Patent Application
20120066706
The present disclosure relates to improvement of the measurement of viewing patterns by set tuners, such as set top boxes, and improvement of advertisement optimization as it relates to such viewing.
Current media delivery systems, e.g., cable television, satellite television, telecommunications, etc., use set tuners, e.g., set top boxes (“STBs”), for consumer end delivery of such media. These set tuners generally include software that monitors what channels the set top boxes are tuned to over a given time period and reports such information to a headend or central office for processing. There are hundreds of millions of existing set tuners in the United States alone that potentially provide a reporting service indicating the channel that the set tuner is tuned to at a given point in time. One known service that uses its own hardware independent of set top boxes, for analyzing such reports is the audience measurement system deployed by Nielson Media Research.
The sample size of current audience measurement is 4 orders of magnitude smaller than the number of set tuners, providing at best an overly coarse estimate of viewing. The present disclosure recognizes that a problem lies in the fact that while set tuners can report what channel that they are tuned to, they do not now report if the TV is turned on or if the volume is muted. This is not surprising, as it is not within the function of the set tuner to know or control these features. Without at least that information (power and sound on/off), any measurement is hopelessly inaccurate in that all it measures is what the last channel tuned was, not if the television is on or that the sound is on.
An exemplary analysis of traditional Neilson audience measurement for a broadcaster follows. A Neilson rating uses direct measurement of the content, not tuning, to generate an indication of viewers per channel (v/ch). In each Nielson home, Neilsen installs its own hardware to determine the state of the equipment and uses its own means to determine what program the viewer has selected.
It is impractical and uneconomic to extend this approach to all homes that use set top boxes. Given the 150 channels, on average, accessed by set top boxes, we see the small Neilsen sample as less than ideal for measuring viewing. However, using set top boxes alone without the invention would lead to unacceptable inaccuracies.
As is noted above, the inaccuracies of existing set tuners lies in the fact that the tuners only report what channel a set tuner is tuned to at a certain point in time. However, while the tuner may be tuned to a channel and may report that the channel is being viewed over a certain time period, the television could be off, or the audio could be muted. This generates an inherent inaccuracy in the reporting data, and consequently in the analysis.
Neilson has introduced a separate box for consumer use to further refine or verify data, including a stand-alone box connected to a telephone line to detect television on/off state or audio on/off state. However, these systems are cumbersome and intrusive, requiring, e.g. for audio state measurement, encoding of a watermark or other signal in an audio feed of the set tuner audio and pickup of sound by the standalone box at a speaker for analysis.
What is needed in the art is a non-intrusive improvement in reporting of viewer data by existing set tuners and corresponding improvement in advertising optimization resultant from analysis of that data.
The above-described and other problems and deficiencies of the prior art are overcome and alleviated by the presently described system and method for improving measurement of viewing patterns by existing set tuners, e.g., set top boxes, and advertisement optimization. The present system and method builds upon the capabilities of existing set tuners that can report, via an application running on the set tuner, the channel that the set tuner is tuned to. According to the present system and method, a supplemental application is uploaded to the existing set tuner, which application monitors a wireless detector (e.g., an infra-red detector) that is built in to the set tuner. The supplemental application compares a monitored wireless signal to a database of signals provided with the supplemental application or accessible by the supplemental application to determine a hardware state of additional non-set tuner devices (e.g., the on/off state of a television, the on/off state of an audio system, etc.). The supplemental application then reports such non-set tuner hardware state for a given time period.
In exemplary embodiments, a report processing application combines the standard report generated by the set tuner (including set tuner channel state) with the supplemental report to generate a file combining the report data. In exemplary embodiments, the generated file is then sent to a central office or a headend over a network for generation of improved viewing patterns and advertisement optimization.
In exemplary embodiments, psychographic and/or demographic information may be combined with the data at the central office or headend to improve advertisement optimization.
The above-discussed and other features and advantages of the presently described system and method will be appreciated and understood by those skilled in the art from the following detailed description and drawings.
Referring now to the drawings, wherein like elements are numbered alike in the following FIGURES:
Reference will now be made in detail to exemplary embodiments, examples of which are illustrated by the accompanying drawing. As was noted above, the present disclosure relates to a system and method for improving measurement of viewing patterns by set tuners, e.g., set top boxes, and advertisement optimization. As is used herein, the term “set tuners” refers to devices that traditionally measure consumer viewing by reporting the channel(s) the tuner is tuned to at any given time. Accordingly, e.g., television tuners incorporating such a reporting application and set top boxes similarly incorporating such a reporting application are included within the scope of that term. While exemplary embodiments describing “set top boxes” are described herein, it should be understood that the present disclosure relates more generally to tuning devices that also report channel selections. Similarly, the present disclosure contemplates reporting with regard to any media, including without limitation, broadcast television, satellite or cable television, internet delivered media, etc.
The present system and method builds upon the capabilities of existing set tuners that can report, via an application running on the set tuner, the channel that the set tuner is tuned to. According to the present system and method, a supplemental application is uploaded to the existing set tuner, which application monitors a wireless detector (e.g., an infra-red detector) that is built in to the set tuner. The supplemental application compares a monitored wireless signal to a database of signals provided with the supplemental application, accessible by the supplemental application or learned by the supplemental application or set tuner to determine a hardware state of additional non-set tuner devices (e.g., the on/off state of a television, the on/off state of an audio system, etc.). The supplemental application then reports such non-set tuner hardware state for a given time period.
Referring now to
The system also includes at least one wireless peripheral device 18, such as a remote control, a computer, a handheld device, such as an iPod, telephone or PDA, a tablet device, such as an iPad, etc. The wireless device includes at least one wireless mechanism for which the set tuner is configured to monitor, e.g., infrared for most types of current remote controls, Bluetooth, radio-frequency transmission, etc. Further, the peripheral device may communicate with the set top device via a wireless network protocol, and may communicate with external media itself through a network, e.g., by a home system gateway common to the set tuner and the peripheral device.
As is illustrated in
In an exemplary embodiment, the set tuner 12 receives media 24, such as television programming, etc., through a network 26. The set tuner 12 reports the channel to which the set tuner is tuned via a first, standard application 30 native to the set tuner. This report data is traditionally reported to a control office or headend 28 for analysis of viewing of channels over a given time period.
The present invention provides a second, supplemental application 32 to the set tuner 12, which application monitors the wireless monitoring hardware 20 of the set tuner. The supplemental application compares the monitored wireless signal against a database of signals provided with, accessible by the supplemental application or learned by the supplemental application or set tuner to determine a state change of non-set tuner hardware. Thus, in one exemplary embodiment, a learning function guides the consumer through a setup procedure to “turn on”, “turn off” etc, their equipment and will store the new information in the database 20. Accordingly, the supplemental application uses already built-in hardware for the set tuner to expand reporting capabilities of existing set tuners from simple reporting of channel state to also include any non-set tuner hardware state as is desired or advantageous for improving measurement of viewing patterns.
Referring still to
In exemplary embodiments, psychographic and/or demographic information 34 may be combined with the data at the central office or headend 28 to improve advertisement optimization 36.
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Accordingly, the present disclosure presents an improvement to existing set tuners that uses an uploaded application code to expand the reporting capabilities of pre-existing set tuners (in an economically feasible manner). The present disclosure also presents a method for increased optimization of advertising by correcting inefficiencies of existing set tuners and, optionally, further analyzing psychographics or demographics in conjunction with improved, non-invasive reporting mechanisms.
It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that, while exemplary embodiments have been shown and described, various modifications and variations can be made to the present system and method disclosed herein without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Accordingly, it is to be understood that the various embodiments have been described by way of illustration and not limitation.
