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 .
This action is responsive to communications: Request for Continued Examination filed on 2/17/2026.
Claims 1-20 are pending in the case. Claims 1, 8 and 15 are independent claims. Claims 1, 8, 15 are currently amended.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 2/17/2026 has been entered.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-3, 5-6, 8-10, 12-13, 15-17, 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rango et al., US 2015/0121436, in view of Puranik et al., US 2010/0070643 A1 and further in view of Krishnamurthy, US 2013/0212178, and Fishman et al, US 2012/0059825
Regarding independent claim 1, Rango teaches a method comprising:
identifying, by a processing device, a plurality of media items comprising at least an audio portion, the media items associated with an event, wherein each of the plurality of media items is created by capturing the event (Rango, [0014], [0021]; audio video (AV) streams associated with a live event at a geographic location);
synchronizing the audio portions of each of the plurality of media items according to a common reference timeline (Rango, [0014], [0022]-[0023]; timeline synchronization across AV streams associated with the event); and
providing the plurality of media items for presentation in an interactive multi-view player interface based on the synchronized audio portions and multiple relative geographic positions (Rango, [0021]; presenting AV streams recorded at different angles or locations relative to geographic locations of the live event so that a user can be map to available AV streams for the user viewing),
wherein the interactive multi-view player interface allows a user of a plurality of users to switch between the plurality of media items (Rango, fig.3; [0021], [0048]-[0050], [0066]-[0067]; presenting timeline synchronization across plurality of AV streams from cameras located at the geographic locations of the event that allow a user to request/switch to view different available AV streams corresponding to a first selected point in-time).
Rango does not teach displays, during playback of at least one of the plurality of media items, a seek bar corresponding to the common reference timeline, a video density indicating a quantity of the plurality of media items available at a given point of the common reference timeline and a popularity indicator of one of the plurality of media items, wherein the popularity indicator idicates, at the given point in time on the common reference timeline, a popularity of the one of the plurality of media items corresponding to the given point of the common reference timeline. Puranik teaches a timeline representing metadata of segments in a video where playback of a particular video segment is indicated (P 0029 Fig 3) a metadata summary identifies scene breaks, segment by popularity, thereby delivering a tiered or hierarchical approach in which the different tiers or levels of the hierarchy represent different ranges, levels of abstraction, or filtering of the underlying synchronized metadata (P 0034) segmentation is based on data volume (P 0014) and density of metadata on the content timeline (P 0016) the media player requests content to be played specifying volume of metadata (P 0017) the timeline is based purely on a time based approach, the volume of the data being delivered, the number or a count of metadata items, or any combination of any of these (P 0019) the user may initiate playback of any video segment (P 0030).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective the filling date of the invention, to have combined the teaching of Puranik into Rango’s teaching to include a video density indicating a quantity of media items available at a given point in time, since the combination would have facilitated the user have an idea about the available video streams.
Rango does not teach wherein the interactive multi-view player interface displays … a popularity indicator of one of the plurality of media items at the given point of the common reference timeline, and wherein the popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item at the given point in time.
Krishnamurthy teaches wherein the interactive multi-view player interface displays … a popularity indicator of one of the plurality of media items …, and wherein the popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of views of the respective media item at the given point in time (Krishnamurthy, fig.1; [0042]; displaying prioritized videos, wherein each of the videos is displayed with reason for selection, such as popularity (number of video views) so that the user “may be more at ease in selecting which video to watch on priority”).
Fishman teaches popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item (Fishman, [0033]; number of viewers being above a threshold value or increased by a certain percent).
Puranik has been combined with Rango for limitation directed to the common reference timeline.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Krishnamurthy’s and Fishman’s teachings and Puranik’s and Puranik’s teachings to include wherein the interactive multi-view player interface displays … a popularity indicator of one of the plurality of media items at the given point of the common reference timeline, and wherein the popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item at the given point in time, since the combination would have facilitated the user to determined which video to watch based on the video’s popularity as Krishnamurthy disclosed.
Regarding claim 2, which is dependent on claim 1, Rango teaches further comprising: generating a single edited media item associated with the event, by combining the plurality of media items based on the synchronized audio portions (Rango, fig.2; [0026]; concatenation of video streams based on common reference clock time).
Regarding claim 3, which is dependent on claim 1, Rango teaches wherein identifying the plurality of media items comprises determining media items having metadata that identifies the event (Rango, [0033], [0048], [0052], [0053]; metadata corresponding to the event; metadata include event identifier).
Regarding claim 5, which is dependent on claim 1, Rango teaches further comprising: identifying a generating user associated with each of the plurality of media items (Rango, [0034]-[0035]; identifying a user marking a point-in-time of AV streams).
Regarding claim 6, which is dependent on claim 5, Rango teaches wherein providing the plurality of media items for presentation in the interactive multi-view player interface comprises:
displaying an icon representing each of the plurality of media items, wherein each icon is associated with the generating user associated with the corresponding media item (Rango, fig.3; [0048]-[0050]; available AV based on primary and alternative cameras);
receiving a first user selection of a first icon representing a first media item of the plurality of media items and beginning playback of the first media item in a first portion of the interactive multi-view player interface (Rango, [0048]-[0050]; playing selected available AV); and
receiving, at a time during playback of the first media item corresponding to a first point on the common reference timeline, a second user selection of a second icon representing a second media item of the plurality of media items and beginning playback, in the first portion of the interactive multi-view player interface, of the second media item at a time in the second media item corresponding to the first point on the common reference timeline (Rango, [0048]-[0050]; user selects an available AV stream representation for playing; the use can selecting different available AV stream representation for playing; it is clear that each media representation is a different graphical representation).
Claims 8-10, 12-13 are for a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium storing instructions which, when executed, cause a processing device to perform the method of claims 1-3, 5-6 respectively and are rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 15-17, 19-20 are for a server computer system comprising: a processing device; a memory coupled to the processing device; and an interactive multi-view module, executable by the processing device to perform the method of claims 1-3, 5-6 respectively and are rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 4, 11, 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rango in view of Puranik, Krishnamurthy, and Fishman, as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Matsumoto et al., US 2013/0162905 (as provided by applicants in IDs filed on 12/15/2023).
Regarding claim 4, which is dependent on claim 1, Matsumoto teaches wherein synchronizing the audio portions of each of the plurality of media items comprises determining a temporal offset for each of the plurality of media items that increases a correlation for a frequency-based audio spectrogram of each audio portion, wherein the temporal offsets represent locations on the common reference timeline (Matsumoto, abstract, [0121], [0192]-[0196]; synchronizing contents including same or similar audio signal component based on audio spectrograms of the contents).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Matsumoto’s teaching into Rango, Puranik, Krishnamurthy and Fishman teaching to include determining a temporal offset for each of the plurality of media items that increases a correlation for a frequency-based audio spectrogram of each audio portion, since the combination would have facilitated the synchronize across AV streams based on frequency-based audio spectrogram as Matsumoto disclosed.
Claim 11 is for a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium storing instructions which, when executed, cause a processing device to perform the method of claim 4 and is rejected under the same rationale.
Claim 18 is for a server computer system comprising: a processing device; a memory coupled to the processing device; and an interactive multi-view module, executable by the processing device to perform the method of claim 4 and is rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 7, 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rango in view of Puranik, Krishnamurthy, Fishman as applied to claim 6 above, and further in view of Mas Ivars et al., US 2010/0017815 (provided by applicants in IDs filed on 12/15/2023)
Regarding claim 7, which is dependent on claim 6, Mas Ivars teaches further comprising:
predicting a subsequent media item to be selected by the user; and buffering the subsequent media item prior to a user selection of the subsequent media item (Mas Ivars, [0043], [0054]; predicted media streams of a channel to be selected is buffered; enable fast access to predicted media streams).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Mas Ivars’s teaching into Rango, Puranik, Krishnamurthy and Fishman teaching to predict a subsequent media item to be selected by the user and buffering the subsequent media item, since the combination would have enhanced the user to access AV streams as Mas Ivars disclosed.
Claim 14 is for a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium storing instructions which, when executed, cause a processing device to perform the method of claim 7 and is rejected under the same rationale.
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 USPTO Internet website contains terminal disclaimer forms which may be used. Please visit www.uspto.gov/patent/patents-forms. The 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/process/file/efs/guidance/eTD-info-I.jsp.
Claims 1-3, 5-10, 12-17, 19-20 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 7, 13 of U.S. Patent No. 11816310, in view of Rango et al., US 2015/0121436, Puranik et al., US 2010/0070643 A1 and Fishman et al, US 2012/0059825. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because:
Regarding independent claims 1, 8, 15 of current application, these claims are unpatentable over claims 1, 7, 13 of patent 11816310 in that claims 1, 7, 13 of the patent contains all the limitations of claims 1, 8, 15 respectively, excepting limitation of synchronizing the audio portions of each of the plurality of media items according to a common reference timeline and popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item.
Rango teaches synchronizing the audio portions of each of the plurality of media items according to a common reference timeline (Rango, [0014], [0022]-[0023]; timeline synchronization across AV streams associated with the event).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Rango’s teaching into the 310’s teaching to include synchronizing the audio portions of each of the plurality of media items according to a common reference timeline, since the combination would have facilitated the synchronizing of AV streams from different cameras for an event.
Puranik teaches a timeline representing metadata of segments in a video where playback of a particular video segment is indicated (P 0029 Fig 3) a metadata summary identifies scene breaks, segment by popularity, thereby delivering a tiered or hierarchical approach in which the different tiers or levels of the hierarchy represent different ranges, levels of abstraction, or filtering of the underlying synchronized metadata (P 0034) segmentation is based on data volume (P 0014) and density of metadata on the content timeline (P 0016) the media player requests content to be played specifying volume of metadata (P 0017) the timeline is based purely on a time based approach, the volume of the data being delivered, the number or a count of metadata items, or any combination of any of these (P 0019) the user may initiate playback of any video segment (P 0030)
Fishman teaches popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item (Fishman, [0033]; number of viewers being above a threshold value or increased by a certain percent).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Fishman’s teaching into Rango and the ‘310’s teaching to include a number of viewers of the respective media item, since the combination would have facilitated the determining video’s popularity based on plurality of factors, such as number of viewers and/or number of views.
Regarding dependent claims 2, 9, 16 which is dependent on claims 1, 8, 15 of current application, Rango teaches further comprising: generating a single edited media item associated with the event, by combining the plurality of media items based on the synchronized audio portions (Rango, [0026]; concatenation of video streams based on common reference clock time).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Zhang’s teaching into Rango and the 310’s teaching to include generating a single edited media item associated with the event, by combining the plurality of media items based on the synchronized audio portions, since the combination would have facilitated the user to create a video stream from collected video streams for an event.
Regarding dependent claims 3, 6, 7, 10, 13, 14, 17, 20 of current application, these claims are unpatentable over claims 3, 5-6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 15, 17 respectively of patent 11816310 in that claims 3, 5-6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 15, 17 of the patent contains all the limitations of claims 3, 6, 7, 10, 13, 14, 17, 20.
Regarding claim 5, 12, 19, which is dependent on claims 1, 8, 15 of current application, Rango teaches further comprising: identifying a generating user associated with each of the plurality of media items (Rango, [0034]-[0035]; identifying a user marking a point-in-time of AV streams).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Zhang’s teaching into Rango and the 310’s teaching to include identifying a generating user associated with each of the plurality of media items, since the combination would have facilitated the identifying and generating metadata, such as users who marks the video streams.
Claims 4, 11, 18 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims U.S. Patent No. 11816310 in view of Rango, Puranik and Fishman as applied to claims 1, 8, 15 above and further in view of Matsumoto et al., US 2013/0162905.
Regarding claim 4, which is dependent on claim 1, Matsumoto teaches wherein synchronizing the audio portions of each of the plurality of media items comprises determining a temporal offset for each of the plurality of media items that increases a correlation for a frequency-based audio spectrogram of each audio portion, wherein the temporal offsets represent locations on the common reference timeline (Matsumoto, abstract, [0121], [0192]-[0196]; synchronizing contents including same or similar audio signal component based on audio spectrograms of the contents).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Matsumoto’s teaching into Fishman, Rango and the ’310’s teaching to include determining a temporal offset for each of the plurality of media items that increases a correlation for a frequency-based audio spectrogram of each audio portion, since the combination would have facilitated the synchronize across AV streams based on frequency-based audio spectrogram as Matsumoto disclosed.
Claims 1-4, 6-11, 13-18, 20 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-3, 4, 6-11, 13-18, 20 of U.S. Patent No. 10754511, in view of Puranik et al., US 2010/0070643 A1 and Fishman et al, US 2012/0059825. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because:
Regarding independent claims 1, 8, 15 of current application, these claims are unpatentable over claims 1, 8, 15 of patent 10754511 in that claims 1, 8, 15 of the patent contains all the limitations of claims 1, 8, 15 respectively, excepting limitation of popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item.
Puranik teaches a timeline representing metadata of segments in a video where playback of a particular video segment is indicated (P 0029 Fig 3) a metadata summary identifies scene breaks, segment by popularity, thereby delivering a tiered or hierarchical approach in which the different tiers or levels of the hierarchy represent different ranges, levels of abstraction, or filtering of the underlying synchronized metadata (P 0034) segmentation is based on data volume (P 0014) and density of metadata on the content timeline (P 0016) the media player requests content to be played specifying volume of metadata (P 0017) the timeline is based purely on a time based approach, the volume of the data being delivered, the number or a count of metadata items, or any combination of any of these (P 0019) the user may initiate playback of any video segment (P 0030).
Fishman teaches popularity indicator at the given point in time is determined using one or more factors comprising a number of viewers of the respective media item (Fishman, [0033]; number of viewers being above a threshold value or increased by a certain percent).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Fishman’s teaching into the 511’s teaching to include a number of viewers of the respective media item, since the combination would have facilitated the determining video’s popularity based on plurality of factors, such as number of viewers and number of views.
Regarding dependent claims 2-4, 6-7, 9-11, 13-14, 16-18, 20 of current application, these claims are unpatentable over claims 2-4, 6-11, 13-18, 20 respectively of patent 10754511 in that claims 2-4, 6-11, 13-18, 20 of the patent contains all the limitations of claims 2-4, 6-7, 9-11, 13-14, 16-18, 20.
Claims 5, 12, 19 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims U.S. Patent No. 10754511 in view of Puranik and Fishman as applied to claims 1, 8, 15 above and further in view of Rango et al., US 2015/0121436.
Regarding claims 5, 12, 19, which are dependent on claims 1, 8, 15, Rango teaches further comprising: identifying a generating user associated with each of the plurality of media items (Rango, [0034]-[0035]; identifying a user marking a point-in-time of AV streams).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill, before the effective filling date of the invention, to have combined Rango’s teaching into Fishman and the 511’s teaching to include identifying a generating user associated with each of the plurality of media items, since the combination would have facilitated the identifying and generating metadata, such as users who marks the video streams.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1, 8, 15 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.
Independent Claims 1, 8 and 15 have been amended with the following or similar limitations: wherein the interactive multi-view player interface displays, during playback of at least one of the plurality of media items, a seek bar corresponding to the common reference timeline, a video density indicating a quantity of the plurality of media items available at a given point of the common reference timeline and a popularity indicator of one of the plurality of media items, wherein the popularity indicator indicates, at the given point in time on the common reference timeline, a popularity of the one of the plurality of media items corresponding to the given point of the common reference timeline.
Paragraph 0069 of Applicant’s specification, discloses, a video density bar can be displayed alongside the normal seek bar to illustrate how many videos are available at a given time (see FIG. 6B). Puranik teaches a timeline representing metadata of segments in a video where playback of a particular video segment is indicated (P 0029 Fig 3) a metadata summary identifies scene breaks, segment by popularity, thereby delivering a tiered or hierarchical approach in which the different tiers or levels of the hierarchy represent different ranges, levels of abstraction, or filtering of the underlying synchronized metadata (P 0034) segmentation is based on data volume (P 0014) and density of metadata on the content timeline (P 0016) the media player requests content to be played specifying volume of metadata (P 0017) the timeline is based purely on a time based approach, the volume of the data being delivered, the number or a count of metadata items, or any combination of any of these (P 0019) the user may initiate playback of any video segment (P 0030).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Lancaster et al., US 2011/0321104, [0006] teaches a large number of videos available to requesting viewers.
Ospalik et al., US 2011/0093907, [0039], stream conflict events indicating number of video streams available to customer.
Any inquiry concerning this communication should be directed to JOHN M HEFFINGTON at telephone number (571)270-1696.
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/J.M.H/Examiner, Art Unit 2145 9/30/2026
/CESAR B PAULA/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2145
