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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 4-7 and 9-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Xu et al. (Pub. No.: US2021/0110610)
Regarding claim 1, Xu discloses a system that manages a virtual object, the system comprising: a memory storing instructions (Fig. 5, Memory 504); and a processor executing the instructions (Fig. 5, Processor 502), causing the system: to manage one set of feature amounts representing a particular point in a real world for displaying a virtual object in linkage with the real world (as shown in Fig. 1, the example real world scene 114 depicts a city street in which the XR anchors 116 may include or be co-located with a street sign (116.sub.1), a mailbox (116.sub.2), a tree (116.sub.3), and a billboard (116.sub.n), each of the XR anchors 116 may store at least one digital object, where the digital object may be downloaded and subsequently inserted, by the device 112, into the real world scene 114), in association with an identifier (e.g. anchors 116) in corresponding to the virtual object (e.g. digital image), wherein the system is configured to be able to manage the one set of the feature amounts in association with respective identifiers corresponding to a plurality of virtual objects (Fig. 3, 302-310); to manage condition information including attribute values to be matched with user attributes of users (Fig. 3, 314 “Customize The Digital Object For The User Based On A Profile of The User”), the condition information being associated with the respective identifiers and being used for determining which one of the plurality of virtual objects is to be provided to a user (Fig. 3, 316, 318); and to return, in response to a request from a terminal, the request including user information of a user and feature amounts in the real world, information regarding a virtual object to the terminal (para [0062], “the user may similarly request a specific digital object other than a digital object being rendered”), wherein the virtual object specified by the returned information is selected, from among the plurality of virtual objects that are managed in association with the feature amounts included in the request, by comparing one or more user attribute values derived from the user information included in the request with the attribute values included in the condition information associated with the respective identifiers (para [0057], “In step 314, the processing system may customize the digital object for the user. As discussed above, the user's profile may specify information about the user, including demographic information (e.g., age, gender, marital status, education, etc.), device information (e.g., whether the user uses a head mounted display, a mobile phone, a tablet computer, or the like to render and display XR media, the types of connections used by the device to access XR media such as cellular or WiFi, etc.), interests (e.g., favorite hobbies, sports teams, music, movies, etc.), and/or usage history with respect to XR media (e.g., types of digital objects the user has interacted with and/or ignored in the past). This information may be used to customize the XR environment, and more specifically individual digital objects which may be rendered in the XR environment, for the user. For instance, if a digital object includes a logo for a football team, then the logo included in the digital object may be customized as the logo of the user's favorite football team. As another example, if the digital object includes text, and the user's vision is known to be poor, then the size and/or font of the text could be increased to improve visibility. Similarly, the language of the text could be adapted to the user's preferred language. For digital objects that include sound, visual cues related to the sound (e.g., closed captioning) could be provided to a user who is hard of hearing”), and wherein the terminal is capable of projecting the virtual object into the real world based on the returned information (Fig. 3, 318 “Render the digital object for presentation by the extended reality device to create extended reality media”).
Regarding claim 4, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein one of attribute values included in the condition information is a value corresponding to progress of the user in a service that provides the virtual object (see para [0057], “the user's profile may specify information about the user, including demographic information (e.g., age, gender, marital status, education, etc.), device information (e.g., whether the user uses a head mounted display, a mobile phone, a tablet computer, or the like to render and display XR media, the types of connections used by the device to access XR media such as cellular or WiFi, etc.”)
Regarding claim 5, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein one of the attribute values included in the condition information is a value indicating whether the user has consented to a contract to use the service that provides the virtual object (e.g. the cellular service as mentioned in [0057] requires consented).
Regarding claim 6, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein the attribute values included in the condition information include settings based on personal attributes of the user (e.g. the user profile includes age, gender etc. as mentioned in [0057]).
Regarding claim 7, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein the attribute values included in the condition information values corresponding to an environment to which the user belongs (para [0057], “For instance, if a digital object includes a logo for a football team, then the logo included in the digital object may be customized as the logo of the user's favorite football team”).
Regarding claim 9, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein the condition information associated with the respective identifiers is set by an owner who has generated the virtual objects plurality of virtual objects (e.g. the anchors links to the virtual objects are set by the service owner, so the users can access through connection services).
Regarding claim 10, Xu discloses the system according to claim 9, wherein, if the owner of the plurality of virtual objects instructs the user to share one or more virtual objects of the plurality of virtual objects, the one or more virtual objects are provided without comparing the one or more user attribute values derived from the user information with the attribute values included in the condition information (para [0067], “the processing system may repeat one or more steps of the method 300, such as steps 304-322, steps 304-318, etc. In another example, the method 300 may include storing one or more digital objects, e.g., at the XR device or at the edge server. The storing may be after step 322. For instance, the XR media, or at least a portion thereof, may be stored for other users who may be interested in experiencing the XR media via the respective XR devices that may be served by the processing system”).
Regarding claim 11, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein the terminal includes a head mounted display (Fig. 1, 112).
Claim 12 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 1. Thus, Claim 12 is rejected for the same reason as claim 1 above.
Claim 13 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 4. Thus, claim 13 is rejected for the same reason as claim 4 above.
Claim 14 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 5. Thus, claim 14 is rejected for the same reason as claim 5 above.
Claim 15 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 6. Thus, claim 15 is rejected for the same reason as claim 6 above
Claim 16 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 7. Thus, claim 16 is rejected for the same reason as claim 7 above.
Claim 17 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 11. Thus, claim 17 is rejected for the same reason as claim 11 above.
Claim 18 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 9. Thus, claim 18 is rejected for the same reason as claim 9 above.
Claim 19 is a method claim corresponding to the system claim 10. Thus, claim 19 is rejected for the same reason as claim 10 above.
Regarding claim 20, Xu discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein the virtual object specified by the returned information is selected by: first narrowing down, from among the plurality of virtual objects that are managed in association with the feature amounts included in the request, one or more candidate virtual objects based on a value corresponding to progress of the user in a service that provides the virtual object; and then, selecting the virtual object from the one or more candidate virtual objects based on a value corresponding to a personal attribute of the user (see Fig. 3, 313 and 314. The digital objects are selected for each anchors and then the digital object can be further customized based on profile of the user such as age, gender, marital status, education, etc.).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1, 4-7 and 9-20 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Shahraray et al. (Pub. No.: US/20210142571) is cited teach a processing system in a telecommunications network includes acquiring the media stream and identifying an anchor in a scene of the media stream. The anchor is a presence in the scene that has a physical effect on the scene.
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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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/XIAO M WU/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2613
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