DETAILED ACTION
1. This Office Action is in response to application 19/016732 filed on 01/10/2025. Claims 1-20 are pending.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
2. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Objections
3. Claims 1, 12, are objected to because of the following informalities: The claim 1 recites “determining factor score”. The examiner believes this should recite “determining a factor score”. Claim 12 similarly recites the same. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
4. Claims 1-20 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.
Specifically, claims 1 and 12 recite the terms “inappropriate and “controversial” which are relative terms which renders the claim indefinite. The terms “inappropriate” and “controversial” are not defined by the claim, the specification does not provide a standard for ascertaining the requisite degree, and one of ordinary skill in the art would not be reasonably apprised of the scope of the invention. For example, something inappropriate to one person may not be considered inappropriate to another person.
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.
5. Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Claims 1 and 12 recite a method and system for receiving a request to transmit a message from a sender device to a recipient device, determining a relationship strength between a user of the sender electronic device and a user of the recipient electronic device, determining a factor score based on the determined relationship strength, determining appropriateness of the message based on factor score, and determining whether to associate a watermark with the content item. The limitations of determining a relationship strength…, determining a factor score…, determining appropriateness of the message…, and determining whether to watermark…are certain methods of organizing human activity and in particular, managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people (including social activities, teaching, and following rules or instructions).
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application, for example an additional element reflects an improvement in the functioning of a computer, or an improvement to other technology or technical field; and additional element applies or uses the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception. Claim 1 further recites a server and electronic devices and claim 12 further recites communication circuitry and control circuitry which are just generic computing components and thus is just implementing an abstract idea on a generic computing device. The claimed solution is not directed to an improvement in the functioning of the computer itself or any other technology or technical field.
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional claim 1 elements of a server and electronic devices and claim 12 additional elements of the communication circuitry and control circuitry performing the steps are no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computing device. Mere instructions to apply an exception using generic computing components cannot provide an inventive concept. Therefore, the additional elements do not add significantly more to the claimed invention and thus the claim is ineligible.
Dependent claims 2-10, 13-20 include limitations which are considered part of the abstract idea. The dependent claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
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.
6. Claims 1-5, 7-16, 18-20, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Iyer et al. (US 2017/0093787) in view of Lewis et al. (US 2010/0268682).
Regarding claim 1, Iyer discloses a method comprising (fig. 3; fig. 8; fig. 11):
receiving a request (Figure 10, 1002, indication to transmit message), at a server (Paragraph 82, server), to transmit a message (Figure 10, transmitting a message) from a sender electronic device (Figure 10, sender) to a recipient electronic device (Figure 10, recipient);
in response to receiving the request, determining factor score (Paragraph 49, personal-to-professional metric) that is reflective of a relationship strength between a user of the sender electronic device and a user of the recipient electronic device (Paragraph 49, determining whether the message context is consistent with the relationship by obtaining a personal-to-professional metric. The metric is an indication on a scale of 1-10, a person is related to the sender at a personal level or more of a professional level);
determining based on the factor score that the message requested to be transmitted includes a content item that is inappropriate or controversial (Paragraph 14, an intelligent process to warn a sender of a potentially inappropriate message. Paragraph 50, determining whether the message context is consistent with the relationship comprises accessing a rule set database which classifies the message context in a sensitivity level of a plurality of message context sensitivities. Paragraph 78-79, if the message is not consistent with the relationship (i.e., inappropriate), a warning is presented).
While Iyer disclosed warning a user of inappropriate messages (see above), Iyer did not explicitly disclose in response to determining that the message requested to be transmitted includes the content item that is inappropriate or controversial, associating a watermark with the content item, and transmitting the message with the watermark associated with the content item.
However, in an analogous art, Lewis disclosed in response to determining that the message requested to be transmitted includes the content item that is inappropriate or controversial, associating a watermark with the content item, and transmitting the message with the watermark associated with the content item (Paragraph 24, the content of the email message is automatically scanned and examined to locate one or more words or phrases and/or other content that would be considered offensive, offending, and/or otherwise inappropriate to the receiver. Paragraph 25, the words, phrases, and/or other content are also automatically highlighted (i.e., watermark) so that the sender is aware of them).
One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to combine the teachings of Iyer with Lewis because the references involve determining if messages have inappropriate content, and as such, are within the same environment.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the watermarking of Lewis with the teachings of Iyer in order to help one avoid sending content to a receiver that may cause a negative response or emotion to be misunderstood (Lewis, Paragraph 22).
Regarding claim 12, the claim is substantially similar to claim 1. Claim 12 recites communications circuitry and control circuitry (Iyer, Paragraph 81, operating on circuits). Therefore the claim is rejected under the same rationale.
Regarding claims 2, 13, the limitations of claims 1, 12, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
further comprising: in response to determining that the message requested to be transmitted includes the content item that is inappropriate or controversial: displaying an alert on the sender electronic device to recompose the message without the content item that is inappropriate or controversial (Iyer, Paragraph 16, Figure 2, showing that the sender gets an alert that says the message is inappropriate and asking the sender to change the message); and
in response to determining that the message was not recomposed, associating the watermark with the content item (Lewis, Paragraph 25, words, phrases, and other content are automatically highlighted in order to make the sender aware of the inappropriate nature. Paragraph 29, suggestions are made for alternatives that are considered appropriate. Therefore, if the suggestions are taken, the highlight is removed. However, if the suggestion is not taken, the highlight still remains as it is still considered inappropriate).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
Regarding claims 3, 14, the limitations of claims 1, 12, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein associating the watermark with the content item includes superimposing the watermark on a portion of the content item that includes the inappropriate or controversial content (Lewis, Paragraph 25, words, phrases, and other content are automatically highlighted (i.e., superimposed) in order to make the sender aware of the inappropriate nature).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
Regarding claims 4, 15, the limitations of claims 3, 14, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein the content item is either an image or a video and the superimposing comprises superimposing the watermark on a portion of the image or a frame of the video that includes the inappropriate or controversial content (Lewis, Paragraph 22, highlighting or tagging words, phrases, or other content that is deemed inappropriate. Other content includes audio, graphics, images, and others).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
Regarding claims 5, 16, the limitations of claims 1, 12, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein the watermark includes a warning (Lewis, Paragraph 53, the alert module raises an alarm (i.e., warning) if the criteria is not met and identifies one or more of the parameters in the document that was not met for a respective recipient. The alert module identifies the location of the parameter in the document and provides an explanation of the reason the parameter did not meet the criteria).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
Regarding claims 7, 18, the limitations of claims 1, 12, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
further comprising, determining the relationship strength between the user of the sender electronic device and the user of the recipient electronic device, wherein the relationship strength is based on either a type of relation (Iyer, Paragraphs 40-42, determining a relationship between the sender and the recipient based on an aspect of the relationship between the two based on an attribute such as if the recipient is a familial role, a workplace, a school, or a social media connection) or frequency of communications between user of the sender electronic device and the user of the recipient electronic device.
Regarding claims 8, 19, the limitations of claims 1, 12, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein the watermark is a textual or graphical watermark (Lewis, Paragraph 22, highlighting (i.e., graphical) or tagging words, phrases, or other content that is deemed inappropriate).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
Regarding claim 9, the limitations of claim 1 have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein the watermark may be superimposed on the content item by a service that is native to an operating system of the sender electronic device (Lewis, Paragraph 25, inappropriate content is automatically highlighted so that they are visually shown on the sender’s display (i.e., native)).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
Regarding claim 10, the limitations of claim 1 have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein the message to be transmitted is composed in a messaging application (Iyer, Paragraph 15, intercepting outgoing messages from various applications such as SMS, emails (i.e., both forms of messaging applications) or other forms of text messages).
Regarding claims 11, 20, the limitations of claims 1, 12, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis disclosed:
wherein the content item is deemed to be inappropriate or controversial if the content item was a) forwarded multiple times b) deleted from a post on social media, or c) identified as inappropriate or controversial in a profile associated with the sender or recipient electronic device (Lewis, Paragraph 31, a profile database stores profiles for each of the one or more recipients. Paragraphs 37-38, Figure 6, showing profiles being used to determine whether certain words are inappropriate and suggestions on what to replace those words with).
For motivation, please refer to claim 1.
7. Claims 6, 17, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Iyer et al. (US 2017/0093787) in view of Lewis et al. (US 2010/0268682) and Cohen (US 8,074,162).
Regarding claims 6, 17, the limitations of claims 5, 16, have been addressed. Iyer and Lewis did not explicitly disclose:
wherein the warning informs the recipient electronic device a) that the content item contains inappropriate or controversial content, b) to open the message in private, or c) that the message requires a user of the recipient electronic device to be of a predetermined minimum age to consume the content item.
However, in an analogous art, Cohen disclosed wherein the warning informs the recipient electronic device a) that the content item contains inappropriate or controversial content (Column 6, Line 53 – Column 7, Line 31, once message 210 is received by the receiving application, the contents of the message is screened. If the content of the message is deemed inappropriate, when displaying the message to the recipient, a label is applied to the message that displays to the recipient that the contents is inappropriate (see Figure 3, 330 and 340), b) to open the message in private, or c) that the message requires a user of the recipient electronic device to be of a predetermined minimum age to consume the content item.
One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to combine the teachings of Iyer and Lewis with Cohen because the references involve determining if messages have inappropriate content, and as such, are within the same environment.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the warning the recipient device of Cohen with the teachings of Iyer and Lewis in order to improve exiting screening techniques (Cohen, Column 1, Lines 39-40).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Steven C. Nguyen whose telephone number is (571)270-5663. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 7AM - 3PM and alternatively, through e-mail at Steven.Nguyen2@USPTO.gov.
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/S.C.N/Examiner, Art Unit 2451
/Chris Parry/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2451
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