise, the learning model for predicting a result of scoring, and the plurality of setting keys for changing pitches of notes are considered a generic computer component without requiring any additional specific elements to apply the exception. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept. The dependent claims 2-4 only further define the abstract idea without significant more, e.g. using training data as described in claim 2, receiving identification information as input as described in claim 3, and averaging results of scoring as described in claim 4 are not described to require any additional unique components or steps. Accordingly, the claims are directed to an abstract idea.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-4 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 101, set forth in this Office action.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Claim 1: Although the prior art (US 2023/0014315 A1) teaches a recommendation information provision device providing recommendation information (page 10 paragraph [0095]), the recommendation information provision device comprising: at least one processor being configured to: acquire a result of scoring (degree of satisfaction) relating to a user's performance of a musical piece in the past (page 2 paragraph [0022]), where the user’s performance is singing (page 2 paragraph [0021]), acquire pitch information representing pitches of notes configuring the musical piece and aligned in a time series in the section (page 4 paragraph [0045]); build a learning model predicting (estimating) a result of scoring relating to the user's singing of a musical piece from the pitch information; acquire a result of scoring relating to a user's singing of a target musical piece on the basis of an output of the learning model and output a recommendation to the user as the recommendation information on the basis of results of scoring for the pitch information about the target musical piece as a target (page 11 paragraph [0103]), and additional prior art (US 2012/0046771 A1) teaches changing pitches of notes represented by the pitch information about the target musical piece according to a plurality of setting keys, wherein for each setting key the at least one processor uniformly changes pitches of the notes represented by the pitch information in all the sections of the target musical piece by a predetermined numeral value (page 5 paragraph [0032]), the prior art does not teach nor suggest the scoring to relate to each of a plurality of sections of the musical piece, the pitch information about the target musical piece to be inputted to the learning model while changing pitches of notes, and output a setting key recommended to the user on the basis of results of scoring for the pitch information of the plurality of setting keys about the target musical piece. The combinations of the claimed limitations are novel and found to be allowable over prior art. The cited references taken singly or in combination do not anticipate nor make obvious applicant's claimed invention.
Claims 2-5 depend from claim 1 and therefore inherit all allowed claim limitations.
Terminal Disclaimer
The terminal disclaimer filed on May 12, 2026 disclaiming the terminal portion of any patent granted on this application which would extend beyond the expiration date of any patent granted on Application Number 18/000,210 has been reviewed and is accepted. The terminal disclaimer has been recorded.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CHRISTOPHER UHLIR whose telephone number is (571)270-3091. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:30-4.
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/Christopher Uhlir/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3619 August 8, 2026
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