Patent Application
20060270463
This patent document pertains generally to telecommunications, and more particularly, but not by way of limitation, to venue-controlled disabling of one or more capabilities of a cellular telephone or other mobile communication devices.
Cell phones are ubiquitous and handy. To be useful, a cell phone must alert its user when there is an incoming call; phones ring for that purpose, and many phones can be set to vibrate substantially inaudibly instead of producing an audible ring.
Ringing cell phones generate a disturbance in concerts, movies, church, meetings, and other circumstances in which quiet is desired. It's common for the person introducing a program to ask the audience members to turn off their cell phones—with moderate success; it is not uncommon for one or more audience members to neglect to turn off their phone, and for one of these phones to ring during the program. This not only disturbs the rest of the audience, but also embarrasses the phone's owner.
Moreover, any cell phone use (not merely the audible ring) is problematic in circumstances where the cell phone's use of the radio channels may interfere with more important radio communication, such as airplane communications, for example, during takeoff and landing.
However, it is also true that it may be very important for someone to receive a call even though they are engaged in an activity which would be disturbed by the phone's ring.
The present inventor has recognized a need for a venue, such as a theater, concert hall, or chapel, to be able to directly turn off the ringing of cell phones-without requiring any action on the part of each phone's owner. Moreover, as discussed above, an aircraft is a venue with an even more compelling need to be able to directly turn off a cell phone than a concert hall.
This patent application describes, among other things, systems, devices, and methods that enable a venue to send a signal to each phone present at the venue, such that the phones, upon receiving the signal, turn themselves off in response. Because, as discussed above, it may be very important for someone to receive a call even though they are engaged in an activity which would be disturbed by the phone's ring, the present patent application also describes systems, devices, and methods that enable a venue to send a signal to each phone present at the venue, such that the phones, in response to receiving the signal, switch from generating an audible ring to instead generating a substantially inaudible alert, such as a vibration.
In one example, users entering a venue receive a signal turning their cell phones off or switching them from ring to vibrate. In a further example, the phones are restored to a previous state when audible communication using the phone is no longer undesirable. In a further example, the venue includes a telephony base station to which phones are registered when present at the venue. The telephony base station intercepts calls to or from the mobile phones at the venue to inhibit calls to or from the mobile phones, such as when audible communication using the phone is undesirable.
In another example, a machine-assisted method includes communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device when the mobile communication device is located in association with a venue hosting an occasion when audible usage of the mobile communication device is undesirable. An audible alert of the mobile communication device is automatically disabled in response to the signal. The method may include numerous variations. In one variation, the communicating the signal includes sending a venue-controlled signal from the remote device to the mobile communication device. In another variation, disabling the audible alert includes turning off the mobile communication device in response to the signal. In another variation, the disabling the audible alert includes switching the mobile communication device from an audible alert mode to a substantially inaudible alert mode in response to the signal. In another variation, the switching the mobile communication device from an audible alert mode to a substantially inaudible alert mode in response to the signal includes switching, in response to the signal, the mobile communication device from an audible ring mode to a substantially inaudible vibration mode of responding to an incoming call. In another variation, the disabling the audible alert includes disabling, in response to the signal, an audible alert of all mobile communication devices located in association with the venue in response to the signal. In another variation, the disabling the audible alert includes first checking whether a particular mobile communication device is registered for a disabling service before performing the disabling. In another variation, the method includes billing an additional charge to a user of the mobile communication device that is registered for the disabling service. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device comprises communicating the signal with a remote device located in association with an entry of the venue. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device comprises communicating the signal with a remote device capable of broadcasting the signal over an entire desired area of the venue. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device comprises communicating the signal with a set of remote devices that, together, are capable of broadcasting the signal over an entire desired area of the venue, and which are capable of avoiding broadcasting the signal outside the desired area of the venue. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes communicating a signal between a radio frequency (RF) remote device and the at least one mobile communication device. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes communicating a signal between the RF remote device and a first RF receiver at the mobile communication device; the first RF receiver at the mobile communication device is separate from a second RF receiver at the mobile communication device that is used to communicate audio information to the mobile communication device. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes communicating a signal between the RF remote device and an RF receiver at the mobile communication device that is also used to communicate audio information to the mobile communication device. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes communicating a signal between a cell phone telephony base station as the remote device and the at least one mobile communication device. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes using at least one of infrared communication, sonic communication, magnetic or electro-magnetic, or chemical communication. In another variation, the method includes saving information about a state of at least one switch of the mobile communication device before the disabling the audible alert, modifying the state of the at least one switch in conjunction with the disabling the audible alert, and restoring the state of the at least one switch of the mobile communication device after the disabling the audible alert. In another variation, the restoring the state of the at least one switch of the mobile communication device is carried out in response to communicating a second signal between the remote device and the mobile communication device. In another variation, the communicating a signal between a remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes communicating information about a time at which the restoring the state of the at least one switch is to be carried out. In another variation, the communicating the signal between the remote device and at least one mobile communication device includes registering the mobile communication device to a base station associated with the venue, and the automatically disabling the audible alert of the mobile communication device includes using the base station to intercept a call to or from the mobile communication device in response to the registering the mobile communication device to the base station associated with the venue. In another variation, the automatically disabling an audible alert of the mobile communication device comprises inhibiting a call to the mobile communication device.
In another example, a system includes a mobile communication device, where the mobile communication device includes a speaker to provide an audible alert and a communication transceiver to communicate a signal with a remote device to automatically disable the audible alert in response to the signal. In one variation, the system includes a switch to disable the audible alert; the switch controls at least one of a power-on status and a ring/vibrate status of the mobile communication device. In another variation, the mobile communication device includes a memory location to store information indicating whether the mobile communication device is registered for a service to automatically disable the audible alert; the mobile communication device includes a controller that checks the memory location to determine whether the mobile communication device is registered for the service as a precondition of the automatically disabling the audible alert. In another variation, the remote communication device has access to information indicating whether the mobile communication device is registered for a service to automatically disable the audible alert; the remote communication device includes a controller that checks whether the mobile communication device is registered for the service as a precondition of the automatically disabling the audible alert. In another variation, the mobile communication device includes at least one memory location to save information about a state of at least one switch of the mobile communication device before the disabling the audible alert, and the mobile communication device includes a controller that restores the state of at least one switch of the mobile communication device using the saved information about the state of the at least one switch of the mobile communication device. In another variation, the system further includes the remote device. In another variation, the remote device includes an RF transmitter providing the signal to automatically disable the audible alert of the mobile communication device. In another variation, the remote device includes a telephony base station associated with a venue, the telephony base station providing the signal to automatically disable the audible alert of the mobile communication device.
In another example, a system includes a remote communication device, for location at a venue hosting an occasion when audible usage of a mobile communication device is undesirable, the remote communication device permitting communication of a signal with at least one mobile communication device at the venue to automatically disable an audible alert of the mobile communication device. In one variation, the remote communication device includes a telephony base station for the venue to intercept calls to or from all mobile communication devices located at a designated area of the venue to disable the audible alert of the mobile communication devices.
This summary is intended to provide an overview of the subject matter of the present patent application. It is not intended to provide an exclusive or exhaustive explanation of the invention. The detailed description is included to provide further information about the subject matter of the present patent application.
In the drawings, which are not necessarily drawn to scale, like numerals describe substantially similar components throughout the several views. Like numerals having different letter suffixes represent different instances of substantially similar components. The drawings illustrate generally, by way of example, but not by way of limitation, various embodiments discussed in the present document.
The following detailed description includes references to the accompanying drawings, which form a part of the detailed description. The drawings show, by way of illustration, specific embodiments in which the invention may be practiced. These embodiments, which are also referred to herein as “examples,” are described in enough detail to enable those skilled in the art to practice the invention. The embodiments may be combined, other embodiments may be utilized, or structural, logical and electrical changes may be made without departing from the scope of the present invention. The following detailed description is, therefore, not to be taken in a limiting sense, and the scope of the present invention is defined by the appended claims and their equivalents.
In this document, the terms “a” or “an” are used, as is common in patent documents, to include one or more than one. In this document, the term “or” is used to refer to a nonexclusive or, unless otherwise indicated. Furthermore, all publications, patents, and patent documents referred to in this document are incorporated by reference herein in their entirety, as though individually incorporated by reference. In the event of inconsistent usages between this document and those documents so incorporated by reference, the usage in the incorporated reference(s) should be considered supplementary to that of this document; for irreconcilable inconsistencies, the usage in this document controls.
In this document, a cell phone is used as an illustrative example, but is not intended as a limitation. The present techniques also apply to a pager, Blackberry, personal digital assistant (PDA), or other handheld mobile communication device. Similarly, as an example but not a limitation, the term “ring” is used to designate any sort of audible alert used by a speaker or the like to tell the device's user of an incoming communication (a phone call, page, e-mail, appointment reminder, etc.), and the term “call” is used to designate any such incoming communication. And again as an example but not a limitation, the term “concert hall” is used to designate any area or venue in which there is benefit in turning off devices or their rings-any dedicated quiet zone. For example, the present techniques also apply to chapels, theatres, aircraft, meeting rooms, laboratories, any building or vehicle in which mobile device communication would be disruptive to electronic communication taking place in the building or vehicle, or any building or vehicle in which mobile device communication would disruptive to the social activity taking place in the building or vehicle.
A cell phone has an on/off switch that can be set in the on or off position manually. It may have a ring/vibrate switch that can be manually set to the ring position, in which case the cell phone will ring when a call comes in, or to the vibrate position, in which case the cell phone will not ring but will vibrate when a call comes in. The present document describes, among other things, various ways that a concert hall or other venue can send a signal to a phone, and the phone can receive and recognize the signal, and can respond to the signal by changing the setting of the on/off or ring/vibrate switch.
In this example, the phone 110 also has an additional receiver 114 that receives one or more signals from signal source 130 and that is connected to on/off switch 116. The phone 110 can be turned on or off either with the external control 118 or by receiving a signal from venue-controlled source 130. Although the example of
As shown in
In the retail-clothing outlet, the article of clothing contains an EAS (Electronic Article Surveillance) tag which is removed when the article is paid for. The tag emits a low power radio signal. An EAS tower (a receiver) is stationed in or near the doorway, and can be built into the doorway to be unobtrusive. If a shopper leaves with an item that has an EAS tag, the radio signal emitted by the tag is received by the tower, which triggers the alarm.
In the example of
People may forget to turn their phones back on when they leave the concert hall, and this could be a cause of irritation that affects the acceptance of the venue-controlled technology. To address this problem, in one example, the phone is built so that upon leaving the hall, the settings of its switches (e.g., on/off switch 116, 316; ring/vibrate switch 216, 315) are returned to whatever they were upon entering the hall.
In one example, this is accomplished by storing in the phone's persistent memory 319 the settings of the phone's switches at the time when the phone first receives the venue-controlled signal (before the venue-controlled signal changes those settings) when the person walks through the doorway into the concert hall. The next time the phone receives the venue-controlled signal, the phone's switches are restored to such stored settings representative of the phone's state before the first venue-controlled signal was received.
In another technique for restoring the pre-venue settings of the phone 530 is for the initial venue-controlled signal received by the phone 530 when the person enters the venue to include time information to establish a quiet time period over which the audible alert suppression is valid. After the quiet time period expires, the pre-venue settings of the phone 530 are automatically restored by the phone 530. The time information provided by the venue-controlled signal can be either a time duration or an specified time-of-day for restoring the pre-venue state of the phone's switches. Most phones include clock and date functionality that can adapted for use with logic returning the switches to the pre-venue states. Similarly, the time information could be used to establish the actual start time of the quiet period, thereby enabling users to continue to use their cell phones, for example, while inside the venue, but before a performance begins.
Cell phones, of course, already have radio receivers, to receive the signals that carry the voice and control data for cell telephony. In one embodiment, the frequency of the venue-controlled signal described herein is in a different range from those dedicated to cell telephony, such that the signals used for different purposes do not interfere with each other.
A radio frequency is a common, efficient, and inexpensive signaling mechanism, but of course any venue-controlled signaling mechanism could be used, with attendant advantages and disadvantages. For example, rather than a radio frequency venue-controlled signal, an infrared venue-controlled signal could be generated by the venue-controlled signal emitter and received by the phone. However, an infrared venue-controlled signal typically requires line-of-sight; phones in pockets, handbags, and briefcases would not be affected. In another example, a magnetic field could be generated by the signal emitter and received by the phone. In another example, the venue-controlled signal could use a sound generated by the venue-controlled signal emitter and received by the phone; the sound need not be in the range of human hearing. In another example the venue-controlled signal could use a chemical compound emitted by the venue-controlled signal emitter and triggering receptors in the phone; this signalling mechanism is not currently cost-effective but advances may make it so in the future.
The examples described so far have emphasized installing specialized signal emitters into concert halls, and installing specialized signal receivers into cell phones. Other examples, however use an existing cell phone receiver to receive a venue-controlled signal, thereby putting the specialization into the cell phone control system. As noted above, cell phones have radio receivers, to receive the signals that carry the voice and control data for cell telephony. An alternative to installing a specialized receiver in the phones and using a frequency outside of the range of those dedicated to cell telephony is to use the equipment already in the phones and use the telephony control system to set and reset these switches. It is well known in the art how to send an appropriately coded signal or series of signals from a cell telephony base station to a cell phone in order to control the cell phone—that is how the transfer of frequencies (channels) for a call works, as well as the control of power used by the cell phone in transmission.
Like the previous examples, a modification of current phones is needed to make the on/off and ring/vibrate switches able to be controlled internally, such as by actuation using a venue-controlled signal. Unlike the emphasis of the previous examples, no new receiver need be installed in the cell phones. Instead, cell telephony control signals are extended to control this new cell phone behavior. Two implementations are described below.
In one example, a channel in the downlink spectrum of the mobile telephony network is reserved for the purpose of setting cell phones to vibrate. Upon receiving a signal on that channel, the phone will set itself to vibrate. In this embodiment, any equipment capable of sending a signal in the proper range can be used by a concert hall to generate a venue-controlled signal in a similar manner to that described above with respect to signal emitters 410, 510, 610, 710.
In another example, it isn't merely receiving a signal in a certain frequency range that triggers the phone to set itself to vibrate. Rather, a first control command is defined and transmitted as data carried on one of the control channels. This control command is defined to be compatible with the other control commands transmitted from a base station to a phone (such as a command to change frequencies, or to increase transmission power, a call waiting command, etc.). A second control command is defined; when transmitted as the venue-controlled signal, this second control command resets the phones to their previous settings, as described above.
As shown in the example of
In the examples of
In another variation of the examples of
In another example, the cell phones 830 require no modification at all. Again the concert hall 800 installs a base station 810. This base station 810 tracks phones 830 entering and leaving the range of the base station 810 and updates the cell phone telephony network's Location Registers, as described above, to reflect control of phones 830 within the hall 800 by the venue's base station 810. In this example, the venue's base station 810 does not transmit calls to and from the phones 830 located in the concert hall 800. Instead, for an outgoing call, in one example, the venue's base station 810 ignores the outgoing call signal received from the phone 830 under its control. Because the network's Location Register lists the calling phone 830 as in the cell of the concert hall's base station 810 (and hence under its control) no other base station will respond. The call will go untransmitted as if it were out of range of any base station. For an incoming call, the concert hall's base station 810 will not transmit the incoming call to the phone 830, but will instead respond to the caller with an indication that the user of the phone associated with the called number is unavailable. (If the subscriber using the phone 830 has a voicemail service, the caller could be offered the option of leaving a message in such voicemail.)
Similarly, for an outgoing call from a phone in the concert hall, in one example, if the venue is in the quiet mode, then, in one example, the outgoing call is not transmitted from the phone in the concert hall. Instead, a message is transmitted to the caller's phone (e.g., “Service discouraged; You are calling from a dedicated quiet location; Press “1” if the call is urgent and the call will be put through). Otherwise, if the venue is not in the quiet mode, then the call is transmitted from the phone in the concert hall. This example uses changes to the control commands recognized by the phone and changes to the phone's software so that upon receiving this signal it can put an appropriate message on the phone's screen. If the caller from within the concert hall selects the “urgent” option (e.g., by pressing “1” on the calling phone), then the base station 810 transmits the call from the phone within the concert hall 800. If the caller within the concert hall does not select the urgent option, the call is not transmitted from the phone located within the concert hall.
In the example of
It is to be understood that the above description is intended to be illustrative, and not restrictive. For example, the above-described embodiments (and/or aspects thereof) may be used in combination with each other. Many other embodiments will be apparent to those of skill in the art upon reviewing the above description. The scope of the invention should, therefore, be determined with reference to the appended claims, along with the full scope of equivalents to which such claims are entitled. In the appended claims, the terms “including” and “in which” are used as the plain-English equivalents of the respective terms “comprising” and “wherein.” Also, in the following claims, the terms “including” and “comprising” are open-ended, that is, a system, device, article, or process that includes elements in addition to those listed after such a term in a claim are still deemed to fall within the scope of that claim. Moreover, in the following claims, the terms “first,” “second,” and “third,” etc. are used merely as labels, and are not intended to impose numerical requirements on their objects.
The Abstract of the Disclosure is provided to comply with 37 C.F.R. §1.72(b), requiring an abstract that will allow the reader to quickly ascertain the nature of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not be used to interpret or limit the scope or meaning of the claims. In addition, in the foregoing Detailed Description, various features may be grouped together to streamline the disclosure. This method of disclosure is not to be interpreted as reflecting an intention that the claimed embodiments require more features than are expressly recited in each claim. Rather, as the following claims reflect, inventive subject matter may lie in less than all features of a single disclosed embodiment. Thus the following claims are hereby incorporated into the Detailed Description, with each claim standing on its own as a separate embodiment.
