Live Program Time Calibration via Characteristic Mark Embedding
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Solution Overview
Problem
Interactive activities in live television or radio programs face synchronization issues due to varying network environments, leading to transmission delays that affect the timing of audience responses, resulting in unfair outcomes for participants.
Innovation Solution
A method and system that embeds a characteristic mark in the live program content to calibrate the start and end times of interactive activities, allowing user devices to adjust their responses based on a computed time difference between the marking time and the initiating time, ensuring accurate and synchronized participation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If interactive activities are conducted over network with varying transmission methods, then audience participation is enabled, but transmission delays cause asynchronization between interactive activity and live program
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by embedding a characteristic mark (time reference) in the live program content before transmission. The user device identifies this mark in advance to calculate and compensate for transmission delays before they affect interactive activity timing. This pre-calibration ensures synchronized interaction despite network variations.
2Reliability
If transmission delay compensation is implemented, then synchronization accuracy is improved, but system complexity increases due to characteristic mark embedding and identification
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses an intermediary approach by introducing a characteristic mark as a mediator between the live program and the interactive activity timing system. This mark serves as a reference point that enables delay calculation without requiring complex real-time communication protocols or centralized control mechanisms.
3Speed
If real-time interactive activity is conducted without time calibration, then response speed is maintained, but transmission delays cause incorrect timing of audience responses
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback by using the identified characteristic mark to calculate transmission delay and apply compensation to the interactive activity timing. This closed-loop approach ensures that response timing accuracy is maintained while preserving real-time interaction speed, as the calibration is calculated and applied automatically based on observed delays.
Data Source
AI summary
The disclosure is related to a method for calibrating an interactive time in a live program, and a system thereof. In the method, a user device is used to receive a live content embedded with a mark from a live program system. A signal processing scheme is performed to identify the mark so as to obtain a marking time. Then an interactive content is received from an interactive serving system. An initiating time of interactive activity is obtained. A time difference between the marking time and the initiating time is counted. The time difference is referred to for calibrating the time of issuing an interactive message when responding to the interactive activity. The responding time, at the system side, is restored to an actual time. Therefore, the method effectively excludes the time error for responding to the interactive activity in the live program due to transmission delay.