Patent Application
20070174867
The present invention relates to computer controlled television sets and particularly to controlling the access of designated viewers, e.g. children to television program content.
The present state of television broadcasting and programming has been marked by a technological revolution driven by the convergence of the data processing industry with the consumer electronics industry. This has resulted in the television set viewer having “fingertip” instant access to hundreds of television programs. This of course includes program content wholly unsuitable to children and younger viewers. As a result, there has been a need to provide the owners/hosts of television sets, i.e. parents, with the means to control access to television programs. Fortunately, the technological advances have provided the resources for implementations for controlling such access.
In order to better appreciate this invention, the background of the television industry, including cable and satellite services, needs to be considered. As the demand for television programming rapidly increased, frequency channels that the Government made available for the presentation of programming by respective television stations also rapidly increased. This led to television service providers that obtained and consolidated the programs transmitted by the respective television stations to be presented to viewers at Government designated frequency channels. The original television stations would transmit at their assigned frequencies either by direct line of sight, cable or through satellites. The television service providers then received the respective program channel signals and consolidated all the data in such transmissions into an integrated data stream representative of an extensive set of television programs being presented on corresponding channels into an unitary data stream that was then compressed and transmitted to the television service provider's subscribers either via satellite or cable. The viewer could then receive this integrated data stream and extract any “live” or real-time television program through his conventional television frequency channel tuner. The provider system would extract the appropriate television program data directly from the real-time satellite of cable service provider integrated data stream. The extracted program data representing the television program would be displayed on a real-time basis on the television set display. Where the user wished to record a particular television program for future viewing, it would be extracted at its scheduled viewing period from the integrated data stream in the same manner as described, decrypted, decompressed and recorded on disk drives (DVD). Individual programs on their respective channels could still be recorded on a real-time basis by extraction. This, of course, resulted in the current state of the (Digital Video Recorder) DVR or (Personal Video Recorder) PVR industry where the user, with an appropriate PVR, could record dozens of broadcasts and transmitted television programs for future viewing on their television sets.
The present invention enables the owners of television sets to take advantage of the advances in the cable and satellite service provider control technologies, and PVRs to limit viewer access to the otherwise instant access to hundreds of programs resulting from these technologies.
While the present invention may be most conveniently implemented on PVRs, it will be clear from the following description that any computer controlled television system could be used to run the routines of the invention. In general, the invention relates to a computer controlled display system for enabling the host of a television set to limit the access of designated viewers to television programs through said television set that comprises a combination including a television set display, apparatus enabling a viewer to request the presentation of a selected television program on said television display, apparatus for assigning an identifier to a viewer of said television display and apparatus enabling the host of the television set to limit an identified viewer requesting access to television programs of host-selected content for a host selected time period. The host may be enabled to limit access to sets or categories of television programs of predetermined content, particularly to limit access to each set of a plurality of sets of television programs of predetermined content for a respective limited time period per set. This is particularly effective when the viewer is a child. In such a case, the host may have access to an “out of the box” implementation wherein a provider, such as a television service provider, predetermines the times and contents of the sets of television programs based upon the age of the viewers. In such an arrangement, all the host or parent has to do is enter the age of the child, and the appropriate television content and times will be presented to the identified child. The apparatus enabling the host to limit access for a limited time period may be set up to automatically turn the television set off after said limited time period.
The system further includes means for prompting a viewer requesting access to television set programs to enter his viewer identifier. This may be a spoken identifier. Finally, with a great many systems in which television programs are transmitted from a television service provider, the television service provider may set up to control all of the limitations of program content and time periods selected by the television set host.
The present invention will be better understood and its numerous objects and advantages will become more apparent to those skilled in the art by reference to the following drawings, in conjunction with the accompanying specification, in which:
Referring to
The apparatus shown connected to receiver 15 may be conveniently housed in a television set top box or in some late systems, the whole DVR apparatus may be integrated within a unitary television set. Satellite receptor antenna 14 receives the integrated data stream that is applied to a standard receiver for integrated broadcast channel input 15. Similarly, the integrated data stream from cable may be applied through input 16 to receiver 15.
The operations involved in the present invention are controlled by a data processing system under the control of a central processing unit 10, which, in turn, is interconnected to various other components by system bus 12. An operating system (OS) 22 that runs on processor 10 provides control and is used to coordinate the functions of the various components of the control system. The OS 22 is stored in Random Access Memory (RAM) 11. The control programs 30 for the functions, including those for limiting access to television programming on television sets of the present invention may be permanently stored in Read Only Memory (ROM) 13 and moved into and out of RAM to perform their respective functions. In the normal operation for real-time television program playing, the integrated incoming data stream, under CPU control, is applied to broadcast channel extractor 17 that extracts the data representative of the television program scheduled for the channel that the user has selected on a tuner (not shown) and applies the extracted data to a conventional television display adapter 28 to be displayed on the user's television set 29.
When the incoming unitary data stream is to be recorded on the DVR, the signal is processed through a disk drive adapter 21 and stored on disk drives 20. In the conventional operation of a DVR, the television program scheduled for a given channel at a given time is extracted by extractor 17, and then stored on a disk drive 20 provided on the DVR. This individual program would be recorded and, thus, stored on the disk drive either in response to either advance scheduling by the user for such a recording or a user request to record a real-time presented television program.
During playback, the viewer, via the control of OS 22, selects a television program recorded on disk drive 20 that is then applied to display adapter via connector 30 and presented on the TV display 29. It will be understood that the present invention implementation wherein the TV owner may limit identified user access to predetermined programming over predetermined time periods will be applicable to both such recorded television programs, as well as television programs presented live. The interrupt program of this invention is stored in RAM 11 and is responsive to input from an interrupt timer 27 that tracks the presented programming to insure that the time limitations are enforced. The interrupt feature may be set up to automatically turn the television set off when all of the timed television is completed. This will be described in greater detail with respect to the illustrative television displays of
With reference to
Now that the television set owner has set up the limitations, there is shown in
Now, with reference to the programming shown in
Now, with reference to the flowchart of
The television set control system then awaits a viewer request, step 75. If Yes, the viewer is prompted for his ID, step 76. There is a verification, step 75. If No, the ID entry is rejected, and the process returns to step 75. If Yes, there is ID verification, the host selections to be offered are retrieved from storage, step 79, and the dialog offers selected television programs and categories to the viewer, step 80. A determination is made in step 81 as to whether the viewer has selected a host approved program. If Yes, the television program is presented on screen, step 82. A timer is usually set for the host selected time periods, step 83, and then a determination is made continuously as to whether the monitored time has expired, step 84. If Yes, the television program being presented is terminated, step 85, and a further determination is made as whether there is any remaining other program and appropriate time, step 86. If Yes, the process is branched via “A” back to the dialog offering, step 80. If No, a viewing termination message may be displayed, step 87, the television set is turned off, step 88, and the session is exited.
While the above preferred embodiment illustrates owner selection and control implemented at the level of the individual television program and preferably on a DVR, the invention may be implemented at the level of the television service provider in the case where there is such a service provider providing the television program services to the television set owner. All of the dialogs offered to host on the screen may come directly from such service provider. All of the television times and selected programming may be under the control of the service provider.
Although certain preferred embodiments have been shown and described, it will be understood that many changes and modifications may be made therein without departing from the scope and intent of the appended claims.
