Ex Parte Cristofalo et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jul 28, 2017

12913338 (P.T.A.B. Jul. 28, 2017)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O.Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
12/913,338 10/27/2010 Michael CRISTOFALO 50196-00157 3693
25231 7590 08/01/2017
MARSH, FISCHMANN & BREYFOGLE LLP
8055 East Tufts Avenue
Suite 450
Denver, CO 80237
EXAMINER
SALTARELLI, DOMINIC D
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2421
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/01/2017 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
PTOMail @ mfblaw. com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte MICHAEL CRUSTOFALO and PATRICK M. SHEEHAN
Appeal 2017-001451
Application 12/913,338
Technology Center 2400
Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, TERRENCE W. McMILLIN, and STEVEN M.
AMUNDSON, Administrative Patent Judges.
NAPPI, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
This is a decision on appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the rejection
of claims 1 through 5, 8 through 17, and 19 through 25.
We reverse.
INVENTION
Appellants’ invention relates to a method for use in targeting
advertisements. Specific information on the individuals in a household and
their viewing consumption information is used to create a classification that
is then used to deliver an asset (advertisement). Abstract and page 1 of
Appellants’ Specification.
Appeal 2017-001451
Application 12/913,338
Claim 1 is illustrative of the invention and reproduced below:
A method for use in targeting broadcast network content,
comprising:
providing a network platform for processing classifiers
for delivery to user equipment devices in the broadcast
network;
obtaining, at said network platform, household
information from at least one third-party information repository
for a specific household in said broadcast network, wherein said
household information is free of information originating from a
user equipment device of said specific household and separately
identifies each of multiple individual members of said specific
household;
obtaining, at said network platform, network usage
information originating from said user equipment device of said
specific household, wherein said network usage information
includes consumption information for two or more individual
members of said household associated with one or more content
channels output by said user equipment device at said specific
household, said consumption information including first
consumption information indexed to a first member of said two
or more individual members, and second consumption
information indexed to a second member of said two or more
individual members;
assigning at least a first classifier associated with said
first member based on said information separately identifying
each of said multiple individual members of said household and
said first consumption information indexed to said first user and
a second classifier associated with said second member based
on said information separately identifying each of said multiple
members of said household and said second consumption
information indexed to said user, wherein said first and second
classifiers are different and include at least one of different
temporal limitations and different content channel limitations;
delivering, via said broadcast network, said two or more
assigned classifiers to said user equipment device at said
specific household;
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Appeal 2017-001451
Application 12/913,338
during an asset viewing opportunity in programming,
delivering via said broadcast network a plurality of parallel
asset transmission bands each including a separate asset,
wherein said user equipment device is operative, based on one
or more limitations of said first and second classifiers, to tune
to one of said plurality of asset transmission bands to deliver an
asset to a one of said first and second members.
REJECTIONS AT ISSUE
The Examiner has rejected claims 1 through 5, 8 through 13, and 21
through 25 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Eldering et al.,
(US 2002/0083442 Al, published June 27, 2002; hereinafter “Eldering”) and
Lu et al., (US 5,550,928; issued, June 27, 1996; hereinafter “Lu”). Ans. 2.1
The Examiner has rejected claims 14 through 17, 19 and 20 under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Eldering, Lu, and Swix et al., (US
7,802,276 B2; issued September 21, 2010; hereinafter “Swix”). Ans. 2.
ISSUES
Appellants argue, on pages 6 through 11 of the Appeal Brief and
pages 2 through 5 of the Reply Brief, that the Examiner’s rejection of
independent claims 1 and 21 is in error. The dispositive issue presented by
these arguments is whether the Examiner erred in finding the combination of
Eldering and Lu teaches obtaining household information from a third-party
information repository for a household which separately identifies each of
multiple individual members of said household and assigning a classifier to
1 Throughout this opinion we refer to the Appeal Brief filed June 27, 2016,
Reply Brief filed October 31, 2016, and the Examiner’s Answer (“Ans.”)
mailed on August 29, 2016.
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Application 12/913,338
the members of the household based up the obtained information and
consumption information of the user.
Appellants’ arguments directed to independent claim 15, on pages 11
and 12 of the Appeal Brief, present us with the same issue, discussed above,
with respect to claim 1.
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellants’
contentions that the Examiner has erred. Further, we have reviewed the
Examiner’s response to Appellants’ arguments. We agree with Appellants’
contention that the Examiner erred in rejecting independent clams 1,15, and
21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
The Examiner, in response to Appellants’ arguments, states that
Eldering discusses clustering (demographic information) guidelines for
selecting targeted advertisements once individual identifying information is
known. Ans. 2, 3, and 4 (citing Eldering || 36, 37 and 45). Further, the
Examiner states:
So while Eldering discloses awareness of each subscriber within a
household based on direct feedback (Eldering paragraph 0037),
additional information that assists in targeting advertisements to said
specific individuals is also retrieved from third party sources
(Eldering paragraph 0045, “commercially available” demographic
database 809). An example of this is provided by Eldering in
paragraph 0059, where the information retrieved by Eldering
identifies not just households but the specific members of said
household and what each of said specific members are most likely to
be interested in. There is no requirement in the claims that the
household information must specifically identity individual members
of a household by name, as unique demographic information for each
member is sufficient (e.g. a household with a man between the ages of
21 and 39 and a female between the ages of 21 and 39, [sic, see]
Eldering paragraph 0059).
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Application 12/913,338
Ans. 3.
We disagree with the Examiner. Each of the independent claims
recites that the information from the third-party information repository is for
a specific household and the information identifies each of multiple
individual members of the household. Thus, while the Examiner is correct
the claim does not identify members of the household by name, the claim
does require the information identifies the individuals. Further, we have
reviewed the cited teachings of Eldering, and do not find that the
information from the third party identifies each of multiple individual
members of said specific household. Accordingly, we do not sustain the
Examiner’s rejection of independent claims 1 and 21, or dependent claims 2
through 5, 8 through 13, and 22 through 25, similarly rejected.
The Examiner has not shown that the additional teachings of Swix,
used in the rejection of independent claim 15, make up for the deficiency in
the rejection of claims 1 and 21. Accordingly, we do not sustain the
Examiner’s rejection of claims 15 and dependent claims 14, 16, 17, 19, and
20 for the same reasons as claims 1 and 21.
DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1 through 5, 8 through
17, and 19 through 25 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
REVERSED
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