Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application 18/963,947, filed on 11/29/2024 (or after March 16, 2013), is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA (First Inventor to File).
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.
DETAILED ACTION
Claims 1-24 are pending in this application.
Drawings
The Drawings filed on 11/29/2024 are acceptable for examination purpose.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for (UNITED KINGDOM) foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed in parent Application No. UNITED KINGDOM application # 2318258.7 filed on 11/29/2023
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Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(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.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 2, 4,6-8,10-12,13-15,17-18, is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 2, it is unclear what is meant by “wherein optionally the step of processing…….., for compact prosecution, examiner assumed, treated performing the step of processing in the office action.
Claim 4,6,8,10,13,17, it is unclear what is meant by “and/or”, for example, the term “and/or” makes claim(s) indefinite.
Claim 4: “the one or more pieces……..model; and/or
Claim 7 is rejected in the analysis of claim 4, and claim 7 is rejected on that basis
Claim 6: “wherein…….information and/or content information
Claim 8: “wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information
Claim 10:” type of information……types of events to be extracted; and/or
Claim 13: “wherein the ……event and/or time of the event and/or location……..
Claim 14-15 is rejected in the analysis of claim 13, and claim 14-15 is rejected on that basis
Claim 17: “wherein the one or more pieces of event data comprises a description of the event and/or time of the event and/or location;
“embedding information; and/or
Claim 18 depend from claim 17, claim 18 is rejected on the basis of claim 17
Claim 10: “examples of the information to be “extracted………, it is unclear what is meant by “examples of information to be extracted, is it “text portions”, “email”, “audio file”, for compact prosecution, examiner assumed, treated any piece of digital content or text in the office action, further the term “examples of the information to be”, makes the claim indefinite
Claim 12: it is unclear what is meant by “user specified guidance” “additional information” related to events……, for compact prosecution, examiner assumed and treated additional information may be metadata of respective entities or event(s) in the office action, and user specified guidance may be treated as user to specify parameters (Carothers: fig 7) in the office action.
Claim 11 depend from claim 10, claim 11 is rejected on the basis of claim 10
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 1-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application.
Claim 1-24 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The eligibility analysis in support of these findings is provided below, in accordance with the 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, Federal Register (84 FR 50) on January 7, 2019 hereinafter 2019 PEG
Step 1. In accordance with Step 1 of the eligibility inquiry (as explained in MPEP 2106), it is noted that the method of claim 1, directed to one of the eligible categories of subject matter and therefore satisfy Step 1.
Step 2A. In accordance with Step 2A prong one of the 2019 PEG, the limitations reciting the abstract idea are highlighted, and the limitations directed to additional elements are highlighted, as set forth in exemplary claim 1
“A computer-implemented method for generating chronologies, the method comprising:
receiving one or more pieces of digital content, and for each piece of digital content:
extracting core content from the piece of digital content;
processing the core content using a pre-trained neural network model to extract one or more pieces of event data from the piece of digital content, the pieces of event data being linked to an event;
combining a plurality of pieces of event data from the one or more pieces of digital content to generate a database of events; generating a chronology using the database of events”, as drafted, is a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components. For example, receiving, extracting, processing, combining event data encompasses the user thinking of collection, combining data
If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, then it falls within the “Mental Processes” grouping of abstract ideas set forth in the 2019 PEG. Accordingly, the claim recites an abstract idea.
With respect to Step 2A prong two of the 2019 PEG, the judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The additional elements are directed to method steps, however, these elements fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they fail to provide an improvement to the functioning of a computer or to any other technology or technical field, fail to apply the exception with a particular machine, fail to apply the judicial exception to effect a particular event(s) generating chronologies, combining event data, to effect a transformation of a particular article to a different state or thing, and fail to apply/use the abstract idea in a meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment.
Furthermore, although these elements have been fully considered, they are directed to the use of generic computing elements (para 0058,0071-0074,0124, fig 1, of the instant specification make it clear that the disclosed functionality is implemented on well-known computing systems and general purpose computing devices) to perform the abstract idea, which is not sufficient to amount to a practical application (as noted in the 2019 PEG) and is tantamount to simply saying "apply it" using a general purpose computer, which merely serves to tie the abstract idea to a particular technological environment computer based operating environment) by using the computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea.
Since the analysis of Step 2A prong one and prong two results in the conclusion that the claims are directed to an abstract idea, additional analysis under Step 2B of the eligibility inquiry must be conducted in order to determine whether any claim element or combination of elements amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Step 2B. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The additional method limitations are directed to a generic computer, at a very high level of generality and without imposing meaningful limitations on the scope of the claim. In addition para: 18, 26-31 of the instant specification describe generic off-the-shelf computer-based elements for implementing the claimed invention which does not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea and is not enough to transform an abstract idea into eligible subject matter. Such generic, high-level, and nominal involvement of a computer or computer-based elements for carrying out the invention merely serves to tie the abstract idea to a particular technological environment, which is not enough to render the claims patent-eligible, as noted at pg. 74624 of Federal Register/Vol. 79, No. 241, citing Alice, which in turn cites Mayo. Further, See, e.g., Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int'l, 134 S. Ct. 2347, 2359-60, 110 USPQ2d 1976, 1984 (2014). See also OIP Techs. v. Amazon.com, 788 F.3d 1359, 1364, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1093-94 (Fed. Cir. 2015) ("Just as Diehr could not save the claims in Alice, which were directed to 'implement[ing] the abstract idea of intermediated settlement on a generic computer', it cannot save O/P's claims directed to implementing the abstract idea of price optimization on a generic computer.") (citations omitted). See also, Affinity Labs of Texas LLC v. DirecTV LLC, 838 F.3d 1253, 1257-1258 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (mere recitation of a GUI does not make a claim patent-eligible); Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One Bank, 792 F.3d 1363, 1370 (Fed. Cir. 2015) ("the interactive interface limitation is a generic computer element".)
The additional elements are broadly applied to the abstract idea at a high level of generality ("similar to how the recitation of the computer in the claims in Alice amounted to mere instructions to apply the abstract idea of intermediated settlement on a generic computer,") as explained in MPEP § 2106.05(f)) and they operate in a well-understood, routine, and conventional manner.
MPEP § 2106.05 (d)(II) sets forth the following:
The courts have recognized the following computer functions as well-understood, routine, and conventional functions when they are claimed in a merely generic manner (e.g. at a high level of generality) as insignificant extra-solution activity.
Receiving or transmitting data over a network, e.g., using the Internet to gather data, Symantec...; TLI Communications LLC v. AV Auto. LLC...; OIP Techs., Inc., v. Amazon.com, Inc... ; buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc...;
Performing repetitive calculations, Flook ... ; Bancorp Services v. Sun Life...;
Electronic recordkeeping, Alice Corp...; Ultramercial... ;
Storing and retrieving information in memory, Versata Dev. Group, Inc. v. SAP Am., Inc...;
Electronically scanning or extracting data from a physical document, Content Extraction and Transmission, LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank...; and
A web browser's back and forward button functionality, Internet Patent Corp. v. Active Network, Inc...
Courts have held computer-implemented processes not to be significantly more than an abstract idea (and thus ineligible) where the claim as a whole amounts to nothing more than generic computer functions merely used to implement an abstract idea, such as an idea that could be done by a human analog (i.e., by hand or by merely thinking).
Claim 2, further elaborates:
“extracting internal metadata from the piece of digital content;
combining the extracted internal metadata with an external metadata of the piece of digital content to generate a complete set of metadata for the piece of digital content;
wherein optionally the step of processing the core content to extract the one or more pieces of event data further comprises processing both the core content and the complete set of metadata using the pre-trained neural network model”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 3, further elaborates: ”wherein the one or more pieces of digital content comprise one or more of: an email, an image file, a text document, a spreadsheet, a written statement, a video file, an audio file, a scanned document and/or a PDF file”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 4, further elaborates:
“the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the video file and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises generating a transcript of the video file using a first machine learning model; and/or
the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the audio file and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises generating a transcript of the audio file using a second machine learning model”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 5, further elaborates: “wherein: the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the image file, the scanned document or the PDF file and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises applying Optical Character Recognition software to the digital content”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 6, further elaborates: wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 7, further elaborates, “wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information and the text information comprises the transcript of the video file and/or the transcript of the audio file”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 8, further elaborates, “ wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information and the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the email, the text file or the spreadsheet and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises harvesting the text information directly from the digital content”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 9, further elaborates, “ wherein prior to processing the core content, the method further comprises:
slicing the text information into two or more smaller text portions; and
optionally associating one or more fragments of the context information with each of the two or more smaller text portions”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 10, further elaborates:
“supplying a prompt to the pre-trained neural network model, the prompt comprising an indication of:
types of events to be extracted; and/or
type of information to be extracted from each type of event; and/or
examples of the information to be extracted from each type of event”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 11, further elaborates: “applying restrictions associated with the prompt when processing the core content using the pre-trained neural network model”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 12, further elaborates:
receiving a request comprising a user-specified guidance, the request comprising additional information relating to events which are to be investigated; and
determining the prompt based on the user-specified guidance”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 13, further elaborates “wherein the one or more pieces of event data comprises a description of the event and/or time of the event and/or location of the event and/or parties involved in the event and/or entities involved in the event”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 14, further elaborates “wherein the time of the event comprises an absolute time of the event and/or a relative time of the event”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 15, further elaborates: “converting the relative time of the event to the absolute time of the event by applying natural language processing techniques to the one or more pieces of event data”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 16, further elaborates: “analyzing the database of events to group a plurality of smaller, related or equivalent events into a larger event”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 17, further elaborates: “wherein the one or more pieces of event data comprises a description of the event and/or time of the event and/or location of the event and/or parties involved in the event and/or entities involved in the event, and
grouping the plurality of smaller, related or equivalent events into a larger event comprises producing a set of potentially matching events by:
searching the plurality of pieces of event data for potentially matching events using fuzzy string matching and embedding information; and/or
identifying similar times of the events in the database of events”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 18, further elaborates:
“ wherein producing a set of potentially matching events further comprises, for each set of potentially matching events:
determining whether the events are related or equivalent using a third machine learning model; and optionally
upon determining that the events are related, identifying a type of relationship between the events using the third machine learning model”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 19, further elaborates:
“providing a visual representation of the chronology by generating a list, a timeline, a fishbone diagram and/or a knowledge graph based on the chronology”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 20, further elaborates:
“filtering the chronology by: a type of event, parties involved in the event, a location of the event, a time range within which the one or more events took place, and/or a keyword”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 21, further elaborates:
“attaching a reference to each event in the chronology, the reference connecting each event to the one or more pieces of digital content”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 22, further elaborates “manually adding, removing, reordering, and/or amending one or more of the events in the chronology”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 23, further elaborates “A computer program comprising instructions which, when the program is executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform a method in accordance with Claim 1, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Claim 24, further elaborates” A computer-readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause an apparatus comprising the one or more processors to perform a method in accordance with Claim 1”, which have been determined to be extra-solution activity that does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(b)(I). Even in combination, the additional details recited in these claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
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(s) 1-2,6,9-18, 20-24 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Carothers et al., (hereafter Carothers), US Pub. No. 2016/0314146 published Oct, 2016.
As to claim 1, Carothers teaches a system which including “a computer-implemented method for generating chronologies, the method comprising: (Carothers: 0074, fig 2, fig 7-8, fig 17 – Carothers teaches generating chronologies of legal data particularly legal events with respect to timeline as shown in fig 2), and Carothers’s fig 17 suggests generating chronologies for example district court cases via GUI:
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“receiving one or more pieces of digital content, and for each piece of digital content” (Carothers: fig 1, Abstract, 0044 – Carothers teaches legal entities and legal events with timestamps presented via graphical user interface);
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“extracting core content from the piece of digital content” (Carothers: fig 1, fig 30043,0046,0052, line 1-4 – Carothers teaches retrieving legal data from one or more sources of legal information sources for example 106 a-n as detailed in fig 1, the legal data may include dates and times and legal data corresponding to the legal event(s))
“processing the core content using a pre-trained neural network model to extract one or more pieces of event data from the piece of digital content, the pieces of event data being linked to an event” (Carothers: fig 4, 0014, 0073, - Carothers teaches machine learning module supporting natural language processing or NPL used in legal data analytics platform (element 400), digital content corresponds to legal entities is integral part of legal data, further Carothers teaches identifying portions with the legal entity names fig 8, element 806,808 corresponds to event data from the piece of digital content and pre-trained neural network model corresponds to learning module element 412 because module is already been trained on large legal data and/or entities on large legal dataset(s) to perform tasks including natural language processing;
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combining a plurality of pieces of event data from the one or more pieces of digital content to generate a database of events” (Carothers: fig 3, 0073, fig 8 – Carothers teaches identifying relevant legal information from legal database(s), identifying portion(s) of legal data including legal entities particularly identifying similar entity names and combine those similar entity names into a single category in the legal analytics platform, it should be noted that legal entities for example courts, judges, parties, and legal events for example resolution, date of filing, termination, trial, damages and like (para: 0077)
“generating a chronology using the database of events” (Carothers: fig 17).
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As to claim 2, Carothers disclosed:
“extracting internal metadata from the piece of digital content” (Carothers: Abstract, 0040, 0052,fig 16, element 1608,1610 – Carothers teaches legal data associated with metadata for example timestamps, also Carothers teaches generate metadata elements of legal events;
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“combining the extracted internal metadata with an external metadata of the piece of digital content to generate a complete set of metadata for the piece of digital content” (Carothers: 0072-0073,0077);
“wherein optionally the step of processing the core content to extract the one or more pieces of event data further comprises processing both the core content and the complete set of metadata using the pre-trained neural network model” (Carothers: Carothers: fig 4, 0014, 0073, - Carothers teaches machine learning module supporting natural language processing or NPL used in legal data analytics platform (element 400), digital content corresponds to legal entities is integral part of legal data, further Carothers teaches identifying portions with the legal entity names fig 8, element 806,808 corresponds to event data from the piece of digital content and pre-trained neural network model corresponds to learning module element 412 because module is already been trained on large legal data and/or entities on large legal dataset(s) to perform tasks including natural language processing).
As to claim 6, Carothers disclosed “wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information” (Carothers: 0091-0092)
As to claim 9, Carothers disclosed:
“slicing the text information into two or more smaller text portions; and
optionally associating one or more fragments of the context information with each of the two or more smaller text portions” (Carothers: fig 8, 0073-0074).
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.
As to claim 10, Carothers disclosed:
“supplying a prompt to the pre-trained neural network model, the prompt comprising an indication of” (Carothers: fig 4, element 412,0014,0071-0072)
“types of events to be extracted; (0049,0051-0052) and/or
“type of information to be extracted from each type of event” (Carothers: 0051-0052,0057,0061); and/or
“examples of the information to be extracted from each type of event” (Carothers:0061-0062, 0080-0081, fig 17) .
As to claim 11, Carothers disclosed: further comprising: applying restrictions associated with the prompt when processing the core content using the pre-trained neural network model” (Carothers: 0073-0074, fig 4).
As to claim12, Carothers disclosed:
“receiving a request comprising a user-specified guidance, the request comprising additional information relating to events which are to be investigated” (Carothers: fig 7, 0069-0070) ; and
“determining the prompt based on the user-specified guidance” (Carothers: 0070-0072).
As to claim 13, Carothers disclosed: “wherein the one or more pieces of event data comprises a description of the event and/or time of the event and/or location of the event and/or parties involved in the event and/or entities involved in the event” (Carothers: 0074-0076,0084)
As to claim 14, Carothers disclosed: “wherein the time of the event comprises an absolute time of the event and/or a relative time of the event” (Carothers: fig 9-11, 0076-0077).
As to claim 15, Carothers disclosed “converting the relative time of the event to the absolute time of the event by applying natural language processing techniques to the one or more pieces of event data” (Carothers: 0091-0094, Carothers teaches legal analytics platform supporting natural language process)
As to claim 16, Carothers disclosed “analyzing the database of events to group a plurality of smaller, related or equivalent events into a larger event” (Carothers: fig 9-11, fig 17).
As to claim 17, Carothers disclosed “wherein the one or more pieces of event data comprises a description of the event and/or time of the event and/or location of the event and/or parties involved in the event and/or entities involved in the event” (Carothers: 0074-0076,0084) , and
“grouping the plurality of smaller, related or equivalent events into a larger event comprises producing a set of potentially matching events by” (Carothers: 0071-0072,0086-0087)
“searching the plurality of pieces of event data for potentially matching events using fuzzy string matching and embedding information” (Carothers: fig 7-8, 0072-0073, and/or
“identifying similar times of the events in the database of events” (Carothers: fig 7-8, 0074, fig 17).
As to claim 18, Carothers disclosed “wherein producing a set of potentially matching events further comprises, for each set of potentially matching events” (Carothers: fig 3, 0071-0072)
“determining whether the events are related or equivalent using a third machine learning model” (Carothers: fig 3-4, 0052-0053); and optionally
“upon determining that the events are related, identifying a type of relationship between the events using the third machine learning model” (Carothers:0049-0052) .
As to claim 20, Carothers disclosed:
“filtering the chronology by: a type of event, parties involved in the event, a location of the event, a time range within which the one or more events took place, and/or a keyword” (Carothers: 0052,0059-0060, table 1) .
As to claim 21, Carothers disclosed:
“attaching a reference to each event in the chronology, the reference connecting each event to the one or more pieces of digital content” (Carothers: 0052, fig 2, fig 9-11, fig 17)
As to claim 22, Carothers disclosed: further comprising manually adding, removing, reordering, and/or amending one or more of the events in the chronology” (Carothers: 0052, 0056,0070).
As to claim 23, Carothers disclosed: “A computer program comprising instructions which, when the program is executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform a method in accordance with Claim 1” (Carothers: fig 21,0097,0100-0101,0103)
As to claim 24, Carothers disclosed “A computer-readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause an apparatus comprising the one or more processors to perform a method in accordance with Claim 1” (Carothers: fig 21,0097,0100-0101,0103)
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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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 3-5,7-8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Carothers et al., (hereafter Carothers), US Pub. No. 2016/0314146 published Oct, 2016 in view of Syed Fathi et al., (hereafter Fathi), US Pub. No. 2024/0193207 filed on Jan, 2023
As to claim 3, Carothers disclosed: “wherein the one or more pieces of digital content comprise one or more of: an email, an image file, a text document, a spreadsheet, a written statement, , a scanned document and/or a PDF file” (Carothers: 0047,0049 – Carothers supports textual, graphical data email, multimedia messaging service or MMS, different formats of legal data for example HTML, PDF,OCR (0067)), however, Carothers does not disclose “a video file, an audio file”. On the other hand, Fathi disclosed “a video file, an audio file” (Fathi: Abstract,0034-0035, fig 2-4 – Fathi teaches various portions of media content organized segments for example videos, images, audio data, where video files may be AVI,WMV,MOV, QT, MP4 and like , and audio data for example music, audio tracks and like
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It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the claimed invention organizing various segments of media content collection including multimedia, images of Fathi et al., into data entities, segments performing time based statistical analysis of Carothers et al., because both Carothers, Fathi teaches extracting organizing data segments analyzing using machine learning (Carothers: 0014, fig 4; Fathi: fig 3, 0060), both Carothers, Fathi teches generating chronology of events (Carothers: fig 17; Fathi: 0126) Because both Carothers, Fathi teaches data entities, segments analyzing data using machine learning technique, it would have been obvious to one skill ed in the art to substitute and/or modify one method for the other to extract respective data segments and/or data, organizing identified data types, while machine learning that determines relevancies between data of the media content files and types thereby improves overall navigation of data (Fathi: 0007), further allows to utilize optimum computing resources, thus improves overall quality and reliability of the system.
As to claim 4, the combination of Carothers, Fathi disclosed
“the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the video file and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises generating a transcript of the video file using a first machine learning model” (Fathi: fig 1-3, fig 6, element 606, 0060,0077) ; and/or
“the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the audio file and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises generating a transcript of the audio file using a second machine learning model” (Fathi: fig 6, 0077-0079)
As to claim 5, the combination of Carothers, Fathi disclosed:” the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the image file (Fathi: 0025,0027) the scanned document or the PDF file (Fathi: 0033) and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises applying Optical Character Recognition software to the digital content (Fathi: 0143-0144,0160).
As to claim 7, the combination of Carothers, Fathi disclosed “wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information and the text information comprises the transcript of the video file and/or the transcript of the audio file” (Fathi: 0117-0118,0119-0120) .
As to claim 8, the combination of Carothers, Fathi disclosed “wherein the core content comprises text information and/or context information and the one or more pieces of digital content comprises the email, the text file or the spreadsheet and the step of extracting the core content from the piece of digital content comprises harvesting the text information directly from the digital content” (Carothers: 0047,0049 – Carothers supports textual, graphical data email, multimedia messaging service or MMS, different formats of legal data for example HTML, PDF,OCR (0067).
Claim 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Carothers et al., (hereafter Carothers), US Pub. No. 2016/0314146 published Oct, 2016 in view of Balasubramanian et al., (hereafter Bala), US Pub. No. 2022/0229430 published Jul, 2022
As to claim 19. The combination of Carothers, Bala disclosed:
providing a visual representation of the chronology by generating a list, a timeline” (Carothers: 0074, fig 15, fig 17). It is however, noted that Carothers does not teach “a fishbone diagram and/or a knowledge graph based on the chronology”. On the other hand, Bala disclosed “a fishbone diagram” (Bala: fig 4, 0053-0054), “a knowledge graph based on the chronology” (Bala: 0042, fig 1, fig 3)
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It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the claimed invention cause and effect analysis of Bala et al., into data entities, segments performing time based statistical analysis of Carothers et al., because that would have allowed users of Carothers to use cause and effect analysis particularly visually identifying and categorizing, able to perform root cause analysis of events (Bala: 0006-0007) thereby effective use of time and resources of the computing system
Conclusion
The prior art made of record
a. US Pub. No. 2016/0314146
b. US Pub. No. 2024/0193207
c. US Pub. No. 2022/0229430
Examiner's Note: Examiner has cited particular columns and line numbers in the references applied to the claims above for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings of the art and are applied to specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant in preparing responses, to fully consider the references in entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the Examiner.
SEE MPEP 2141.02 [R-5] VI. PRIOR ART MUST BE CONSIDERED IN ITS ENTIRETY, INCLUDING DISCLOSURES THAT TEACH AWAY FROM THE CLAIMS: A prior art reference must be considered in its entirety, i.e., as a whole, including portions that would lead away from the claimed invention. W.L. Gore & Associates, Inc. v. Garlock, Inc., 721 F.2d 1540, 220 USPQ 303 (Fed. Cir. 1983), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 851 (1984) In re Fulton, 391 F.3d 1195, 1201,73 USPQ2d 1141, 1146 (Fed. Cir. 2004). >See also MPEP §2123.
In the case of amending the Claimed invention, Applicant is respectfully requested to indicate the portion(s) of the specification which dictate(s) the structure relied on for proper interpretation and also to verify and ascertain the metes and bounds of the claimed invention.
The prior art made of record, listed on form PTO-892, and not relied upon, if any, is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure
Authorization for Internet Communications
The examiner encourages Applicant to submit an authorization to communicate with the examiner via the Internet by making the following statement (from MPEP 502.03):
“Recognizing that Internet communications are not secure, I hereby authorize the USPTO to communicate with the undersigned and practitioners in accordance with 37 CFR 1.33 and 37 CFR 1.34 concerning any subject matter of this application by video conferencing, instant messaging, or electronic mail. I understand that a copy of these communications will be made of record in the application file.”
Please note that the above statement can only be submitted via Central Fax (not Examiner's Fax), Regular postal mail, or EFS Web using PTO/SB/439.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Srirama Channavajjala whose telephone number is 571-272-4108. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Friday from 8:00 AM to 5:30 PM Eastern Time.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Gorney, Boris, can be reached on (571) 270- 5626. The fax phone numbers for the organization where the application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300 Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free)
/Srirama Channavajjala/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2154