Steve Jobs Credited with an Apple TV Patent for Episodic TV
The US Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of twenty-two newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. This morning's second report is focused on a single Apple TV patent. It's a patent regarding episodic TV and it's another patent credited to the late, great, Steve Jobs.
Apple Wins an Apple TV Patent Relating to Organizing Episodic TV
Apple has received a Granted Patent relating to a method of organizing episodic content such as TV shows on Apple TV.
Apple's patent FIG. 5 shown below, illustrates a block diagram of an example interface environment which corresponds to television content, and could, for example, appear as the end result of the transition from a higher level (e.g., closer to a "root" level) interface environment after selecting a media menu item entitled "TV Shows." The patent goes on to state that the menu items, could, for example, "correspond to television shows that have either been recorded from a broadcast or purchased from a content provider."
Recording broadcast TV shows isn't an option available today on Apple TV, so it's interesting to see that this option was listed in this 2006 Apple TV patent which also credits Steve Jobs as one of the inventors. Early into the patent Apple refers to Apple TV working with a cable network. This notion of being able to record TV shows on an Apple TV has since been bolstered in a 2011 granted patent which clearly states that "Media systems could also be used to connect a media environment to a video content provider, such as a cable service provider." It doesn't get any clearer than that.
In October 2011, the Washington Post reported that Steve Jobs had told his authorized biographer Walter Isaacson that he'd "like to create an integrated television set that is completely easy to use," and that "It would be seamlessly synced with all of your devices and with iCloud." Steve Jobs went on to state that "No longer would users have to fiddle with complex remotes for DVD players and cable channels. It will have the simplest user interface you could imagine. I finally cracked it."
In Microsoft's last CES keynote, Steve Ballmer discussed advances coming to Xbox's Kinect to control TV (around the 52 minute mark and beyond), movies and more using a "natural user interface" that includes "actionable discovery." It would appear that Apple's Siri and Microsoft's Kinect related technologies may go head to head in vying for the TV interface of tomorrow. Of course Google isn't going to relent either.
Time will tell how this plays out in the future, but if Apple is going to be a real contender on this front, then they're going to have to either make peace with the cable providers or strike a landmark deal with the individual studios to bypass cable providers. The latter is highly unlikely to occur. Yet - Whatever Steve Jobs finally came up with, I'm sure it's bound to be another revolutionary idea. Let's just hope that it's practical as well.
Apple's First Patent Claim: A computer-implemented method, comprising: receiving episodic content including one or more episodes of television programs and storing the episodic content in a data store; receiving metadata associated with the episodic content and storing the received meta data in the data store; displaying on a display device a menu arranged in an interface environment, the menu comprising a list of menu items associated with the episodic content; displaying on the display device a sort interface arranged in the interface environment, the sort interface defining a plurality of sort options and being configured to receive a selection of a sort option and to sort the list of menu items based upon the selection; in response to receiving a selection of a sort option: determining whether the received metadata stored in the data store includes metadata that facilitates sorting the menu items in accordance with the sort option: in response to determining that the received metadata does include metadata that facilitates sorting the menu items in accordance with the sort option, sorting the menu items based on the received metadata in accordance with the sort option; and in response to determining that the received metadata does not include metadata that facilitates sorting the menu items in accordance with the sort option: extracting from the received metadata that is associated with additional metadata that facilitates sorting the menu items in accordance with the sort option; providing the extracted metadata to a content provider and receiving the additional metadata from the content provider in response; and sorting the menu items based on the additional metadata in accordance with the sort option; and displaying on the display device the sorted menu items.
Apple credits the late, great Steve Jobs along with Rainer Brodersen, Rachel Goldeen, Jeffrey Ma and Mihnea Pacuraiu as the inventors of this patent which was originally filed in Q3 2006.
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VR-Zone reports that 313@Somerset welcomes in the Year of the Dragon by launching the first ever 313 iDragon iPhone app for Singaporean shoppers. The app reportedly uses augmented reality technology to find and capture "3-D" Jewels hidden on the iconic 313 Fashion Dragon installation in the Atrium.
Here are a Few Sites covering our Original Report
MacSurfer, Twitter, Facebook, Apple Investor News, Google Reader, Macnews, iPhone World Canada, MarketWatch, MacDailyNews, 9to5 Mac, AppleInsider, Cult of Mac, Apple Adictos Spanish, MacTechNews Germany, iPhoneclub Netherlands, GIGA Germany, iPhoneAddict France, Mela Blog Italy, Digital Apple Italy, Mac User Greece, Apple TV Guide Denmark, WebProNews, ModMyi, Redmond Pie, Pulse2, iSmashPhone, Fast Company, PadGadget, Apple HD Blog Italy, TUAW, Techmeme, iPhoneinCanada, Ars Technica, and more.
I was reading Ars Technica's report today and I think that they over thought their position. The reality is that this report is more or less presenting the news that Apple was granted a patent for Apple TV. It's something that's done on this site every Tueday relating to newly granted patents.
The report points to what Apple was thinking about in 2006 and that they may have to eventually work with cable operators.
Obviously since 2006 Apple has worked on several other patents that point to new on TV menus which would indicate something tightly integrated with regular TV scheduling. That doesn't mean that Siri or iCloud won't be real options. They likely will.
I think that Apple's Apple TV box is a secondary solution in the home at the moment and that most will continue to use their cable provider. If Apple wants a "mass market" TV, it has to be a regular HDTV first and all of Apple's wiz-bang features a secondary option to ease people into using Apple TV more and more. I like cable TV and my DVR allow me to skip commercials I'm not interested in.
Apple being granted a patent on Apple TV with DVR capabilities is interesting, but by no means can a six year old patent feature be scrutinized to death (by Ars Technica or anyone) in respect to what's coming in 2012-2014. It's just an interesting look back and in a way, DVR-like capabilities can be mimicked with an iCloud solution. But for the sake of a patent, the two are alike.
Posted by: Robert F. Galloway | January 23, 2012 at 09:07 AM
What's noticeable is the patent was lodged in 2006, almost 6 years ago, and far further developments in the iTV project have no doubt been made since then so there is a lot more to play out in the Apple TV stakes.
Personally when thinking about it, the Apple TV hardware move was 'reset' to a little black SSD box which will subsequently be integrated into a possible iTV panel [In beautiful aluminium!]. Along side its stand alone hardware iterations.
Posted by: Rob | January 19, 2012 at 06:36 PM
Interesting development, it will be fancinating to see just what TV (type) we will be using by 2020.
Beyond concept at this time... Maybe...
Posted by: Frank Wilson | January 18, 2012 at 04:57 PM
@ AGx. Well said. I can appreciate what Apple,Google,Msft or others are inventing without having to bash any of them. There's a certain amount of copying being done by all.
Posted by: Victor | January 18, 2012 at 02:05 PM
@ Free Speech: You stated "I have never seen a more daring band of thieving criminals like the android gang over at Google."
You're obviously a fanboy and a troll. This article had nothing to do with Google or Android. Why can't you just enjoy what Apple is doing without bashing another company for absolutely no reason at all.
Posted by: AGx | January 18, 2012 at 09:00 AM
I think that many missed the point of this report. This patent doesn't represent what Steve Jobs talked about to Isaacson. This is just to show that this is one of the foundational Apple TV patents with Steve Jobs' name on it to show that it was a key project that Steve worked on until he died. This is a granted patent report, not a new patent application. The context speaks for itself.
Posted by: Joe | January 17, 2012 at 09:23 PM
Even in death, the great Steve Jobs still creates. Legend !!!
But wait, it won be long before Google steals the idea/intellectual property and bundle it on to an "android" tv or google tv.
I have never seen a more daring band of thieving criminals like the android gang over at Google. They probably dress in balaclavas and black overalls to their staff meetings
Posted by: Free Speech | January 17, 2012 at 03:27 PM