| QURIO HOLDINGS, INC. Patent applications |
| Patent application number | Title | Published |
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| 20130132519 | CONTROLLING QUALITY OF SERVICE AND CONTENT QUALITY BASED ON USER RELATIONSHIPS - A system and method are provided for controlling Quality of Service (QoS), content quality, or both QoS and content quality in a content sharing network based on user relationships. More specifically, QoS, content quality, or both QoS and content quality may be controlled based on a relationship of a user of a network node requesting content and either a user of a network node hosting the requested content or an owner of the requested content, a relationship between the user of the network node requesting the content and the content, or any combination thereof. | 05-23-2013 |
| 20130070958 | CLIENT-SIDE WATERMARKING USING HYBRID I-FRAMES - A system and method for client-side watermarking of digital content using hybrid Intra-Frames (I-Frames) are provided. In general, a content source provides a compressed video stream and a hybrid I-Frame stream to a client device via a network. The hybrid I-Frame stream includes a number of low-loss I-Frames corresponding to select ones of the I-Frames in the compressed video stream to be used for client-side watermarking. The client device watermarks the I-Frames in the hybrid I-Frame stream, optionally compresses the watermarked I-Frames, and replaces the select ones of the I-Frames in the compressed video stream with the watermarked and optionally compressed I-Frames to provide a watermarked version of the compressed video stream. | 03-21-2013 |
| 20120291137 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR SOCIAL NETWORK TRUST ASSESSMENT - A first user's trust level with regard to a second user can be determined by providing questions to the second user, with the questions based on a previously-collected knowledge base including information about the first user. The information about the first user may be partitioned into levels of trust, and the second user's responses to the questions may be evaluated to determine which level of trust the second user is entitled to. The knowledge base may be assembled by prompting the first user for information and/or by scanning or otherwise collecting already-existing data about the first user. The knowledge base and/or trust assessment may be distributed across a network, and in some embodiments the knowledge base or parts thereof is distributed to other users according to the trust level of those users. | 11-15-2012 |
| 20120271905 | PROXY CACHING IN A PHOTOSHARING PEER-TO-PEER NETWORK TO IMPROVE GUEST IMAGE VIEWING PERFORMANCE - The present invention provides a method and system for serving an image stored in the peer computer to a requesting computer in a network photosharing system in which the peer computer is coupled to a photosharing system server. Aspects of the invention include caching copy of the image in the photosharing server; and in response to the photosharing server receiving a request from the requesting computer to view the image stored in the peer computer, transmitting the cached image from the photosharing server to the requesting computer, thereby avoiding the need to transfer the image from the peer computer to the photosharing server for each request to view the image. | 10-25-2012 |
| 20120178434 | PERSONAL AREA NETWORK HAVING MEDIA PLAYER AND MOBILE DEVICE CONTROLLING THE SAME - A system and method are provided for controlling content played by a number of media devices. In general, the system includes a mobile device and the number of media devices. The mobile device includes a wireless communication interface for communicating with the media devices, a media database, and a control system including a media client. When the mobile device enters a Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) associated with a media device, the media client obtains information describing the content residing at the media device and stores the information in the media database at the mobile device. Thereafter, when the mobile device is within the WPAN associated with the media device, the media database is used to select content to be played at the media device. | 07-12-2012 |
| 20120133817 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR CORRECTING ASPECT RATIO IN A CAMERA GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACE - A device and method are provided that retrieves a plurality of thumbnails corresponding to a plurality of images captured by the digital camera and rotates each thumbnail of the plurality of thumbnails into an upright position. The method and device also crops each thumbnail of the plurality of thumbnails to a uniform size which is an overlap of a portrait and landscape image and displays each thumbnail of the plurality of thumbnails having the uniform size such that the plurality of thumbnails has a uniform appearance while the digital camera is in a review mode. | 05-31-2012 |
| 20110314016 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR TAGGING IMAGES BASED ON POSITIONAL INFORMATION - A system and method for suggesting keywords for tagging a digital image are provided. In general, a requesting node is communicatively coupled to a keyword service via a network. The requesting node sends a request to the keyword service requesting suggested keywords for a digital image. The request includes information relating to the digital image such as positional information. Based on the information, the keyword service generates a list of suggested keywords and provides the list of suggested keywords to the requesting node. At the requesting node, the list of suggested keywords is displayed to a user, and the user selects one or more of the suggested keywords for tagging the digital image. | 12-22-2011 |
| 20110268197 | CLIENT-SIDE WATERMARKING USING HYBRID I-FRAMES - A system and method for client-side watermarking of digital content using hybrid Intra-Frames (I-Frames) are provided. In general, a content source provides a compressed video stream and a hybrid I-Frame stream to a client device via a network. The hybrid I-Frame stream includes a number of low-loss I-Frames corresponding to select ones of the I-Frames in the compressed video stream to be used for client-side watermarking. The client device watermarks the I-Frames in the hybrid I-Frame stream, optionally compresses the watermarked I-Frames, and replaces the select ones of the I-Frames in the compressed video stream with the watermarked and optionally compressed I-Frames to provide a watermarked version of the compressed video stream. | 11-03-2011 |
| 20110261998 | SELECTION OF I-FRAMES FOR CLIENT-SIDE WATERMARKING - A system and method are provided for selecting frames of a compressed video stream that may be used for client-side watermarking. In general, a content source evaluates a number of Intra-Frames (I-Frames) in the compressed video stream using a sample watermark that is similar to actual watermarks that may be used for client-side watermarking. More specifically, each of a number of I-Frames in the compressed video stream is evaluated by first watermarking the I-Frame with the sample watermark. Associated frames in the compressed video stream are then decoded using the watermarked I-Frame. An error value for the decoded video frames is then computed. If the error value is outside of a predetermined error threshold range, the I-Frame is selected as an I-Frame that may be used for client-side watermarking. | 10-27-2011 |
| 20110202636 | PERSONAL AREA NETWORK HAVING MEDIA PLAYER AND MOBILE DEVICE CONTROLLING THE SAME - A system and method are provided for controlling content played by a number of media devices. In general, the system includes a mobile device and the number of media devices. The mobile device includes a wireless communication interface for communicating with the media devices, a media database, and a control system including a media client. When the mobile device enters a Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) associated with a media device, the media client obtains information describing the content residing at the media device and stores the information in the media database at the mobile device. Thereafter, when the mobile device is within the WPAN associated with the media device, the media database is used to select content to be played at the media device. | 08-18-2011 |
| 20110197209 | MANAGING CACHE READER AND WRITER THREADS IN A PROXY SERVER - A system and method are provided for managing reader and writer threads in a caching proxy server. In general, a caching proxy server operates as an intermediary between a web server and a number of client devices. The clients send requests for digital assets hosted by the web server to the caching proxy server. For each request, or more particularly for each group of concurrent requests, for a particular digital asset, the caching proxy server operates in either a decoupled writer mode of operation or a reader/writer mode operation. In addition, while serving the requests, the proxy server may switch between the decoupled writer and the reader/writer modes of operation depending on one or more criteria. | 08-11-2011 |
| 20110170688 | CLIENT-SIDE PROTECTION OF BROADCAST OR MULTICAST CONTENT FOR NON-REAL-TIME PLAYBACK - A system and method are disclosed for providing client-side protection of broadcast or multicast multimedia content for non-real-time playback. A set-top box function receives a request to record multimedia content and determines whether recording of the multimedia content is restricted. Upon receiving the multimedia content, the set-top box decrypts the multimedia content for real-time playback. If recording of the multimedia content is restricted, the set-top box re-encrypts the multimedia content and generates a packaged file including the re-encrypted multimedia content and one or more of a content identifier, a set-top identifier, a network reference to a copyright policy server, and a record policy of the multimedia content. The packaged file is either stored locally or transferred to remote storage. A remote system having access to the packaged file obtains the packaged file and enforces a copyright policy of the multimedia content before releasing the multimedia content for non-real-time playback. | 07-14-2011 |
| 20110145935 | INTERCONNECT DEVICE TO ENABLE COMPLIANCE WITH RIGHTS MANAGEMENT RESTRICTIONS - To help ensure that only authorized media content that is associated with rights management (RM) restrictions is delivered from a compliant RM interface of a source device to a non-compliant RM interface of a destination device, an interconnect device provides a compliant RM interface to connect to the source device and monitors media content received from the source device to detect an embedded digital watermark. The interconnect device takes the necessary steps to determine if the watermark is authentic and control delivery of the media content to the destination device accordingly. The interconnect device may go back to the source device or to a remote service to authenticate the watermark. If the watermark is authentic, the media content is passed by the interconnect device to the non-compliant interface of the destination device outside of normal RM restrictions. Otherwise, the delivery of the media content is restricted by the interconnect device. | 06-16-2011 |
| 20110125989 | COLLABORATIVE CONFIGURATION OF A MEDIA ENVIRONMENT - A system and method for collaboratively providing configurations for a media environment are provided. In general, configuration events from a number of media environments are collected and provided to a Collaborative Configuration System (CCS) server. Based on the configuration events, the CCS server generates and provides recommended configurations to a media environment. The recommended configurations may be generated prior to or after receiving a request for recommended configurations from the media environment. In one embodiment, the recommended configurations are provided as a recommended configuration profile providing a set of configurations to be applied at the media environment. In another embodiment, the recommended configurations are provided as a CCS track associated with a particular media presentation. The CCS track includes configuration changes to be applied to the media environment for a number of time slices of the media presentation during playback of the media presentation. | 05-26-2011 |
| 20110125861 | SYSTEM AND METHOD PROVIDING PEER REVIEW AND DISTRIBUTION OF DIGITAL CONTENT - A digital content review and distribution system and method are provided. In general, a number of authors of digital content register with a content review and distribution agent, which may be hosted by a central server. The authors agree to review digital content submitted by other authors in exchange for review and distribution of their own content. In operation, an author submits metadata associated with digital content to be reviewed and optionally the digital content to the content review and distribution agent. In response to the submission, the content review and distribution agent effects a review of the digital content by one or more groups of reviewers, where the groups of reviewers are selected from the other authors registered with the content review and distribution agent based on the metadata for the digital content and reviewer credentials of the other authors. | 05-26-2011 |
| 20110113098 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR SOCIAL NETWORK TRUST ASSESSMENT - A first user's trust level with regard to a second user can be determined by providing questions to the second user, with the questions based on a previously-collected knowledge base including information about the first user. The information about the first user may be partitioned into levels of trust, and the second user's responses to the questions may be evaluated to determine which level of trust the second user is entitled to. The knowledge base may be assembled by prompting the first user for information and/or by scanning or otherwise collecting already-existing data about the first user. The knowledge base and/or trust assessment may be distributed across a network, and in some embodiments the knowledge base or parts thereof is distributed to other users according to the trust level of those users. | 05-12-2011 |
| 20110040779 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR TAGGING IMAGES BASED ON POSITIONAL INFORMATION - A system and method for suggesting keywords for tagging a digital image are provided. In general, a requesting node is communicatively coupled to a keyword service via a network. The requesting node sends a request to the keyword service requesting suggested keywords for a digital image. The request includes information relating to the digital image such as positional information. Based on the information, the keyword service generates a list of suggested keywords and provides the list of suggested keywords to the requesting node. At the requesting node, the list of suggested keywords is displayed to a user, and the user selects one or more of the suggested keywords for tagging the digital image. | 02-17-2011 |
| 20110035449 | METHODS, SYSTEMS, AND PRODUCTS FOR SEARCHING SOCIAL NETWORKS - Methods, systems, and products are disclosed for searching social networks. A device is encountered that sends a query. The query comprises a search packet. A content search is performed according to a query parameter described by the search packet. The content search is then repeatedly performed according to a duration parameter described by the search packet. | 02-10-2011 |
| 20100332298 | SYNCHRONIZING MULTIPLE PLAYBACK DEVICE TIMING UTILIZING DRM ENCODING - A system and method are provided for synchronizing playback of media content on multiple playback devices utilizing Digital Rights Management (DRM) encoding. In general, multiple playback devices or users of those playback devices are associated to form a virtual group. A virtual group (VG) control function operates to synchronize advertisement (ad) slots within media content provided to the playback devices in the virtual group utilizing DRM encoding. | 12-30-2010 |
| 20100297934 | PERSONAL AREA NETWORK HAVING MEDIA PLAYER AND MOBILE DEVICE CONTROLLING THE SAME - A system and method are provided for controlling content played by a number of media devices. In general, the system includes a mobile device and the number of media devices. The mobile device includes a wireless communication interface for communicating with the media devices, a media database, and a control system including a media client. When the mobile device enters a Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) associated with a media device, the media client obtains information describing the content residing at the media device and stores the information in the media database at the mobile device. Thereafter, when the mobile device is within the WPAN associated with the media device, the media database is used to select content to be played at the media device. | 11-25-2010 |
| 20100208819 | CLIENT-SIDE WATERMARKING USING HYBRID I-FRAMES - A system and method for client-side watermarking of digital content using hybrid Intra-Frames (I-Frames) are provided. In general, a content source provides a compressed video stream and a hybrid I-Frame stream to a client device via a network. The hybrid I-Frame stream includes a number of low-loss I-Frames corresponding to select ones of the I-Frames in the compressed video stream to be used for client-side watermarking. The client device watermarks the I-Frames in the hybrid I-Frame stream, optionally compresses the watermarked I-Frames, and replaces the select ones of the I-Frames in the compressed video stream with the watermarked and optionally compressed I-Frames to provide a watermarked version of the compressed video stream. | 08-19-2010 |
| 20100169465 | SERVING CONTENT FROM AN OFF-LINE PEER SERVER IN A PHOTOSHARING PEER-TO-PEER NETWORK IN RESPONSE TO A GUEST REQUEST - A method and system for serving content from a peer server in a photosharing peer-to-peer network is disclosed, wherein the peer server stores a web album and at least one associated digital image. Aspects of the invention include prior to the peer server going off-line, the peer server initiates a synchronization with a proxy server and a guest content server in which the web page a web page descriptor defining the web album is copied from the peer server to the guest content server, and the image associated with the web album is copied from the peer server to the proxy server. In response to a request from a requesting computer to view content stored in the peer computer when the peer server is off-line, the request is fulfilled by forwarding the web page from the guest content server to the requesting computer, and forwarding the image associated with a web page from the proxy server to the requesting computer, thereby successfully serving content from the peer server even when the peer server is off-line. | 07-01-2010 |
| 20100146398 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR ON-DEMAND NARRATION OF A CUSTOMIZED STORY - A method and apparatus for on-demand narration of a customized story. A user indicates a desire via a user device to listen to a narrated customized story. A story service receives personalization information relating to the user associated with the user device, and obtains localization information relating to information associated with a location of the user device. A customized story is generated based on the personalization information and the localization information, and is narrated to the user device. | 06-10-2010 |
| 20100125887 | METHOD AND SYSTEM TO INFLUENCE A VIEWER TO SELECT A FEED - A method and apparatus for influencing a viewer to select a second feed. A shared medium is loaded beyond a loading threshold. One or more high viewership feeds being provided over the shared medium are designated preferred feeds, and one or more user devices providing low viewership feeds to viewers are designated candidate user devices. The candidate user devices are instructed to influence their respective viewers to select one of the high viewership feeds. The candidate user devices select a second feed from one or more preferred feeds, and provide information pertaining to the second feed to the viewer. | 05-20-2010 |
| 20100100627 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR BYPASSING AN ACCESS POINT IN A LOCAL AREA NETWORK FOR P2P DATA TRANSFERS - A system and method for bypassing an access point in a wireless Local Area Network (LAN) for direct point-to-point data transfers are provided. A user device in the wireless LAN is equipped with a primary local wireless interface establishing a wireless communication link with an access point of the wireless LAN, a secondary local wireless interface used for direct point-to-point (P2P) file transfers, and a P2P file transfer application. When the P2P application desires to transfer a data file to another user device within the wireless LAN, the user device determines whether the other user device is within a coverage area of the secondary local wireless interface and whether the file transfer meets one or more alternate transfer criterion. If so, the data file is transferred to the other user device via a direct P2P wireless communication link, thereby bypassing the access point of the wireless LAN. | 04-22-2010 |
| 20090276328 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR SUPPORTING SECURE TRANSACTIONS IN A PEER-TO-PEER NETWORK - At least two computer systems in a peer-to-peer network are utilized to support a secure transaction. Aspects of the present invention include allowing a shopper to create an order to purchase an item stored on a first computer system in the peer-to-peer network, and after the order is created, passing the order and control from the first computer system to a second computer system in the peer-to-peer network. The second computer system establishes a secure transaction session with the shopper, and then proceeds to process the order. | 11-05-2009 |
| 20090172132 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PROVIDING IMAGE RICH WEB PAGES FROM A COMPUTER SYSTEM OVER A NETWORK - The present invention is related to a computer system that provides a web page to a requestor over a network. Aspects of the present invention include receiving by the computer system a request to access a web page and in response, determining whether a descriptor for the requested web page is in a session memory. If the descriptor is not in the session memory, it is retrieved from a database and the stored in the session memory. From there, the descriptor is used to determine whether the web page should be retrieved and returned to the requestor. By storing the descriptor in session memory, additional accesses to the database can be avoided when the descriptor is used for subsequent tasks. | 07-02-2009 |
| 20090083412 | ILLUSTRATION SUPPORTED P2P MEDIA CONTENT STREAMING - A system and method for Peer-to-Peer (P2P) media content streaming are provided. In one embodiment, prior to streaming desired original media content, a playback agent of a first peer playback device downloads illustration media content, which is a derivate light-weight version of the original media content. The playback agent then initiates streaming of the original media content from one or more other peer playback devices hosting the original media content or a segment thereof. The playback agent monitors a quality of the network connection to the other peer playback devices streaming the original media content to the playback agent. If the quality of the network connection falls below a defined threshold, the playback agent switches playback to the illustration media content. Once the quality of the network connection improves or a new connection is established, the playback agent switches playback back to the streaming original media content. | 03-26-2009 |
| 20090063983 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR REPRESENTING CONTENT, USER PRESENCE AND INTERACTION WITHIN VIRTUAL WORLD ADVERTISING ENVIRONMENTS - A control system renders a shared virtual environment to one or more users and obtains metadata associated with content accessed by the users. Representations based on the gathered metadata are provided to a viewing user, and may include visual elements serving as host, content and/or presence representations. Applicable representations are identified from a plurality of defined possible content representations based on the metadata associated with and obtained for a hosting user. The representations may be descriptive of a variety of parameters, including but not limited to the type, timing, nature or other parameters associated with content currently being accessed by a hosting user, content available from the hosting user, a future schedule for content access, time remaining for the hosting user to remain within a shared virtual environment, the hosting user's social network status relative to the viewing user. Presence representations may be displayed to provide information on a hosting user's presence availability within a shared virtual environment elative to one or more determined time slots. | 03-05-2009 |
| 20090055371 | PHOTOSHARING SERVER FILTERS FOR AUTOMATIC STORAGE AND SHARING OF DIGITAL FILES - A method and system for providing on online file- service that automatically stores and organizes digital files. The method and system include providing the server with a set of trigger handlers that are each configured to perform a particular action on a digital file. The user may log into the server and specify attribute criteria for each of the trigger handlers. Digital files uploaded by the user are received by the server, wherein each file has a plurality of attributes associated therewith. The attributes of each file are then compared with the attribute criteria entered by the user for each of the trigger handlers. And upon a match, the corresponding trigger handler is invoked, such that actions are automatically performed on the digital files. | 02-26-2009 |
| 20090037822 | CONTEXT-AWARE SHARED CONTENT REPRESENTATIONS - Systems and methods for providing context-aware content representations are disclosed. In general, the context-aware content representations are visual representations presented in association with a content representation host representative of a user or, alternatively, some other entity. The context-aware content representations are indicative of content made accessible by the user or of interest to the user and are additionally influenced by context. The context may be, for example, topics of social interactions such as text-based or voice-based conversations, device information descriptive of a device on which the accessible content is stored or through which the content is accessible, physical location, location within a virtual world, content access information related to content accessed by the user or entity represented by the content representation host or accessed by another user through the content representation host, or the like. | 02-05-2009 |
| 20080313029 | PUSH-CACHING SCHEME FOR A LATE-BINDING ADVERTISEMENT ARCHITECTURE - A system providing late-binding of advertisements to video content and incorporating a push-caching scheme is disclosed. In general, the system includes an advertisement server located at a central location such as a central headend and a number of late-binding systems located at locations such as a number of remote headends. The late-binding systems are connected to the advertisement server via a Wide Area Network (WAN). Each of the late-binding systems is also connected to an associated advertisement cache via a Local Area Network (LAN). A cache assignment agent associated with the advertisement server operates to push advertisements to the advertisement caches associated with the late-binding systems in a predictive fashion based on, for example, historical information for the late-binding systems and/or profiles of users or viewers associated with the client devices served by the late-binding systems. | 12-18-2008 |
| 20080307066 | Systems and Methods of Providing Collaborative Consumer-Controlled Advertising Environments - Targeted or other advertising may comprise one or more advertisements presented to multiple users in a virtual world environment such that participating users can interact with one another and/or with executed advertisements. Groups of users may be invited to participate in collaborative virtual world environments based on consumer contact lists or profiles establishing matching preferences for such groups. Synchronized data may be narrowcasted or broadcasted to invited users. Such data may define one or more virtual world environments as well as traditional and/or virtual world advertisements for execution in the shared environment(s). Advertisements may be selected based on one or more consumer preferences associated with one or more of the users participating in the shared virtual world environment. | 12-11-2008 |
| 20080306818 | MULTI-CLIENT STREAMER WITH LATE BINDING OF AD CONTENT - A late-binding multi-client streamer utilizing Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) transfers to obtain video and advertisement content is provided. For each client device, the streamer receives a video content selection. In response, the streamer initiates an RDMA transfer of the video content or a segment of the video content from a storage device of a video content server to an associated video buffer and begins streaming the video content from the video buffer to the client device. When an upcoming advertisement slot in the video content is detected, the streamer initiates an RDMA transfer of an advertisement for the ad slot from a storage device associated with an advertisement content server to an associated ad buffer. The streamer then inserts the advertisement from the ad buffer into the ad slot in the video content as the video content is streamed to the client device. | 12-11-2008 |
| 20080306817 | Methods and Systems of Presenting Advertisements in Consumer-Defined Environments - Targeted or other advertising may comprise one or more advertisements presented in a virtual world environment constructed according to consumer parameters, with the advertisements presented according to rules, scripts, or other parameters defined by the advertiser(s). For instance, one or more consumer computing device(s) can access data defining a brand name, logo, and/or message and can access data defining consumer preferences for the context in which advertisements are to be presented. For example, the context may vary according to viewer identity, programming content, time of day, and the like. Then, the consumer computing device(s) can render a virtual world based on the consumer preferences with the virtual world also comprising the advertisement(s) generated based on advertiser definitions. | 12-11-2008 |
