DETAILED ACTION
Status
This communication is in response to Applicant’s “AMENDMENT ‘A’ AND RESPONSE UNDER 37 C.F.R. § 1.111” filed on November 19, 2025 (hereinafter “Amendment”). In the Amendment, Applicant amended Claims 1 and 13; cancelled Claims 2 and 14; and added Claim 21. No claim was previously cancelled. Therefore, Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21 are currently pending and presented for examination. Of the pending claims, Claims 1 and 13 remain independent claims.
The present application (U.S. App. No. 18/657,231) and its “Parent Application” (U.S. App. No. 17/543,284) were both filed after March 16, 2013; and, therefore, this application is being examined under the first inventor to file (FITF) provisions of the America Invents Act (AIA ).
Original Claims 1-20 are originally presented by Applicant and, therefore, have been constructively elected by original presentation for prosecution per MPEP §§ 819 and 821.03.
The present application (U.S. App. No. 18/657,231) has published as U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2024/0289832 of Chunduri et al. (hereinafter “Chunduri”).
Benefit Claim
No foreign priority has been claimed in this application or any parent application.
This application (U.S. App. No. 18/657,231) claims domestic benefit of U.S. Application No. 17/543,284 filed on December 6, 2021 (hereinafter “Parent Application”) and, therefore, the effective filing date of this application (U.S. App. No. 18/657,231) is its Parent Application’s filing date of December 6, 2021.
Divisional
This application is a divisional application of U.S. Application No. 17/543,284 filed on December 6, 2021 (“Parent Application”), which has abandoned. See MPEP § 201.06. In accordance with MPEP § 609.02 A. 2 and MPEP § 2001.06(b) (last paragraph), the Examiner has reviewed and considered the prior art cited in the Parent Application. Also in accordance with MPEP § 2001.06(b) (last paragraph), all documents cited or considered ‘of record’ in the Parent Application are now considered cited or ‘of record’ in this application. Additionally, Applicant(s) are reminded that a listing of the information cited or ‘of record’ in the Parent Application need not be resubmitted in this application unless Applicants desire the information to be printed on a patent issuing from this application. See MPEP § 609.02 A. 2. Finally, Applicants are reminded that the prosecution history of the Parent Application is relevant in this application. See e.g., Microsoft Corp. v. Multi-Tech Sys., Inc., 357 F.3d 1340, 1350, 69 USPQ2d 1815, 1823 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (holding that statements made in prosecution of one patent are relevant to the scope of all sibling patents).
Information Disclosure Statement (IDS)
No IDS has been filed in either this case (U.S. App. No. 18/657,231) or the Parent Application (U.S. App. No. 17/543,284).
Applicant is notified of 37 C.F.R. 1.56, which states that each inventor named in the application has a duty to disclose information material to patentability. In addition, Applicant is notified of MPEP § 2001.06(b): “prior art references from one application must be made of record in another subsequent application if such prior art references are ‘material to patentability’ of the subsequent application”.
Drawings
Examiner notes that Applicant has labelled Figures 1 and 2 of this application as “Prior Art”.
Examiner notes:
Figures 5 and 10 correspond to independent Claims 1 and 13 of this instant application.
Figures 3 and 9 correspond to claims elected and examined in the Parent Application.
Response to Amendments
A Summary of the Response to Applicant’s Amendment:
Applicant’s Amendment introduces new objections to Claims 1, 3-5, 13 and 15-17; therefore, the Examiner objects to Claims 1, 3-5, 13 and 15-17, as provided below.
Applicant’s Amendment overcomes previous rejections to Claims 13-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b); therefore, the Examiner withdraws the previous § 112(b) rejections to Claims 13-20. However, Applicant’s Amendment introduces new rejections to Claims 1 and 13 under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b); therefore, the Examiner asserts new § 112(b) rejections to Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21, as provided below.
Applicant’s Amendment overcomes rejections to Claims 2 and 14 under 35 U.S.C. § 101; therefore, the Examiner withdraws the § 101 rejections to Claims 2 and 14. However, Applicant’s Amendment does not overcome rejections to Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 101; therefore, the Examiner maintains/asserts § 101 rejections to Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21, as provided below.
Applicant’s Amendment overcomes rejections to Claims 1-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103; therefore, the Examiner withdraws the § 103 rejections to Claims 1-20.
Applicant’s arguments are found to be not persuasive; please see Examiner’s “Response to Arguments” provided below.
Claim Objections
Independent Claims 1 and 13 are each objected to because of the following informalities: spelling error(s). The phrase “place holder” (recited in each of Claims 1 and 13) should correct to “placeholder” (i.e., a single word), which is consistent with Applicant’s specification filed on May 7, 2024, as well as with Applicant’s Parent Application. Appropriate correction(s) is required to each of Applicant’s independent claims.
In addition, Claims 1 and 13 are objected to because of the following informalities: grammatical error(s)/improper subject-verb agreement. Independent Claims 1 and 13 recite “wherein the browser logs records” (bolding emphasis added); however, the verb "records" fails to agree with the plural noun “logs”. Appropriate correction(s) is required to each of Claims 1 and 13.
Claims 3-5 and 15-17 are objected to because of the following informalities: dependent claim errors in view of MPEP § 608.01(n), Subsection V. More specifically, each of Claims 3-5 and 15-17 attempts to depend from a cancelled base claim (i.e., cancelled Claim 2 for Claims 3-5, and cancelled Claim 14 for Claims 15-17). Dependent Claims 3-5 and 15-17 make reference to a canceled base claim and, therefore, Claims 3-5 and 15-17 are objected to as being improper. See, for example, MPEP § 608.01(n), Subsection V. Appropriate corrections are required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b) of the America Invents Act (AIA ):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) of the AIA as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention. “A claim is indefinite when it contains words or phrases whose meaning is unclear” (MPEP § 2173.05(e)).
Regarding independent Claims 1 and 13, since it is unclear as to what the phrase “a selected timeframe” serves to limit in the independent claims, Claims 1 and 13 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite. For example, with respect to Claim 1, it is unclear as to whether the phrase “within a selected timeframe” recited in Claim 1 serves to limit (or modify) the verb “record[]” such that the browser logs of Claim 1 are recorded within a selected timeframe; or whether the phrase “within a selected timeframe” serves to limit (or modify) the word “accessed” such that the browser logs of Claim 1 record only those webpages that were accessed within a selected timeframe. As currently presented, what the phrase “a selected timeframe” modifies in the independent claims is amenable to multiple plausible constructions and, therefore, a person having ordinary skill in the art would be unable to determine what the Applicant does and does not regard as the invention. Therefore, independent Claims 1 and 13 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite. Appropriate corrections are required.
In addition, independent Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) of the AIA , as being indefinite because it is unclear as to what the phrase “records…accessed by the user a selected timeframe” means in the context of Claim 13. As currently presented, “records…accessed by the user a selected timeframe” is amenable to multiple plausible constructions and, therefore, a person having ordinary skill in the art would be unable to determine what the Applicant does and does not regard as the invention. For example, it is unclear whether the logs record[] webpages accessed by the user outside a selected timeframe, or whether the logs record[] webpages accessed by the user within a selected timeframe (like Claim 1). Consequently, Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) of the AIA as being indefinite. Appropriate correction(s) is required.
Claims 3-12 and 21 depend from independent Claim 1, but do not resolve the above issues and inherit the deficiencies of the parent claim(s); therefore, Claims 3-12 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) of the AIA .
Similarly, Claims 15-20 appear to depend from independent Claim 13, but do not resolve the above issues and inherit the deficiencies of the parent claim(s); therefore, Claims 15-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) of the AIA .
Appropriate corrections are required.
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, 3-13 and 15-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. During patent examination, the examined claims must be “given their broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with the specification” (MPEP § 2111). In view of this standard and based upon consideration of all of the relevant factors with respect to each claim as a whole, Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21 are rejected as ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. 101.
Step 1: Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21 appear to satisfy Step 1 enunciated in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International, 573 U.S. __, 134 S. Ct. 2347 (2014).
Step 2A: Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21 are rejected under § 101 because Applicant’s claimed subject matter is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The rationale for this finding is that Applicant’s pending claims recite generating or creating a classification (a hierarchical taxonomy or “a product class taxonomy” which may be an organized set of product keywords) of product information (e.g., brands, product names, prices, etc.) for a merchant, the classification being organized in a hierarchical manner according to product classes, brands, and products (i.e., types of product information categorized for the merchant) and using the classification to author/write the product information (e.g., brands, product names, prices, etc.) as part of “new coupon text” with “additional textual descriptions” (e.g., wording, textual message, etc.) for the merchant, as more particularly recited in Applicant’s pending claims save for recited (non-abstract claim elements): browser logs recording/storing a plurality of uniform resource locator (URL) impressions and webpages; using a machine learning model; a merchant; uniform resource locators (URLs) for the merchant; each of Applicant’s recited steps/processes of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding, and presenting; the machine learning model dynamically filling placeholders corresponding to different parts of a coupon to be filled; (only Claims 4 and 16) receiving information; (only Claims 5 and 17) presenting by a browser on a website; (only Claims 6 and 18) using the URL impressions; (only Claims 11 and 20) one or more machine learning models identifying the URLs for the merchant; and (only Claim 13 and corresponding dependent claims) a system comprising: a memory to store data and computer program instructions; and a processor operable to communicate with the memory and to execute the computer program instructions to cause the processor to perform. However, generating/creating a classification (a hierarchical taxonomy) of product information (e.g., brands, product names, prices, etc.) for a merchant, the classification being organized in a hierarchical manner according to product classes, brands, and products and then using the classification to create “new coupon text” with “additional textual descriptions” for the merchant, as currently recited in Applicant’s pending claims and further explained below, is within a certain method of organizing human activity — (i) fundamental economic principle or practice; and/or (ii) commercial interaction (including advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations). Similarly, authoring/writing text (e.g., wording, textual message, etc.) for a coupon of a merchant by using a product class taxonomy (e.g., an organized set of product keywords) identifying product information (e.g., brands, product names, prices, etc.) to include with the coupon, as recited in Applicant’s independent claims, is also within a certain method of organizing human activity — (i) fundamental economic principle or practice; and/or (ii) commercial interaction (including advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations). MPEP 2106.04(a)(2)(II)(A) provides examples of “fundamental economic principles or practices” and MPEP 2106.04(a)(2)(II)(B) provides additional discussion and examples of commercial or legal interactions. Each of Applicant’s judicial exceptions (i.e., abstract idea exceptions) is not integrated into a practical application because each claim as a whole, having the combination of additional elements beyond the judicial exception(s), does not integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception and, therefore, the pending claims are “directed to” a judicial exception under USPTO Step 2A. More specifically, each claim as a whole does not appear to reflect the combination of additional elements as: (1) improving the functioning of a computer itself or improving another technology or technical field, (2) applying the judicial exception with, or by use of, a particular machine/manufacture that is integral to the claim, (3) effecting a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, or (4) applying or using the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment. Instead, any improvement is to Applicant’s underlying abstract idea of creating a classification (a hierarchical taxonomy or “a product class taxonomy” which may be an organized set of product keywords) of product information for a merchant, the classification being organized in a hierarchical manner according to product classes, brands, and products. (Examiner understands a taxonomy to be a hierarchical classification system, like a tree structure, used to organize and categorize concepts) and then using the classification of product information (i.e., recited “taxonomy”) to word/write/rewrite/author what a coupon says (i.e., textual message of the coupon). SAP Am., Inc. v. InvestPic, LLC, No. 2017-2081, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS 12590, Slip. Op. 13 (Fed. Cir. May 15, 2018) (“What is needed is an inventive concept in the non-abstract realm.”). Examiner notes that independent Claims 1 and 13 recite “a machine learning model” while Claims 11 and 20 recite “one or more machine learning models”; however, the “a machine learning model” and the “one or more machine learning models” appear as a high-level black box with no detail about the machine learning algorithm itself or any machine learning processes, such as how Applicant's model/tool operates on input data to identify/map an output (i.e., product URLs for the merchant). In addition, Examiner notes that no detail of any training algorithm appears to be mentioned in Applicant's disclosure and, therefore, no specific way of training the algorithm/model exists within Applicant's recited use of a machine learning model(s). Consequently, Applicant's mere recitation to “a machine learning model” and “one or more machine learning models” is not sufficient to amount to a practical application under Step 2A, Prong 2 of the Subject Matter Eligibility (SME) analysis. In addition, although Claims 1 and 13 recite use of a regex pattern (regular expression pattern) having different placeholders, Claims 3 and 15 recite “comparing price information”, and Claims 5 and 17 recite “ranking”, these technique encompass mathematical concepts in the form of formulas, equations, and calculations which also have been determined to constitute abstract ideas. See Memorandum, "Grouping of Abstract Ideas" and cases cited in footnote 12, such as enumerated in Section I of the 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance (84 Fed. Reg. 50). As noted on page 4 of the “October 2019 Update: Subject Matter Eligibility” issued by the USPTO, Examiner notes that a claim does not have to recite the word “calculating” in order to be considered a mathematical calculation. For example, a step of “determining” a variable or number using mathematical methods or “performing” a mathematical operation may also be considered mathematical calculations when the broadest reasonable interpretation (BRI) of the claim, in light of the specification, encompasses one or more mathematical calculations. Applicant’s additional elements, taken individually and in combination, do not appear to be integrated into a practical application since they embody mere instructions to implement the abstract idea on a computer or mere use of a computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea, do no more than generally linking the use of the abstract idea to a particular technological environment or field of use {e.g., an online/Internet environment in network communication with merchant websites, web servers and user client devices, also see Chunduri at ¶¶ [0014], [0078] and [0079] of Applicant’s published specification, mentioning that “FIG. 5 illustrates an example environment for creating a product class taxonomy for merchants”, “one or more computing devices are used to perform the processing of environment 500”, and “each of the components of the environment 500 is in communication with each other using any suitable communication technologies” (Chunduri at ¶¶ [0014], [0078] and [0079], respectively}, and amount to no more than combining the abstract idea with insignificant extra-solution activity including each of Applicant’s recited operations/processes of each of Applicant’s recited steps/processes of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding and presenting, as further explained below. For the reasons discussed above, Applicant’s pending claims are directed to an abstract idea that is not integrated into a practical application under Step 2A, Prong 2 of the Subject Matter Eligibility (SME) analysis of 35 U.S.C. 101.
Step 2B: Under Step 2B enunciated in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International, 573 U.S. __, 134 S. Ct. 2347 (2014), Applicant’s instant claims do not recite limitations, taken individually and in combination, that are sufficient to amount to “significantly more” than the abstract idea because Applicant’s claims do not recite, as further explained in detail below, an improvement to another technology or technical field, an improvement to the functioning of a computer itself, an application with or by a particular machine, a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, unconventional steps confining the claim to a particular useful application, or meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment. Examiner notes that each of Claims 1 and 3-12 is drawn to a method; however, Applicant’s method steps do not recite, require or indicate implementation by any particular machine since none of limitations recited in Applicant’s method claims are performed by any computer or processing device. Examiner notes that mere recited use of a computing device (or “using a machine learning model”) encompasses a situation where the computing device (or machine learning model) does no more than assist/help a person perform such steps/processes or thoughts when the person is using the computing device (or machine learning model). Even if a computer/machine was implied in Claims 1 and 3-12, Applicant’s method claim limitations taken individually and in combination would be merely instructions to implement the abstract idea on a computer and would require no more than generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment or field of use {e.g., an online/Internet environment in network communication with merchant websites, web servers and user client devices, also see Chunduri at ¶¶ [0014], [0078] and [0079] of Applicant’s published specification, mentioning that “FIG. 5 illustrates an example environment for creating a product class taxonomy for merchants”, “one or more computing devices are used to perform the processing of environment 500”, and “each of the components of the environment 500 is in communication with each other using any suitable communication technologies” (Chunduri at ¶¶ [0014], [0078] and [0079], respectively}, and having the abstract idea combined with insignificant extra-solution activity including each of Applicant’s recited steps/processes of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding and presenting, as further explained below. Examiner also notes that albeit limitations recited in Claims 13 and 15-20 are performed by the generically-recited “a processor operable to communicate with…memory”, these limitations of Claims 13 and 15-20, taken individually and in combination, are merely instructions to implement the abstract idea on a computer and require no more than a generic computer to generally link Applicant’s abstract idea to a particular technological environment or field of use {e.g., an online/Internet environment in network communication with merchant websites, web servers and user client devices, also see Chunduri at ¶¶ [0014], [0078] and [0079] of Applicant’s published specification, mentioning that “FIG. 5 illustrates an example environment for creating a product class taxonomy for merchants”, “one or more computing devices are used to perform the processing of environment 500”, and “each of the components of the environment 500 is in communication with each other using any suitable communication technologies” (Chunduri at ¶¶ [0014], [0078] and [0079], respectively} and no more than a combination of the abstract idea with insignificant extra-solution activity including each of Applicant’s recited steps/processes of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding and presenting, as further explained below. As mentioned above, the claim elements in addition to Applicant’s abstract idea arguably include: browser logs recording/storing a plurality of uniform resource locator (URL) impressions and webpages; using a machine learning model; a merchant; uniform resource locators (URLs) for the merchant; each of Applicant’s recited steps/processes of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding, and presenting; the machine learning model dynamically filling placeholders corresponding to different parts of a coupon to be filled; (only Claims 4 and 16) receiving information; (only Claims 5 and 17) presenting by a browser on a website; (only Claims 6 and 18) using the URL impressions; (only Claims 11 and 20) one or more machine learning models identifying the URLs for the merchant; and (only Claim 13 and corresponding dependent claims) a system comprising: a memory to store data and computer program instructions; and a processor operable to communicate with the memory and to execute the computer program instructions to cause the processor to perform. However, each of these components is recited at a high level of generality that taken individually and in combination perform corresponding generic computer functions of each of Applicant’s recited steps/processes of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding and presenting — there is no indication that the combination of elements improves the functioning of a computer or improves any other technology since the additional elements taken individually and collectively merely provide generic computer implementations known to the industry. Furthermore, Examiner notes that none of the processes/steps recited in Applicant’s pending claims taken individually and in combination impose a meaningful limit on the claim’s scope since none of recited processes/steps taken individually and in combination involve activity that amounts to more than generic computer functions/activity. The recited operations of receiving, obtaining, identifying, saving in/to a datastore, outputting, dynamically filling placeholders, adding and presenting, as currently recited individually and in combination in Applicant’s claims, are considered to be generic computer functions since they involve having the abstract idea combined with insignificant extra-solution activity, and generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment or field of use previously known to the industry — each of Applicant’s recited steps of receiving, obtaining and using encompasses a data input/loading or retrieving function performed by virtually all general purpose computers {see Alice Corp., 134 S. Ct. at 2360; see Ultramercial, 772 F.3d at 716‐17; see buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355 (Fed. Cir. 2014); see Cyberfone Systems, LLC v. CNN Interactive Group, Inc., 558 Fed. Appx. 988, 993 (Fed. Cir. 2014); and see Mayo Collaborative Serv. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 566 U.S. __, 132 S.Ct. 1289, 101 USPQ2d 1961 (2012)}; each of the steps of identifying encompasses a data recognition/inquiry function or retrieving function performed by virtually all general purpose computers {see Content Extraction and Transmission LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., 776 F.3d 1343, 113 U.S.P.Q.2d 1354 (Fed. Cir. 2014), hereinafter “Content Extraction”, for data recognition); each of the steps of saving and filling placeholders encompasses a data storing or depositing function performed by virtually all general purpose computers {see Alice Corp., 134 S. Ct. at 2360; Cyberfone Systems, LLC v. CNN Interactive Group, Inc., 558 Fed. Appx. 988 (Fed. Cir. 2014), hereinafter “Cyberfone”; and Content Extraction and Transmission LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., 776 F.3d 1343, 113 U.S.P.Q.2d 1354 (Fed. Cir. 2014), hereinafter “Content Extraction”, for data storage}; and each of the steps of outputting, adding and presenting encompasses a data output/transmittal function performed by virtually all general purpose computers {see Ultramercial, 772 F.3d at 716‐17; see buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355 (Fed. Cir. 2014); and see Cyberfone Systems, LLC v. CNN Interactive Group, Inc., 558 Fed. Appx. 988, 993 (Fed. Cir. 2014)}. Examiner notes that Applicant's recited use of a machine learning model appears as a high-level black box with no detail about the machine learning algorithm itself or any machine learning processes, such as how Applicant's model operates on input data (extracted coupon metadata and text from coupons, such as merchant, product name and brand information), to produce an output(s), such as a product class or product category. In addition, Examiner notes that no detail of any training algorithm appears to be mentioned in Applicant's disclosure and, therefore, no specific way of training the algorithm/model appears to exist within the context of Applicant's recited use of a machine learning model in Claims 1, 11, 13 and 20. Consequently, Applicant's mere recitation to "machine learning model" is not sufficient to amount to “significantly more” than the abstract idea. For the reasons discussed above, Applicant’s pending claims do not satisfy Step 2B enunciated in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International, 573 U.S. __, 134 S. Ct. 2347 (2014).
Consequently, based upon consideration of all of the relevant factors with respect to each claim as a whole, Claims 1, 3-13 and 15-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 as being directed to non-statutory subject matter. For information regarding 35 U.S.C. 101, please see Subject Matter Eligibility (SME) guidance and instructional materials at https://www.uspto.gov/patent/laws-and-regulations/examination-policy/subject-matter-eligibility, which includes the latest guidance, memoranda, and updates regarding SME under 35 U.S.C. 101.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments in the Amendment filed on November 19, 2025, have been fully considered and are not persuasive with respect to 35 U.S.C. § 101.
Applicant's Arguments in the Amendment
(Pages 9-10) Applicant submits that the pending independent claims, as currently amended, are drawn to eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
Examiner’s Response to Applicant's Arguments
Please see updated/modified § 101 rejections above regarding the pending claims being drawn to ineligible subject matter in view of considering all relevant factors with respect to each claim as a whole including amended portions of the independent claims. Regarding Applicant’s argument that “saving ‘user interactions’ ” is “an improvement in computing” (see page 9 of Applicant’s November 2025 Amendment), Examiner notes that saving information about a user encompasses a data storing or depositing function performed by virtually all general purpose computers {see Alice Corp., 134 S. Ct. at 2360; Cyberfone Systems, LLC v. CNN Interactive Group, Inc., 558 Fed. Appx. 988 (Fed. Cir. 2014), hereinafter “Cyberfone”; and Content Extraction and Transmission LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., 776 F.3d 1343, 113 U.S.P.Q.2d 1354 (Fed. Cir. 2014), hereinafter “Content Extraction”, for data storage}. Examiner notes that Applicant’s recited “saving” is at a high level of generality that corresponds to a generic computer function — there is no indication that Applicant’s recited “saving” of user information improves the functioning of a computer or improves any other technology since Applicant’s recited “saving” of user information merely provides generic computer implementations known to the industry. Applicant’s recited “saving” of user information does not impose a meaningful limit on the claim’s scope since none of recited “saving” processes/steps taken individually and in combination involve activity that amounts to more than generic computer functions/activity. The recited operations of saving are considered to be generic computer functions since they involve having the abstract idea combined with insignificant extra-solution activity, and generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment or field of use previously known to the industry.
Conclusion
The following references are considered pertinent to Applicant's disclosure, and are being made of record albeit the references are not relied upon as a basis for rejection in this Office action:
Although not prior art to this particular case, U.S. Patent No. 11,710,000 issued to Cuan et al. (hereinafter “Cuan”) mentions “pattern matching technologies (e.g., Regex) can be employed to identify salient facts…. a machine learning model can be developed and trained to identify such facts” and “promotion such as the items, discount, conditions, and expiration date…. a search for patterns or particular data can be performed… using regular expressions…. a machine learning model can be generated and used to identify pertinent information automatically.” —Detailed Description of Cuan.
U.S. Patent No. 10,956,522 issued to Jha et al. (hereinafter “Jha”) for “multiple regular expressions that are used to screen newly uploaded …advertisements” and “adaptive generation of regular expressions, and in particular to generation of regular expressions based on semantic analysis and classification of textual content of items using machine learning and embedding techniques” —Summary and Background of Jha
U.S. Patent No. 8,756,241 issued to Thite et al. (hereinafter “Thite”) for “give rise to an expanded set of advertising keywords that can be used to select advertisements to provide with search results responsive to search queries that include the rewrite source. For example, for the rewrite source "running shoes" and the rewrite target "hiking boots," occurrences of "running shoes" in search queries are rewritten by "hiking boots." Thus, for example, the search query "brand x running shoes" gives rise, by being rewritten, to the set of expanded keywords that include "brand x hiking boots" or "hiking boots." These expanded keywords can also be used to identify advertisements for search queries including "running shoes." ” —Description of Thite.
U.S. Patent No. 7,774,333 issued to Colledge et al. (hereinafter “Colledge”) for “advertisement keyword meanings are expanded using their relevant semantic relations to other word meanings to create a list of expanded advertisement keyword meanings.” —Claim 7 of Colledge.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2021/0097404 of YANOSY, JR. et al. (hereinafter “Yanosy”) for “create the product classification taxonomy by: (i) asserting a plurality of subclasses for a plurality of entity terms in the existing product taxonomy as subclasses of classes defined in the universal product classification ontology, (ii) generating semantic relationships between the plurality of entity terms asserted as subclasses using predefined semantic relationships from the universal product classification ontology, and (iii) generating a combination of the semantic relationships to create a product classification definition in the product classification taxonomy based on the universal product classification ontology for at least one definition associated with the plurality of entity terms in the existing product taxonomy” —Yanosy at ¶ [0008].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2020/0267064 of Wackerly et al. (hereinafter “Wackerly”) for “The URI can be compared to a URI pattern indicative of advertisements. Patterns that can be matched can be in the form of regular expressions…. machine learning can be used on lists of URIs with structures indicative of advertisements to determine the criteria used in the pattern matching…. an advertisement indicator can be determined to be present if the URI is matched with a URI pattern indicative of advertisements.”
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2018/0060921 of Mengle et al. (hereinafter “Mengle”) for “One or more other templates 252, such as second template 252b, may be a so-called “regular expression” template. A regular expression template may perform one or more regular expression matches over content of one or more documents associated with a destination linked to by ad creative 250. If content of a landing page matches a regular expression, that content (and/or a variant thereof) may be output by template application engine 124 as one of a plurality of content candidates.” —Mengle at ¶ [0045].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2017/0262894 of Kirti et al. (hereinafter “Kirti”) for “To expand the possible audience for an advertisement”….
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2017/0075996 of Azimi et al. (hereinafter “Azimi”) for “Rewriting Keyword Information Using Search Engine Results” —Title of Azimi; and “modifying original keyword information to increase the probability that it will match the queries input by users” —Abstract of Azimi.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2014/0258001 of Ramaksrihnan et al. (hereinafter “Ramaksrihnan”) for “Determining Net-New Keywords In Expanding Live Advertising Campaigns In Targeted Advertising Systems” —Title of Ramaksrihnan; “a semantic model used to build targeted search advertising campaigns can also include elements of an ontology (and/or a taxonomy) in the sense that the possible attributes of classified concepts can also be specified as can the relationships between those attributes…. a semantic model is constructed based upon keywords actually used by people searching for the specific products and/or services that are featured in an advertising campaign…. the semantic model is used to relate landing pages within a website or group of websites to categories and attributes. The semantic model can also be used to identify relationships between keyword components and the categories and attributes within the semantic model and these relationships used to identify potentially relevant keywords for use in targeting a search advertising campaign with respect to specific concepts defined by the categories and attributes within the semantic model.”; and “A third type of keyword utilized in targeted advertising campaigns…is broad keywords. A broad keyword is matched when a search term matches the keyword, a synonym for the keyword, and/or other related variations of the keyword. By adding broad keywords, an expanded advertising campaign can more expansively target additional keywords and phrases relative to the original live advertising campaign. A process for determining net-new broad keywords for use in an expanded advertising campaign … is illustrated in FIG. 5. The process 500 includes checking (510) if a broad keyword exists in a net-new keyword collection. If the broad keyword does not exist in the net-new keyword collection, the broad keyword is processed (512)…. broad keywords can only be added to a net-new keyword collection for use in an expanded advertising campaign as a keyword with a match type of phrase or exact…. a broad keyword is processed (512) as a phrase keyword utilizing a process for determining phrase keywords.” —Ramaksrihnan at ¶ [0061].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2014/0236708 (“Wolff”) as noted in first two Office actions (November 2022 and March 2023) of this case’s Parent Application.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2014/0067539 of Burt et al. (hereinafter “Burt”) for “record the prospective client's information according to a single set of schemas or taxonomies, rather than dealing with multiple separate schemas…. a taxonomy is a set of labels and/or descriptors. Different local advertising service providers can use different taxonomies. Taxonomies can include business taxonomies, which can include business categories, business offerings, and other categorizations for businesses and services and/or goods provided by the businesses. Taxonomies can also include location taxonomies to describe geographical locations. Other appropriate taxonomies can be used by the local advertising service providers” —Burt at ¶ [0014].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2012/0316972 of Hu et al. (hereinafter “Hu”) for “an ad expanded feature set that is combined with the Ad keywords associated with the advertisement to generate an expanded Ad index; and when receiving a request to provide to a client device other content for display, selecting an advertisement from a plurality of advertisements, including the received advertisement, based on the expanded Ad index.” —Claim 1 of Hu. Related to App. No. 12/935,283 which issued as U.S. Pat. No. 8,788,342
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2012/0239488 of Zimmerman et al. (hereinafter “Zimmerman”) for “building a taxonomy … involves obtaining a set of source data describing the products and categories of products featured on the website or group of websites that will be the subject of the campaign…. an initial crawl of the website or group of websites is performed. Typical crawls can include … a product crawl, which pulls key pieces of information about each product, and a category crawl, which determines the categorization structure of the website or group of websites…. a filter crawl is also performed to obtain all relevant product filters on the site…. search results pages returned by the site in response to search queries based upon keywords of interest are also crawled and the search results pages used as landing pages within a targeted search campaign…. the site categorization structure becomes the basis of category definitions within the taxonomy. In effect, the source data provides information concerning the attributes of the products… that can be presented to a user by the landing pages that are the subject of the advertising campaign. In addition to information about the products…, the source data can also include information concerning search queries such as search logs, reports, keyword tools, and search query reports…. any of a variety of sources of data can be used to obtain information related to the attributes of products and/or services that will be presented in the paid search campaign. For example, a semantic reasoner or inference engine can be utilized to determine additional attributes associated with products…. Accordingly, any of a variety of sources of data concerning the attributes of products and/or services can be utilized in the generation of a taxonomy as appropriate to the requirements of a specific application in accordance with embodiments of the invention” —Zimmerman at ¶ [0072].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2012/0059713 of Galas et al. (hereinafter “Galas”) for “expanding keywords” and “Advertisers may be able to see which intent topics, key intents, or intents are profitably driving business for them, and then take action to enhance their campaign by expanding keywords, ad copy, and landing pages around highly productive intents.” —Galas at ¶ [0093].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0313848 of Vaidyanathan et al. (hereinafter “Vaidyanathan”) for “dynamically updating online advertisements and providing updated online advertisements are provided. An object-oriented online advertisement is provided that has properties inherited from an advertisement class. The inherited properties include metadata fields and corresponding metadata values. The metadata fields and values determine the content, appearance, behavior, and other characteristics of the online advertisement when it is published on a web page. Changes to or addition or deletion of metadata fields and values in an advertisement class or subclass are communicated to the online advertisements, and the metadata of the advertisements are updated to reflect the changes” —Abstract of Vaidyanathan.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0307485 of Udupa et al. (hereinafter “Udupa”) for “Extracting Topically Related Keywords From Related Documents” —Title of Udupa; and “in the context of the… advertiser who is looking for keywords in a set of documents for use in contextual targeted advertising, the advertisement dictionary can include importance factors for some or all of the keywords listed therein. In this way the advertiser can emphasis the importance of certain keywords in the partition procedure. If there is no importance factor associated with a keyword it is simply set to 1.” —Description of Udupa.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0208984 (“Bilenko”) as noted in first two Office actions (November 2022 and March 2023) of this case’s Parent Application.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2009/0292677 of Larry Kim (hereinafter “Kim”) for “allow the users to create Ad Campaigns and Ad Groups by selecting different keyword groups from a user-defined taxonomy hierarchy consisting of a tree of nested keyword groups, and then associating the keywords belonging to the selected keyword group for use as keywords in a new or existing ad group. This may provide better support for keyword classification and organization.” —Kim at ¶ [0044].
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2007/0255631 of Schmidt et al. (hereinafter “Schmidt”) for “Product Catalog Management” —Title of Schmidt.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2004/0083162 of Mamoud Sadre (hereinafter “Sadre”) for “creating, using the computer, a hierarchical product taxonomy of a group of products of the sector, comprising: creating a product taxonomy tree representing the group of products as sector products, wherein the branches of the tree represent successively defined sub-sector products and sub-sector product groupings, and the leaves of the tree represent root products” —Claim 1 of Sadre.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2002/0156688 of Horn et al. (hereinafter “Horn”) for “creating a hierarchical taxonomy of products, the taxonomy comprising a four-level hierarchical tree structure that may be described with English language names for the levels (top to bottom) as level 1--Department, level 2--Group, level 3--Family, and level 4--Category, populating the taxonomy at each level with a set of nodes …. improving the ease of the Buyer's shopping experience and promoting customer loyalty” —Claim 22 of Horn.
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 extension fee 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Mathew Syrowik whose telephone number is 313-446-4862. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday through Friday 8:30 AM to 4:00 PM (Eastern Time). If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Waseem Ashraf, can be reached at telephone number 517-270-3948. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from Patent Center. Status information of published applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Status information of unpublished applications is available through Patent Center for authorized users only. Should you have questions about access to Patent Center, please contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free) or by email at EBC@uspto.gov. Examiner interviews are available via telephone or video conference using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, please email Mathew.Syrowik@USPTO.gov or applicant may use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) Form at https://www.uspto.gov/patents/uspto-automated-interview-request-air-form. For additional information or questions, please contact the Inventors Assistance Center at 1-800-786-9199 (toll free), 571-272-1000 (local), or 1-800-877-8339 (TDD/TTY).
/Mathew Syrowik/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3621