Facebook, Inc.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Feb 4, 2022

2021002003 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 4, 2022)

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. 15/808,756 11/09/2017 Arpit Sood 26295-38599/US 1083 87851 7590 02/04/2022 Facebook/Fenwick Silicon Valley Center 801 California Street Mountain View, CA 94041 EXAMINER OSMAN BILAL AHME, AFAF ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3682 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 02/04/2022 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): fwfacebookpatents@fenwick.com ptoc@fenwick.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte GURPREETSINGH BALJEETSINGH SACHDEV, ARPIT SOOD, ALEX MEYER, ROHIT PODDAR, MANISHA SINGH, TAO CUI BAECKLUND, ANTHONY MANG YAU, and SHASHIKANT KHANDELWAL ____________ Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 Technology Center 3600 ____________ Before MICHAEL C. ASTORINO, NINA L. MEDLOCK, and BRADLEY B. BAYAT, Administrative Patent Judges. BAYAT, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE The Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final rejection of claims 1-20, which constitute all pending claims in the application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM. 1 We use the term “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a). The Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Facebook, Inc. Appeal Br. 2. Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 2 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER The Appellant’s invention “generally relates to data processing on an online system to predict affinity for geographical locations.” Spec. ¶ 1. Claims 1 and 11 are independent and recite substantially similar subject matter. Claim 1, reproduced below with added bracketed notations and reformatting, is representative of the subject matter on appeal. 1. A method comprising: [(a)] determining a first set of signals indicating affinity of a first user for a first geographical location and a second geographical location, the first signals including actions performed by the first user with a first set of objects associated with the first geographical location and the second geographical location on an online system using a first client device; [(b)] receiving content associated with the second geographical location from the first client device; [(c)] determining a second set of signals indicating affinity of a second user for the first geographical location, the second signals including actions performed by the second user with a second set of objects associated with the first geographical location on the online system using a second client device; [(d)] determining, by a model that receives as input the first and second sets of signals, that the second user is likely to have affinity for the second geographical location, the model trained using actions performed by a plurality of users of the online system on objects associated with a plurality of geographical locations; [(e)] generating a content item describing the second geographical location and including at least the content received from the first client device; and [(f)] providing the content item for presentation on the second client device. Appeal Br. 15, Claims App. (emphasis added). Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 3 REJECTIONS Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as directed to patent- ineligible subject matter. Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Bockius et al. (US 2009/0307168 A1, pub. Dec. 10, 2009) (“Bockius”) and Horvitz et al. (US 2007/0005419 A1, pub. Jan. 4, 2007) (“Horvitz”). ANALYSIS 35 U.S.C. § 101 Under 35 U.S.C. § 101, an invention is patent eligible if it claims a “new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter.” 35 U.S.C. § 101. The Supreme Court, however, has long interpreted § 101 to include an implicit exception: “[l]aws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas” are not patentable. Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 573 U.S. 208, 216 (2014). The Supreme Court, in Alice, reiterated the two-step framework previously set forth in Mayo Collaborative Services v. Prometheus Laboratories, Inc., 566 U.S. 66 (2012), “for distinguishing patents that claim laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas from those that claim patent-eligible applications of those concepts.” Alice Corp., 573 U.S. at 217. The first step in that analysis is to “determine whether the claims at issue are directed to one of those patent-ineligible concepts.” Id. If the claims are not directed to a patent-ineligible concept, e.g., an abstract idea, the inquiry ends. Otherwise, the inquiry proceeds to the second step where the elements of the claims are considered “individually and ‘as an ordered combination’” to determine whether there are additional elements that “‘transform the nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” Id. (quoting Mayo, Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 4 566 U.S. at 78, 79). This is “a search for an ‘inventive concept’ - i.e., an element or combination of elements that is ‘sufficient to ensure that the patent in practice amounts to significantly more than a patent upon the [ineligible concept] itself.’” Id. at 217-18 (alteration in original) (citation omitted). The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”) published revised guidance for evaluating subject matter eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101. 2019 REVISED PATENT SUBJECT MATTER ELIGIBILITY GUIDANCE, 84 Fed. Reg. 50, 57 (Jan. 7, 2019) (“Revised Guidance”). That guidance revised the USPTO’s examination procedure with respect to the first step of the Alice framework by (1) “[p]roviding groupings of subject matter that [are] considered an abstract idea”; and (2) “clarifying that a claim is not ‘directed to’ a judicial exception if the judicial exception is integrated into a practical application of that exception.” Id. at 50. The first step in the Alice framework is to determine whether the claims at issue are “directed to” a patent-ineligible concept, e.g., an abstract idea. Alice Corp., 573 U.S. at 217. This first step, as set forth in the Revised Guidance (i.e., Step 2A), is a two-prong test; in Step 2A, Prong One, the Examiner looks to whether the claim recites a judicial exception, e.g., one of the following three groupings of abstract ideas: (1) mathematical concepts; (2) certain methods of organizing human activity, e.g., fundamental economic principles or practices, commercial or legal interactions; and (3) mental processes. Revised Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 54. If so, the Examiner next considers whether the claim includes additional elements, beyond the judicial exception, that “integrate[s] the [judicial] exception into a practical application,” i.e., that apply, rely on, or Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 5 use the judicial exception in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the judicial exception (Step 2A, Prong Two). Id. at 54-55. Only if the claim (1) recites a judicial exception and (2) does not integrate that exception into a practical application, then the Examiner can conclude that the claim is “directed to” the judicial exception, e.g., an abstract idea. Under Prong One of Step 2A, the Examiner determines that “Claim 12 recites the abstract idea of: targeting users based on predicting their affinity with a specified location.” Final Act. 7. According to the Examiner, the unitalicized limitations of steps (a), (c), (d), and (e) in claim 1 supra “set forth [the] abstract idea . . . because the limitations are directed toward an example of organizing human activity such as a commercial [interaction] that includes advertising, marketing or sales activities.” Id. Under Prong Two of Step 2A, the Examiner determines that the additional elements (italicized in claim 1 supra) “do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they provide no improvement in the technical field, no transformation of data, no particular machine, and/or no meaningful steps.” Id. at 7. Under Step 2B, the Examiner finds that the “[u]se of a computer or other machinery in its ordinary capacity for economic or other tasks (e.g., to receive, store, or transmit data) or simply adding a general purpose computer or computer components after the fact to an abstract idea (e.g., a fundamental economic practice or mathematical equation) does not provide significantly more.” Id. 2 We agree with Examiner that claim 1 recites a method, and is directed to a process, which is one of the statutory categories under § 101. Final Act. 6. Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 6 The Appellant argues that claim 1 does not recite an abstract idea under Step 2A, Prong One, and supplies a practical application under Step 2A, Prong Two. Appeal Br. 6-11; Reply Br. 2-6. The Appellant also argues that claim 1 recites significantly more under Step 2B. Id. at 11. For the reasons discussed below, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred in concluding that claim 1 is directed an abstract idea. The Appellant’s claimed invention determines affinities of users for geographical locations, which may indicate travel-related preferences of users, and customizes content items. Spec. ¶ 3. Process steps (a)-(f) of claim 1 describe how this is performed, however, these steps may be performed “in different orders than the order described in conjunction with FIG. 3” (id. ¶ 37), which mirrors the order in claim 1. Under the broadest reasonable interpretation, step (a) of claim 1 recites determining affinity of a first user for a first and second geographical location, including actions performed by the first user with objects associated with the first and second geographical location. Appeal Br. 15. The Specification discloses that “the signals may be retrieved from the user profile store 200, action log 220, edge store 225, or content store 250” and the first and second geographical location may be a beach in Los Angeles and a beach in Hawaii. Spec. ¶ 38 (emphasis added). “Examples of actions include adding a connection to another user, sending a message to another user, uploading media, reading a message from another user, viewing content provided by another user, attending an event posted by another user, among others.” Id. ¶ 24. As such, this step may be ascertained by a content administrator from the first user’s profile preferences or activity log. Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 7 Step (b) recites receiving content associated with the second geographical location. Appeal Br. 15. The content received by the content administrator “may be the photo of the beach in Hawaii.” Id. ¶ 40. Step (c) recites determining affinity of a second user for the first geographic location. Appeal Br. 15. Applying a similar example, the content administrator ascertains that the second user also has an affinity for the beach in Los Angeles because the second user’s activity log may show surfing lessons booked at the beach in Los Angeles. Id. ¶ 41. Step (d) recites determining that the second user is likely to have affinity for the second geographic location. Appeal Br. 15. This step can be performed by a content administrator comparing geographic location information (e.g., beach in Hawaii) from the user’s profile or activity log. Step (e) recites generating a content item including the content associated with the second geographic location (Appeal Br. 15), for example “the photo of the beach in Hawaii.” Id. ¶ 48. Generating content items includes sponsored content such as an advertisement for presentation to a user, wherein the sponsored content may include “an image, a photo, video, audio, or any other suitable form of information presented to a user.” Id. ¶ 50. Step (f) recites providing the content item for presentation. Appeal Br. 15. For example, presenting the advertisement to a user. Id. Under the broadest reasonable interpretation, claim 1 as a whole recites a method of organizing human activity of a content administrator targeting sponsored content items (e.g., advertising) to a user based on shared interests by determining that the particular user may have an affinity for and be likely to travel to a geographical location, e.g., for a vacation. Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 8 Spec. ¶¶ 17, 19. “For example, entities that provide sponsored content online seek to increase metrics such as online views of content items or webpages, click-through rate (CTR) of content items, or conversion rates of users completing a process to obtain assets from the entity, e.g., completing an online check-out process to book a flight ticket or hotel room.” Id. ¶ 55. The steps of claim 1 together reflect fundamental economic practices long prevalent in our system of commerce and commercial interactions in the form of marketing or sales activities or behaviors between a content administrator and user, which fall within the enumerated “Certain methods of organizing human activity” grouping of abstract ideas set forth in the 2019 Revised Guidance. 84 Fed. Reg. at 52. Providing customized marketing/advertising targeted to a user based on user demographics, time of day, user preferences, and other data recites a fundamental economic practice and, therefore, a method of organizing human activity. The abstract idea recited here is not meaningfully different from the ideas found to be abstract in other cases before our reviewing court. Our reviewing court has held that “tailoring of content based on information about the user-such as where the user lives or what time of day the user views the content-is an abstract idea.” Affinity Labs of Texas, LLC v. Amazon.com Inc., 838 F.3d 1266, 1271 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (describing Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One Bank (USA), 792 F.3d 1363, 1369 (Fed. Cir. 2015)). And, in Bridge and Post, Inc. v. Verizon Communications, Inc., 778 F. App’x 882 (Fed. Cir. 2019), the Federal Circuit held that abstract ideas include tracking a user’s computer network activity and using information gained about the user to deliver targeted media such as advertisements. The court reiterated that claims reciting the Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 9 concept of targeting advertisements to a user and bidding to display advertisements are an “abstract idea and fundamental economic practice of organizing human activity.” In re Morsa, 809 F. App’x 913, 917 (Fed. Cir. 2020). See also Evolutionary Intelligence, LLC v. Sprint Nextel Corp., 137 F. Supp. 3d 1157 (N.D. Cal. 2015), aff’d, 677 F. App’x 679 (Fed. Cir. 2017) (tailoring content based upon the time of day and location is abstract) and Morsa v. Facebook, Inc., 77 F. Supp. 3d 1007, 1013 (C.D. Cal. 2014), aff’d, 622 F. App’x 915 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (concluding that targeting advertisements to certain consumers is no more than an abstract idea). In light of these precedents, we conclude that claim 1 equally recites an abstract idea. The Appellant’s argument that “claim 1 is about using machine learning techniques to generate personalized online content for one user based on another user’s actions, and providing the content for display to the other user’s device, which is not an abstract idea” (Appeal Br. 7) is unavailing because the Examiner has included the “model” in step (d) as an additional element that is not part of the abstract idea. See Final Act. 7. Accordingly, we agree with the Examiner that claim 1 recites an abstract idea. Having concluded that claim 1 recites a judicial exception, i.e. an abstract idea (Step 2A, Prong One), we next consider whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (Step 2A, Prong Two). 2019 Revised Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 51. When a claim recites a judicial exception and fails to integrate the exception into a practical application, the claim is “directed to” the judicial exception. Id. A claim may integrate the judicial exception Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 10 when, for example, it reflects an improvement to technology or a technical field. Id. at 55. The Federal Circuit has explained that “the ‘directed to’ inquiry applies a stage-one filter to claims, considered in light of the specification, based on whether ‘their character as a whole is directed to excluded subject matter.’” Enfish, LLC v. Microsoft Corp., 822 F.3d 1327, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (quoting Internet Patents Corp. v. Active Network, Inc., 790 F.3d 1343, 1346 (Fed. Cir. 2015)). It asks whether the focus of the claims is on a specific improvement in relevant technology or on a process that itself qualifies as an “abstract idea” for which computers are invoked merely as a tool. See id. at 1335-36. Under Step 2A, Prong Two, the Examiner identifies the recitation of steps (b) and (e), “first and second client device,” “model,” “online system,” and “signals indicating affinity” as elements in addition to the abstract idea. Final Act. 7. The Examiner determines that these additional elements do not reflect an improvement in the functioning of a computer or technology and fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. Id. The Examiner also determines that steps (b) and (e) “consist of adding insignificant extra-solution activity to the judicial exception” and that the “combination of additional elements in the claims fail[s] to apply, rely on, or use the judicial exception in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception.” Id. The Appellant argues: The claimed invention actually provides a technical improvement in the field of computer technology and in the field of providing customized online content to users. As provided in the Specification as filed, paragraphs [0002] and [0055], Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 11 “existing systems do not customize the content based on a particular users’ [sic] travel preferences. Additionally, at a large scale of information, it is difficult and challenging to efficiently select specific content in which a given user is most likely interested and with which the user is likely to interact . . . This problem addressed by the online system 100 is unique to systems providing content items over the Internet (e.g., the network 130) in an online environment.” Appeal Br. 9. We disagree. As discussed above, the Federal Circuit has repeatedly held that tailoring or customizing advertising content based on user preferences in an online environment does not reflect an improvement to computer technology and is instead directed to an abstract idea. For example, in Bridge and Post the court held: “Targeted marketing is a form of ‘tailoring information based on [provided] data,’ which we have previously held is an abstract idea” and the patents at issue “describe tracking a user’s computer network activity and using information gained about the user to deliver targeted media, such as advertisements.” 778 F. App’x at 887, 884. Indeed, paragraph 55 of the Specification, on which the Appellant relies, discloses “entities that provide sponsored content online seek to increase metrics such as online views of content items or webpages, click-through rate (CTR) of content items, or conversion rates of users completing a process to obtain assets from the entity” and providing sponsored or advertising content over the Internet in an online environment does not reflect an improvement to technology or a technical field. See Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One Bank, 792 F.3d at 1371 (“Requiring the use of a ‘software’ ‘brain’ ‘tasked with tailoring information and providing it to the user’ provides no additional limitation beyond applying an abstract idea, restricted to the Internet, on a Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 12 generic computer.”). Moreover, because the scope of claim 1 does not encompass “a large scale of information,” the Appellant’s argument is not commensurate with the scope of the claim. We also are not persuaded by the Appellant’s argument that “[t]he claimed invention actually supplies a practical application of generating a content item by using machine learning techniques and providing the generated content item for display on a client device.” Appeal Br. 11. Training a generic model using actions performed by users of the generic online system to analyze data in some unspecified way without any technical details of that process fails to reflect any apparent improvement to computers or other technology. Claim 1 does not recite an improved way to train a model by using machine learning and does not purport to improve machine learning using training data. See Intellectual Ventures, 792 F.3d at 1371. “For instance, the model 260 determines from training data that each user of a sample group of users visited both the first and second geographical locations (e.g., users who visit the beach in Los Angeles tend to also visit the beach in Hawaii, or vice versa)” and “implement[s] collaborative filtering, information filtering, or other types of machine learning algorithms to automate predictions regarding travel-related affinities or preferences of the users.” Spec. ¶ 43. Claims that recite abstract ideas in purely functional form have regularly been held ineligible for patenting. For example, in Affinity Laboratories, the claim was directed to a software application that would enable a wireless cellular telephone device outside the range of a regional broadcaster to receive content from the broadcaster by way of a streaming signal. 838 F.3d at 1258. Because nothing in that claim described how to Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 13 perform the claimed function, the court held the claim patent ineligible. 838 F.3d at 1260-61. Likewise, in Interval Licensing LLC v. AOL, Inc., 896 F.3d 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2018), the claim was directed to an “attention manager” in a computer readable medium, and the court held that claim to be patent ineligible because the claim recited a “broad, result-oriented” structure. Id. at 1344-45. See also, e.g., Two-Way Media Ltd. v. Comcast Cable Commc’n, LLC, 874 F.3d 1329, 1337 (Fed. Cir. 2017) (“The claim [before the court] requires the functional results of ‘converting,’ ‘routing,’ ‘controlling,’ ‘monitoring,’ and ‘accumulating records,’ but does not sufficiently describe how to achieve these results in a non-abstract way.”); Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One Fin. Corp., 850 F.3d 1332, 1342 (Fed. Cir. 2017) (“IV argues that the claims set forth a unique solution to a problem with contemporary XML documents. But the claims do not recite particular features to yield these advantages. . . . Indeed, the claim language here provides only a result-oriented solution, with insufficient detail for how a computer accomplishes it. Our law demands more.”); Apple, Inc. v. Ameranth, Inc., 842 F.3d 1229, 1241 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (“The patents claim systems including menus with particular features. They do not claim a particular way of programming or designing the software to create menus that have these features, but instead merely claim the resulting systems.”). We acknowledge that “[s]oftware can make non-abstract improvements to computer technology just as hardware improvements can, and sometimes the improvements can be accomplished through either route.” Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1335. However, “to be directed to a patent- eligible improvement to computer functionality, the claims must be directed to an improvement to the functionality of the computer or network platform Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 14 itself.” Customedia Techs., LLC v. Dish Network Corp., 951 F.3d 1359, 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2020) (citing Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1336-39). Claim 1 recites an online system using a client device arranged in no particular way to perform basic functions of receiving, determining, generating, and providing content. The Specification’s description of the online system using a client device in which a content item is presented makes clear that generic computer components are utilized as tools to implement the abstract idea in an online environment, rather than improving the functioning of the computer system or other technology. See Spec. ¶¶ 12-16, 26, 57-59, Fig. 1. As a whole, claim 1 does no more than use instructions to implement the abstract idea on a generic online system using generic client devices. Accordingly, we determine that claim 1 lacks any additional elements sufficient to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. As such, we agree with the Examiner that claim 1 is directed to the above identified abstract idea. We next consider whether claim 1 recites additional elements, individually, or as an ordered combination, that provide an inventive concept. Alice, 573 U.S. at 217-18. The second step of the Alice test is satisfied when the claim limitations involve more than the performance of well-understood, routine, and conventional activities previously known to the industry. Berkheimer v. HP Inc., 881 F.3d 1360, 1367 (Fed. Cir. 2018); see 2019 Revised Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 56 (explaining that the second step of the Alice analysis considers whether a claim adds a specific limitation Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 15 beyond a judicial exception that is not “well-understood, routine, conventional” activity in the field). The Appellant argues that the Examiner referred only to some elements of claim 1, “specifically ignoring the inventive concepts that are supposed to be considered when determining whether the inventive concept amounts to significantly more.” Appeal Br. 11. We are not persuaded because “the relevant inquiry is not whether the claimed invention as a whole is unconventional or non-routine.” BSG Tech LLC v. BuySeasons, Inc., 899 F.3d 1281, 1290 (Fed. Cir. 2018). Rather, the second step of the Alice analysis considers if a claim adds a limitation beyond the judicial exception that is not “well-understood, routine, conventional” activity. See Berkheimer v. HP Inc., 881 F.3d 1360, 1367 (Fed. Cir. 2018); Revised Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 56. And, a claim does not gain subject matter eligibility solely because it is narrowed or limited to the Appellant’s alleged improvement over existing processes. See, e.g., Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Symantec Corp., 838 F.3d 1307, 1321 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (“A narrow claim directed to an abstract idea, however, is not necessarily patent-eligible.”). The question is whether the claim includes additional elements, i.e., elements other than the abstract idea itself, that “‘transform the nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” Alice Corp., 573 U.S. at 217 (quoting Mayo, 566 U.S. at 79, 78). We agree with the Examiner that claim 1 lacks additional elements that provide an inventive concept. As discussed, the additional elements recited in claim 1 are described as conventional computer components that perform well-understood, routine, or conventional functions of receiving, determining, generating, and presenting information at a high level of Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 16 generality. Spec. ¶ 13 (“[A] client device 110 is a conventional computer system, such as a desktop or laptop computer. Alternatively, a client device 110 may be a device having computer functionality, such as a personal digital assistant (PDA), a mobile telephone, a smartphone or another suitable device.”). Individually, the computing devices are used as tools to implement the abstract idea without improving computers. See, e.g., Elec. Power, 830 F.3d at 1355 (the claims interpreted in light of the specification required off-the shelf conventional computer, network, and display technology to process information without an inventive concept); buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (“That a computer receives and sends the information over a network-with no further specification-is not even arguably inventive.”); In re Katz Interactive Call Processing Patent Litig., 639 F.3d 1303, 1316 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (Absent a possible narrower construction of the terms processing, receiving, and storing functions can be achieved by any general purpose computer without special programming). As an ordered combination, the additional elements provide no more than when they are considered individually. Alice, 573 U.S. at 225. They recite generic computer components that perform well-understood and conventional functions. They are used as tools to implement the judicial exception. See SAP Am. Inc. v. InvestPic, LLC, 898 F.3d 1161, 1169-70 (Fed. Cir. 2018) (limitations of various databases and processors did not improve computers but used already available computers and available functions as tools to execute the claimed process); Inventor Holdings, LLC v. Bed Bath & Beyond, Inc., 876 F.3d 1372, 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2017) (considering the method steps of the representative claims as an “ordered combination” Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 17 reveals that they “amount to ‘nothing significantly more’ than an instruction to apply [an] abstract idea” using generic computer technology). Accordingly, we agree with the Examiner that claim 1 lacks an inventive concept sufficient to transform the abstract idea into patent-eligible subject matter. We sustain the rejection of independent claim 1 as directed to patent-ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101, and independent claim 11, which is not argued separately. Appeal Br. 11 (“The other independent claim 11 recites similar claim elements as claim 1 and therefore, is also eligible.”). We also sustain the rejection of claims 2-10 and 12-20 for the same reasons because “[e]ach of the dependent claims is [only argued as being] eligible at least by virtue of dependency from claim 1 or claim 11.” Id. at 11-12. 35 U.S.C. § 103 We are persuaded by the Appellant’s argument that Bockius, on which the Examiner relies, “does not teach or suggest ‘determining, by a model that receives as input the first and second sets of signals, that the second user is likely to have affinity for the second geographical location, the model trained using actions performed by a plurality of users of the online system on objects associated with a plurality of geographical locations,’ as recited in [step (d) of] claim 1.” Appeal Br. 12. In the Final Office Action, the Examiner cites paragraphs 95, 97, 98, 127, and 150-155 of Bockius in rejecting step (d) of claim 1. See Final Act. 9. In response to the Appellant’s argument, the Examiner modifies the rejection and instead relies on paragraphs 73-75, 97, and 137 of Bockius. Ans. 10-14. The Examiner appears to correlate the “collaborative filtering, affinity algorithms” in paragraph 75 and the “self learning, smart algorithm” Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 18 described in paragraph 137 of Bockius to the model recited in step (d). Id. But paragraph 75 of Bockius, as the Appellant points out, “describes using algorithms to more precisely determine membership in a group” “or ‘activity’ on the site as indicated by electing to join a group or activity or filling in questions indicating membership in a demographic group.” Reply Br. 6. And, paragraph 137 of Bockius “describes using algorithms to determine affinity for members or groups.” Id. at 7. Bockius’s system allows users to find friends who share exact interests or frequent similar places to actually meet them at those places either “through advanced planning or just to say hi at the place or event if there is chemistry and they have proactively indicated they will be at the event.” Bockius ¶ 97. However, the Examiner has not adequately explained how those discussions in Bockius teach “determining, by a model that receives as input the first and second sets of signals, that the second user is likely to have affinity for the second geographical location, the model trained using actions performed by a plurality of users of the online system on objects associated with a plurality of geographical locations,” as required by claim 1. In other words, the Examiner has not shown that Bockius’s algorithms are “used to determine that the second user is likely to have affinity for the second geographical location.” Reply Br. 7. Accordingly, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 1-20 as unpatentable over Bockius and Horvitz. Appeal 2021-002003 Application 15/808,756 19 CONCLUSION The Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1-20 is affirmed. Decision summary: Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1-20 101 Eligibility 1-20 1-20 103 Bockius, Horvitz 1-20 Overall Outcome 1-20 TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv). AFFIRMED