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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 12/27/2023, 05/07/2024, and 01/18/2025 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings were submitted on 12/27/2023. These drawings are reviewed and accepted by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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) 1-11 and 13-16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haykin et al. (US 20090304203 A1) in view of Rosenberg (S 20070189544 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Haykin teaches:
“a first ambient microphone configured to generate a first acoustic signal” (par. 0104; ‘The input signals can be provided, for example, by two microphone arrays located in spatially distinct areas; for example, the first microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the left ear of a hearing instrument user and the second microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the right ear of the hearing instrument user.’);
“a second ambient microphone configured to generate a second acoustic signal” (par. 0104; ‘The input signals can be provided, for example, by two microphone arrays located in spatially distinct areas; for example, the first microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the left ear of a hearing instrument user and the second microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the right ear of the hearing instrument user.’);
“a speaker configured to play an audio content signal” (par. 0104; ‘In order to achieve true binaural processing, both parts of the hearing instrument cooperate with each other, e.g. through a wired or a wireless link, such that all microphone signals are simultaneously available from the left and the right hearing instrument so that a binaural output signal can be produced (i.e. a signal at the left ear and a signal at the right ear of the hearing instrument user).’);
“a memory that stores instruction; and a processor electrically connected to the first ambient microphone, the second ambient microphone, and the speaker, wherein the processor is configured to execute the instructions to perform operations” (par. 0208; ‘It should be understood by those skilled in the art that the components of the hearing aid system may be implemented using at least one digital signal processor as well as dedicated hardware such as application specific integrated circuits or field programmable arrays.’), the operations comprising:
“detecting a voice based on an analysis of the first acoustic signal and the second acoustic signal, and wherein the analysis of the first acoustic signal and the second acoustic signal uses at least one of a coherence analysis, correlation analysis, level-detection, spectral analysis, or a combination thereof” (par. 0126; ‘Since the speech components in the output signals of the TF-LCMV beamformer 100 are constrained to be equal to the speech components in the reference microphones for both microphone arrays, the binaural cues, such as the interaural time difference (ITD) and/or the interaural intensity difference (IID), for example, of the speech source are generally well preserved.’).
However, Haykin does not expressly teach:
“detecting a user’s voice based upon the analysis of the first acoustic signal or the second acoustic signal;”
“generating a decreased volume audio content signal upon detecting the user’s voice;”
“mixing the first acoustic signal with the decreased volume audio content signal to generate a mixed audio content signal;” and
“sending the mixed audio content signal to the speaker.”
In a similar field of endeavor (enhancing voice/speech), Rosenberg teaches:
“detecting a user’s voice based upon the analysis of the first acoustic signal or the second acoustic signal” (par. 0023; ‘This is a function in which the playing volume of a currently playing media file is automatically reduced by the processor for a period of time in response to the media players user's own voice being detected within the audio signal captured from the ambient environment.’);
“generating a decreased volume audio content signal upon detecting the user’s voice” (par. 0023; ‘In this way if the media player user begins speaking aloud into the ambient environment, the media player is automatically responsive by reducing the playing volume of media content to that user so the user can more easily hear himself talk.’);
“mixing the first acoustic signal with the decreased volume audio content signal to generate a mixed audio content signal” (par. 0025; ‘In some embodiments of the present invention, the media player is operative to mix musical audio content derived from a stored media file with ambient audio content captured from a microphone local to the user.’) and
“sending the mixed audio content signal to the speaker” (par. 0025; ‘In this way the user can listen to musical media content in audio combination with ambient audio signals from the local environment.’; par. 0043; ‘The program flow shown would generally be performed in parallel with other processes performed by the media player, including processes that select and/or play media items by accessing media content from memory and outputting an audio representation of such media content through headphones and/or other similar audio presentation hardware.’).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Haykin’s binaural signal enhancement system (e.g., the first and second microphone arrays) by incorporating features from Rosenberg’s ambient sound responsive media player (e.g., mixing audio content with microphone signals) in order to reduce the volume of audio content during speech segments. The combination enables a media player to intelligently adjust and/or vary the playing volume of a musical media file to a user based at least in part upon detected sounds from the ambient environment of the user. (Rosenberg: par. 00026)
Regarding claim 2 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“detecting a background noise level by analyzing at least one of the first acoustic signal or the second acoustic signal or a combination of both” (Haykin: par. 0105; ‘The perceptual binaural signal enhancement selectively extracts useful signals and suppresses background noise, by employing pre-processing that is somewhat analogous to the human auditory system and analyzing various spatial and temporal cues on a time-frequency basis.’).
Regarding claim 3 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“passing the first acoustic signal to a gain function” (Haykin: par. 0152; ‘The perceptual binaural speech enhancement unit 22' can be combined with other subband speech enhancement techniques and auditory compensation schemes that are used in typical multiband hearing instruments, such as, for example, automatic volume control and multiband dynamic range compression.’).
Regarding claim 4 (dep. on claim 3), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“band-pass filtering the first acoustic signal after passing the first acoustic signal to the gain function” (Haykin: par. 0154; ‘Accordingly, the noise-reduced signals 18 and 20 are passed through a bank of bandpass filters, each of which simulates the frequency response that is associated with a particular position on the basilar membrane of the human cochlea.’).
Regarding claim 5 (dep. on claim 4), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“band-pass filtering the first acoustic signal in a time domain or by digitally using frequency” (Haykin: par. 0154; ‘Accordingly, the noise-reduced signals 18 and 20 are passed through a bank of bandpass filters, each of which simulates the frequency response that is associated with a particular position on the basilar membrane of the human cochlea.’).
Regarding claim 6 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“receiving a user's command, wherein the user's command is at least one of a non-voice audio command, a visual command, or a combination thereof” (Rosenberg: par. 0059; ‘User Interface: In some embodiments of the present invention the media player includes dedicated user interface elements such as buttons, touch screen elements, and/or other manual or vocal commands that enable a user to override the automatic volume adjustment methods disclosed herein.’).
Regarding claim 7 (dep. on claim 6), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“calculating a cross correlation between at the first and second acoustic signals” (Haykin: par. 0128; ‘It is assumed that the ITD can be expressed using the phase of the cross-correlation between two signals.’).
Regarding claim 8 (dep. on claim 7), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“extracting a peak value of the cross-correlation and a lag at which the peak value occurs” (Haykin: par. 0172; ‘This results in peaks in the autocorrelation function (ACF) that can be used as a cue for periodicity.’).
Regarding claim 9 (dep. on claim 8), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“determining if the lag for the peak value matches a reference value” (Haykin: par. 0172; ‘For a periodic signal, the similarity is greatest at lags equal to integer multiples of its fundamental period.’).
Regarding claim 10 (dep. on claim 9), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“outputting a user voice active message if the lag for the peak value matches the reference value” (Haykin: par. 0172; ‘At each time instance, a two-dimensional (centre frequency vs. autocorrelation lag) representation, known as the autocorrelogram, is generated. For a periodic signal, the similarity is greatest at lags equal to integer multiples of its fundamental period.’; the Examiner takes official notice on the feature of voice active message. Outputting a message if a condition is met is well-known in the art. It would be obvious to output any kind of feedback when a condition such as lag matching a reference value.).
Regarding claim 11 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“wherein the operation of detecting the voice includes an analysis of whether a sound pressure level of the first acoustic signal or the second acoustic signal or a combination of both is above a threshold” (Rosenberg: par. 0053; ‘In addition, one or more generic words commonly used to summon attention, such as, for example, "sir" or "help" or "excuse me," may be additionally optionally configured to also trigger the automated volume reduction methods if such words are captured in the ambient audio signal at a volume that exceeds a certain threshold.’).
Regarding claim 13 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“generating a filtered sound signal by filtering at least one of the first acoustic signal, the second acoustic signal, or a combination thereof, and presenting a notification based on the filtered sound signal” (Rosenberg: par. 0054; ‘It should be noted that the ambient audio signal content may be filtered or otherwise processed to extract extraneous noise and/or sound content that is outside certain magnitude and/or frequency limits or thresholds.’ Presenting a notification is well-known in the art.).
Regarding claim 14 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“increasing a gain of at least one of the first acoustic signal, the second acoustic signal, or a combination thereof” (Rosenberg: par. 0055; ‘More specifically, the relative volume of the microphone content is automatically increased with respect to the musical media content, for a period of time, in response to detected characteristic ambient audio events within the ambient audio signal stream.’).
Regarding claim 15 (dep. on claim 1), the combination of Haykin in view of Rosenberg further teaches:
“obtaining a speaking level associated with a spectral characteristic of the voice” (Rosenberg: par. 0054; ‘It should be noted that the ambient audio signal content may be filtered or otherwise processed to extract extraneous noise and/or sound content that is outside certain magnitude and/or frequency limits or thresholds.’).
Regarding claim 16, Haykin teaches:
“receiving a first microphone signal” (par. 0104; ‘The input signals can be provided, for example, by two microphone arrays located in spatially distinct areas; for example, the first microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the left ear of a hearing instrument user and the second microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the right ear of the hearing instrument user.’);
“filtering the first microphone signal to generate a filtered first signal” (par. 0154; ‘Accordingly, the noise-reduced signals 18 and 20 are passed through a bank of bandpass filters, each of which simulates the frequency response that is associated with a particular position on the basilar membrane of the human cochlea.’);
“receiving a second microphone signal” (par. 0104; ‘The input signals can be provided, for example, by two microphone arrays located in spatially distinct areas; for example, the first microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the left ear of a hearing instrument user and the second microphone array can be located on a hearing instrument at the right ear of the hearing instrument user.’);
“filtering the second microphone signal to generate a filtered second signal” (par. 0154; ‘Accordingly, the noise-reduced signals 18 and 20 are passed through a bank of bandpass filters, each of which simulates the frequency response that is associated with a particular position on the basilar membrane of the human cochlea.’);
“detecting a voice based on an analysis of a first portion of the filtered first signal and a second portion of the filtered second signal, and wherein the analysis of the first portion and the second portion uses at least one of a coherence analysis, correlation analysis, level-detection, spectral analysis, or a combination thereof” (par. 0126; ‘Since the speech components in the output signals of the TF-LCMV beamformer 100 are constrained to be equal to the speech components in the reference microphones for both microphone arrays, the binaural cues, such as the interaural time difference (ITD) and/or the interaural intensity difference (IID), for example, of the speech source are generally well preserved.’).
However, Haykin does not expressly teach:
“detecting a user’s voice based upon the analysis of at least one of the filtered first signal, or the filtered second signal, or a combination thereof;”
“generating a decreased volume audio content signal upon detecting the user’s Voice;”
“mixing the first acoustic signal with the decreased volume audio content signal to generate a mixed audio content signal;” and
“sending the mixed audio content signal to the speaker.”
In a similar field of endeavor (enhancing voice/speech), Rosenberg teaches:
“detecting a user’s voice based upon the analysis of at least one of the filtered first signal, or the filtered second signal, or a combination thereof” (par. 0023; ‘This is a function in which the playing volume of a currently playing media file is automatically reduced by the processor for a period of time in response to the media players user's own voice being detected within the audio signal captured from the ambient environment.’);
“generating a decreased volume audio content signal upon detecting the user’s Voice” (par. 0023; ‘In this way if the media player user begins speaking aloud into the ambient environment, the media player is automatically responsive by reducing the playing volume of media content to that user so the user can more easily hear himself talk.’);
“mixing the first acoustic signal with the decreased volume audio content signal to generate a mixed audio content signal” (par. 0025; ‘In some embodiments of the present invention, the media player is operative to mix musical audio content derived from a stored media file with ambient audio content captured from a microphone local to the user.’) and
“sending the mixed audio content signal to the speaker” (par. 0025; ‘In this way the user can listen to musical media content in audio combination with ambient audio signals from the local environment.’; par. 0043; ‘The program flow shown would generally be performed in parallel with other processes performed by the media player, including processes that select and/or play media items by accessing media content from memory and outputting an audio representation of such media content through headphones and/or other similar audio presentation hardware.’).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Haykin’s binaural signal enhancement system (e.g., the first and second microphone arrays) by incorporating features from Rosenberg’s ambient sound responsive media player (e.g., mixing audio content with microphone signals) in order to reduce the volume of audio content during speech segments. The combination enables a media player to intelligently adjust and/or vary the playing volume of a musical media file to a user based at least in part upon detected sounds from the ambient environment of the user. (Rosenberg: par. 00026)
Double Patenting
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
The USPTO Internet website contains terminal disclaimer forms which may be used. Please visit www.uspto.gov/patent/patents-forms. The actual filing date of the application in which the form is filed determines what form (e.g., PTO/SB/25, PTO/SB/26, PTO/AIA /25, or PTO/AIA /26) should be used. A web-based eTerminal Disclaimer may be filled out completely online using web-screens. An eTerminal Disclaimer that meets all requirements is auto-processed and approved immediately upon submission. For more information about eTerminal Disclaimers, refer to www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/applying-online/eterminal-disclaimer.
Claims 1-11 and 13-16 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-14 of US 11217237 B2. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because they both are directed to wearable device for mixing ambient audio with audio content.
Instant claims
US Patent Claims
1. A wearable device, comprising: a first ambient microphone configured to generate a first acoustic signal;a second ambient microphone configured to generate a second acoustic signal;
a speaker configured to play an audio content signal; a memory that stores instruction; and a processor electrically connected to the first ambient microphone, the second ambient microphone, and the speaker, wherein the processor is configured to execute the instructions to perform operations, the operations comprising: detecting a voice based on an analysis of the first acoustic signal and the second acoustic signal, and wherein the analysis of the first acoustic signal and the second acoustic signal uses at least one of a coherence analysis, correlation analysis, level-detection, spectral analysis, or a combination thereof;detecting a user’s voice based upon the analysis of the first acoustic signal or the second acoustic signal: generating a decreased volume audio content signal upon detecting the user’s voice; mixing the first acoustic signal with the decreased volume audio content signal to generate a mixed audio content signal; and sending the mixed audio content signal to the speaker.
An earphone device, comprising: an ambient microphone that generates a first acoustic signal where the ambient microphone is configured to measure sound in an ambient environment; an ear canal microphone that generates a second acoustic signal where the ear canal microphone is configured to measure sound closer to a user's ear canal than the ambient microphone; a speaker configured to play an audio content signal; and a processor communicatively linked to the ambient microphone, the ear canal microphone, and the speaker, wherein the processor is configured to perform operations comprising: detecting a voice based on an analysis of the first acoustic signal and the second acoustic signal, and wherein the analysis of the first acoustic signal and the second acoustic signal uses at least one of a coherence analysis, correlation analysis, level-detection, spectral analysis, or a combination thereof; mixing the first acoustic signal with the audio content signal to generate a mixed audio content signal; andsending the mixed audio content signal to the speaker.
Claims 2-11 and 13-16
Claims 2-14
Conclusion
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MARK . VILLENA
Examiner
Art Unit 2658
/MARK VILLENA/Examiner, Art Unit 2658