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 .
Examiner’s Comments
Examiner notes the use of setting in claim 8 is recited as comprising multiple other settings. The examiner notes the same convention will be used when reading and applying all prior art to the current claims.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
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) 1-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Mohapatra (US 20210217407 A1), and further in view of Hassel et al (US 20030149980 A1).
As per claim 1, Mohapatra discloses a method comprising:
determining a presence of at least one secondary device proximate to a display device (recipient device 208, per para 46, where any of the signaling associated with the near field communication is determining the presence of the secondary device/headset, para 46: play audio associated with the AV content; additionally this function in para 46 could also read on determining a presence: ‘as further disclosed herein the selector 202 may be presented upon detection of near field communication (NFC) ‘);
responsive to the determining, retrieving a content presentation setting from the at least one secondary device(the information from the recipient device used to retrieve the characteristic content setting which is used to determine/retrieve a characteristic content setting/indication of the first or second language per para 6) ;
determining content that is available for the retrieved content presentation setting and available to the at least one secondary device (once a language is selected, the device must identify currently streaming content in order to present the content in the selected language, where the streaming content must be determined in order to perform either of the steps: ‘the instructions may be executable to translate the audio into the second language’ or ‘the instructions can be executable to access the audio in the second language from an advanced television systems committee (ATSC) data stream’ per para 6, further content must be identified in order for the display to present the available languages per 202,fig. 2, additionally, the information to display the language selection menu in fig. 7);
providing for display a user selectable option for the available content (as shown in 202, fig. 2, each displayed language); and
based at least in part on user selection of the user selectable option to select one of the available content, selecting at least a portion of the content for the at least one secondary device, according to the respective retrieved content presentation setting (the system receiving the user’s input to the selection shown in fig. 7); and
initiating a transmitting of the selected at least portion of the content to the at least one secondary device (the tv sends the audio to the listening device in the selected language, or sends all available languages to the listening device/headphones per the abstract) .
However, Mohapatra disclose content on a tv but does not disclose
providing for display representations of the available content for user selection and viewing;
Hassel teaches that tvs can implement visual guides to available content (Fig. 5b) and its associated language information (Fig. 6). Hassel teaches this provides for selectable listing per para 37. It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art to implement display representations of the available content for the purpose of allowing the user to select the desired program.
Where, when implemented in the tv of Mohapatra the contents taught by Hassel would each have an associated language selection as taught by Mohapatra, further noting the additional information display taught by Hassel in Fig. 6.
As per claim 2, the method of claim 1, wherein the determining further comprises establishing a communication link with the at least one secondary device (the communication link between the recipient device 208, and the display device), and wherein the retrieving further comprises retrieving the content presentation setting using the communication link. (the nearfield communication per para 46 as used to perform the content and language selecting as per the claim 1 rejection, noting the recipient device 208 receives signaling from the display based on selection of the content and language).
As per claim 3, the method of claim 1, wherein: the retrieving comprises retrieving a first content presentation setting from a first secondary device and a second content presentation setting from a second secondary device (there can be multiple headphones per para 47, device 212,208, each with different languages, per the setting processing per the claim 2 rejection);
the selecting further comprises selecting at least a first portion of the content for the first secondary device, according to the respective first content presentation setting (the process of claim 1 and 2 rejections on recipient device 208) and
selecting at least a second portion of the content for the second secondary device, according to the respective second content presentation setting (the process of claim 1 and 2 rejections on recipient device 212); and
the initiating further comprises initiating the transmitting of the selected at least first portion of the content to the first secondary device and transmitting of the selected at least second portion of the content to the second secondary device (each device 212 and 208 receives different signals with different languages per 47).
As per claim 4, the method of claim 3 wherein: the first and second content presentation settings are not the same (the content in the selected different languages); and
the at least first portion of the content and the at least second portion of the content are not the same (the content in the selected different languages, noting per cited above that the display can send either the selected track or all tracks to each individual recipient device/headset).
As per claim 5, the method of claim 1, wherein the at least one secondary device is one or more of a headphone, a speaker, a cellular telephone, a tablet computing device, or a laptop computer.
As per claim 6, the method of claim 1, comprising: providing for display an interactive media guidance application (all of the gui elements cited in the above claim rejections) including information based on media guidance data (the incoming content), the representations of the available content (per claim 1 rejection), and the user selectable option for each of the available content (per the claim 2-5 rejections).
As per claim 7, the method of claim 1, wherein:
the retrieving further comprises retrieving first and second content presentation settings from the at least one secondary device (the respective demographic characteristics per para 6, as used by the first and second headphone devices 208 and 212);
the selecting further comprises selecting the at least portion of the content for the at least one secondary device, according to the respective first content presentation setting (the demographic characteristics can be used for content presentation setting, since the signaling for the audio is simultaneously transmitted from the tv/display device to each headphone, the selection of portions of the content must by synchronized/’selected according to’ with each other and the display in order to present the audio to the user along with the displayed content); and
the initiating further comprises initiating the transmitting of the selected at least portion of the content to the at least one secondary device for play according to the respective second content presentation setting (the demographic characteristic of a listener per para. 6 as applied to the respective headphones as they receive their respective audio streams form the display).
As per claim 8, the method of claim 1, wherein the content presentation setting is one or more of a language setting, a volume setting, or an equalization setting (language).
As per claim 9, the method of claim 1, further comprising determining identifiers of content having at least one track playable according to at least one retrieved content display setting, and transmitting the identifiers for display on the display device (the determination of available languages as sent to the display per fig. 7).
As per claim 10,
a system comprising:
a storage device; and
control circuitry (each device per claim 1 rejection processor memory and software in order to implement the cited functions) configured to:
determine a presence of at least one secondary device proximate to a display device (per claim 1 rejection);
responsive to the determining, retrieve a content presentation setting from the at least one secondary device (per claim 1 rejection);
determine content that is available for the retrieved content presentation setting and available to the at least one secondary device (per claim 1 rejection);
provide for display representations of the available content for user selection and viewing (per claim 1 rejection);
provide for display a user selectable option for each of the available content (per claim 1 rejection); and
based at least in part on user selection of the user selectable option to select one of the available content (per claim 1 rejection),
select at least a portion of the content for the at least one secondary device, according to the respective retrieved content presentation setting(per claim 1 rejection); and
initiate a transmitting of the selected at least portion of the content to the at least one secondary device (per claim 1 rejection).
As per claim 11, the system of claim 10, wherein the determining further comprises establishing a communication link with the at least one secondary device, and wherein the retrieving further comprises retrieving the content presentation setting using the communication link (per claim 2 rejection).
As per claim 12, The system of claim 11, wherein the communication links include one or more of a Bluetooth link or a near-field communication link (near field communication per above rejections).
As per claim 13, the system of claim 10, wherein:
the retrieving comprises retrieving a first content presentation setting from a first secondary device and a second content presentation setting from a second secondary device;
the selecting further comprises selecting at least a first portion of the content for the first secondary device, according to the respective first content presentation setting and selecting at least a second portion of the content for the second secondary device, according to the respective second content presentation setting; and the initiating further comprises initiating the transmitting of the selected at least first portion of the content to the first secondary device and transmitting of the selected at least second portion of the content to the second secondary device.(per claim 3 rejection)
As per claim 14, the system of claim 13 wherein: the first and second content presentation settings are not the same; and the at least first portion of the content and the at least second portion of the content are not the same(per claim 4 rejection).
As per claim 15, the system of claim 10, wherein the content comprises one or more of audio tracks having audio recorded in specified languages, or closed caption tracks having text in specified languages (audio tracks in languages per above rejections).
As per claim 16, the system of claim 10, wherein: the retrieving further comprises retrieving first and second content presentation settings from the at least one secondary device; the selecting further comprises selecting the at least portion of the content for the at least one secondary device, according to the respective first content presentation setting; and the initiating further comprises initiating the transmitting of the selected track of the content to the at least one secondary device for play according to the respective second content presentation setting (per claim 7 rejection).
As per claim 17, the method of claim 10, wherein the content presentation setting comprises a language setting, and the second content presentation setting comprises one or more of a volume setting, or an equalization setting (per claim 8 rejection).
As per claim 18, the system of claim 10, wherein the at least one secondary device is one or more of a headphone, a speaker, a cellular telephone, a tablet computing device, or a laptop computer (headphone).
As per claim 19, the system of claim 10, wherein the control circuitry is further configured to determine identifiers of content having at least one portion playable according to at least one retrieved content display setting, and transmitting the identifiers for display on the display device (per claim 9 rejection).
As per claim 20, the system of claim 10, wherein the control circuitry is further configured to:
provide for display an interactive media guidance application including information based on media guidance data, the representations of the available content, and the user selectable option for each of the available content (per claim 6 rejection).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALEXANDER KRZYSTAN whose telephone number is 571-272-7498, and whose email address is alexander.krzystan@uspto.gov
The examiner can usually be reached on m-f 7:30-4:00 est.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone or email are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Fan Tsang can be reached on (571) 272-7547.
The fax phone numbers for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned are 571-273-8300 for regular communications and 571-273-8300 for After Final communications.
/ALEXANDER KRZYSTAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2653
Examiner Alexander Krzystan
March 2, 2026