Ex Parte Mehta et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 30, 201612571197 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 30, 2016) Copy Citation 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. 12/571,197 09/30/2009 Japan A. MEHTA 20090231 1559 25537 7590 VERIZON PATENT MANAGEMENT GROUP 1320 North Court House Road 9th Floor ARLINGTON, VA 22201-2909 EXAMINER CASTRO, ALFONSO ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2421 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 01/04/2017 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): patents @ verizon.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte JAPAN A. MEHTA, SHAFIQ KASSAM, ENRIQUE RUIZ-VELASCO, and MOUSUMI DESGUPTA Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 Technology Center 2400 Before ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, THU A. DANG, and LARRY J. HUME, Administrative Patent Judges. DANG, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL 1. STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s Final Rejection of claims 1—3, 5—9, 11, 12, 14—17, 19, 20, 23, 25, 29 and 30. Appellants have previously canceled claims 4, 10, 13, 18, 21, 22, 24, and 26—28. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 A. THE INVENTION Appellants’ disclosed and claimed invention relate to transactional advertising for television. (Title.) B. ILLUSTRATIVE CLAIM Claim 1 is exemplary: 1. A method comprising: sending, by one or more devices, an advertisement to a video client of a user, the advertisement including a link for initiating a transaction related to the advertisement; receiving, by the one or more devices, a notification from the video client that the user has selected the link; identifying, by the one or more devices and based on the notification, the video client of the user that is initiating the transaction; identifying, by the one or more devices and based on the notification, a third-party server that is necessary for the user of the video client to conduct the transaction; receiving, by the one or more devices and from the third- party server, instructions for the video client to present a transaction interface for the transaction; providing, by the one or more devices and to the video client, the instructions for the video client to present the transaction interface; and establishing, by the one or more devices and after providing, to the video client, the instructions for the video client to present the transaction interface, a communication session between the video client and the third-party server to permit the user of the video client to conduct the transaction with the third- party server. C. REJECTIONS The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal is: 2 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 Moncreiff Hudson et al. Chemock et al. Linehan Anderson et al. US 5,828,839 US 2002/0078456 Al US 2003/0126611 Al US 7,003,789 B1 US 2009/0216621 Al Oct. 27, 1998 June 20, 2002 July 3, 2003 Feb. 21,2006 Aug. 27, 2009 Customized Live Interactive Events with Livestream, http://web.archive.Org/web/20090913182700/http:/cdn.livestream.com/ services/customevent/ (September 13, 2009)(“Livestream”) Claims 1—3, 6—9, 11, 12, 14—17, 19, 20, 23, 25, and 30 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Anderson, Hudson and Chemock. Claim 5 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Anderson, Hudson, Chemock and Linehan. Claim 29 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Anderson, Hudson, Chemock, Moncreiff and Livestream. II. ISSUES The principal issues before us are whether the Examiner erred in finding that the combination of Anderson, Hudson and Chemock teaches or suggests: receiving, by the one or more devices and from the third-party server, instructions for the video client to present a transaction interface for the transaction; providing, by the one or more devices and to the video client, the instructions for the video client to present the transaction interface; and 3 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 establishing, by the one or more devices and after providing, to the video client, the instructions for the video client to present the transaction interface, a communication session between the video client and the third-party server to permit the user of the video client to conduct the transaction with the third-party server. (Claim 1). III. ANALYSIS Claims 1, 6, 8, and 30 Appellants contend the references cited in claim 1 rejection do not teach the “receiving . . . from the third party server, instructions” and “providing ... to the video client, the instructions” limitations, as recited in claim 1. (App. Br. 9). In particular, Appellants contend Hudson’s “[cjonnecting ‘the user with a retail web site’ that is operated by a commercial entity does not disclose or suggest” the “receiving” and “providing” limitations of claim 1. (App. Br. 10, citing Hudson 144.) Appellants also contend Anderson’s facilitating “commerce transactions between a client device and merchant server 190” doesn’t teach or suggest establishing “a communication session between the video client and the third-party server to permit the user of the video client to conduct the transaction with the third-party server,” let alone establishing the communication session “after providing, to the video client, the instructions for the video client to present the transaction interface,” as recited in claim 1. (App. Br. 11). We note Appellants’ contentions regarding claim 1, as well as the other claims argued, merely adopt the following general pattern of argument throughout the Brief (App. Br. 8-44): (1) reciting the claim language and 4 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 asserting it is not taught by the cited references; (2) reproducing portions of the references cited by the Examiner; (3) attacking the references separately, considered in isolation; and (4) making conclusory statements that each reference does not disclose the contested limitation without substantively traversing the specific findings set forth by the Examiner. Our reviewing court guides that such mere conclusory statements which are unsupported by factual evidence are entitled to little probative value. In re Geisler, 116 F.3d 1465, 1470 (Fed. Cir. 1997); In re De Blauwe, 736 F.2d 699, 705 (Fed. Cir. 1984); and Ex parte Belinne, 2009 WF 2477843, at *3^4 (BPAI Aug. 10, 2009) (informative). Nevertheless, we find no error in with the Examiner’s finding that the combined teachings of the cited references teach or at least suggest the contested limitations. Ans. 3—24. We adopt the Examiner’s findings which we incorporate herein by reference. In particular, we find no error with the Examiner’s broad but reasonable interpretation of claim term “instructions” (Ans. 5—6), and agree with the Examiner that the combination of Anderson, Hudson and Chemock discloses or at least suggests the “receiving” “from the third party server, instructions” and “providing” “to the video client, the instructions” limitations, as recited in claim 1. (Ans. 8—20). We agree with the Examiner’s finding that Anderson relates to “intermediary device(s). . . receiving information from a third party and providing said information to video client devices to present information relating to a transaction” and after a user “initiates a purchase from the service which then creates an e-commerce transaction,” the transaction “is 5 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 performed through an interactive interface provided through a television.” (Ans. 12—13). Although Appellants contend Hudson does not disclose or suggest the “receiving” and “providing” limitations of claim 1 (App. Br. 10), we are not persuaded that the Examiner errs in finding “modifying Anderson with the teachings of Hudson would have resulted in an intermediary device transmitting a web site comprising HTML information from a merchant server after the intermediary device received a purchase request from a video client.” (Ans. 18). Additionally, as the Examiner finds, “Chemock, similar to Hudson, discloses a video client initiates a transaction and transmits a request to access a URL to be fulfilled by a merchant server” and “additionally teaches that the intermediary device is responsible for delivering the request from the video client, to access a URL, to a merchant server.” (Ans. 19). We similarly find no error with the Examiner’s reliance on the combination of Anderson, Hudson and Chemock for also disclosing or at least suggesting “establishing” “a communication session” between the video client and the third-party server to permit the user of the video client to conduct the transaction with the third-party server, limitations recited in claim 1. (Ans. 21—24). In particular, as the Examiner finds, “Anderson specifically disclosed that the video client comprises a network browser 106 to request, receive and provide network content” and “clearly discloses that a merchant server is part of the network” (Ans. 22), while “Hudson teaches that a server responds to a client device’s purchase request by serving HTML assets (e.g., retail website) such that a communication session is established between a video client and a web server.” (Ans. 23). We are not 6 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 persuaded that the Examiner errs in finding that the combination of references teaches and suggests the contested limitation. Consequently, Appellants have identified no reversible error in the Examiner’s rejection of claim 1. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claim 1 under § 103(a) over Anderson, Hudson, and Chemock. Appellants make separate but similar arguments for independent claims 9 (App. Br. 19—24), 14 (App. Br. 26—32), and 19 (App. Br. 33—39); and dependent claims 2 (App. Br. 15—16), 3 (App. Br. 16—18), 7 (App. Br. 18—19), 11 (App. Br. 25), 15 (App. Br. 32—33), and 20 (App. Br. 39-40), rejected under 103(a) over the combined teachings and suggestions of Anderson, Hudson, and Chemock. Similar to Appellants’ contentions regarding claim 1, Appellants merely: (1) recite the claim language and assert it is not taught by the cited references; (2) reproduce portions of the references cited by the Examiner; (3) attack the references separately, considered in isolation; and (4) make conclusory statements that each reference does not disclose the contested limitation without substantively traversing the specific findings set forth by the Examiner (App. Br. 15—40). We are unconvinced the Examiner erred in finding the claims obvious over the combination of references, for same reasons as explained above regarding claim 1, and adopt the Examiner’s findings which we incorporate herein by reference (Ans. 24—55). Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claims 2, 3,1,9, 11, 14, 15, 19, and 20 under § 103(a) over Anderson, Hudson, and Chemock. 7 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 Appellants do not separately argue claims 6, 8, 12, 16, 17, 23, 25, and 30. Arguments not made are waived. Therefore, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of these claims. As for claims 5 and 29, Appellants additionally contend the Examiner’s “reasons for combining [the references] do not satisfy the requirements of 35 U.S.C. § 103” because they are “merely conclusory statements” (App. Br. 40-44). In particular, Appellants contend the Examiner’s reasons for combining the references “fail to address” the contested features (App. Br. 42). However, in an obviousness analysis, inferences and creative steps that a person of ordinary skill in the art would employ can be taken into account. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). In this regard, “[a] person of ordinary skill is also a person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton.” Id. at 421. Here, the Examiner concludes “Appellant’s limitation recited in claim 5 is obvious and the product not of innovation but of [sic] ordinary skill and common sense” (Ans. 58). Although Appellants contend that the Examiner cites no evidence in support of the articulated rationale (App. Br. 40-44), this is not necessarily indicative of error. Here, the Examiner relies upon common sense reasoning. Common sense does not require a “specific hint or suggestion in a particular reference,” only a reasoned explanation that avoids conclusory generalizations. Dystar Textilfarben GmbH & Co. Deutschland KG v. C.H. Patrick Co., 464 F.3d 1356, 1366 (Fed. Cir. 2006); see also In re Kahn, 441 F.3d 977, 987 (Fed. Cir. 2006) (requiring “some rationale, articulation, or reasoned basis to explain why the conclusion of 8 Appeal 2016-000480 Application 12/571,197 obviousness is correct”). “[A]n implicit motivation to combine exists not only when a suggestion may be gleaned from the prior art as a whole, but when the ‘improvement’ is technology-independent and the combination of references results in a product or process that is more desirable.” DyStar, 464 F.3d at 1368. Appellants do not explain why the Examiner’s common sense reasoning is incorrect, and thus, do not apprise us of error. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejections of claim 5 under § 103(a) over Anderson, Hudson, and Chemock, in further view of Linehan; and claim 29 under § 103(a) over Anderson, Hudson, and Chemock, in further view of Moncreiff and Livestream. CONCLUSION AND DECISION We affirm the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1—3, 5—9, 11, 12, 14— 17, 19, 20, 23, 25, 29, and 30 under § 103(a). No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv). AFFIRMED 9 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation