Dynamic Playlist Segmentation for Real-Time Content Updates

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Solution Overview

Problem

Existing digital media delivery systems lack the ability to dynamically update non-entertainment content, such as advertisements, in real-time or near real-time during media streaming sessions, leading to inefficiencies and a failure to adapt to user changes or location shifts.

Innovation Solution

The system segments media content playlists into smaller segments, allowing for dynamic insertion and updating of non-entertainment content by appending references that point to variable content, enabling real-time or near real-time updates based on user feedback and changes, without requiring new playlist creation for each streaming session.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Adaptability or versatility

If a playlist is generated for media content with non-entertainment content, then the media content can be streamed with advertisements, but the playlist cannot be updated in real-time when user changes or location shifts occur

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvereal-time content update capabilityVSAvoidplaylist validity period

Core Design Contradiction:

Adaptability or versatilityVSDuration of action of stationary object

Solution Approach 1:

The playlist is divided into multiple segments, where each segment contains a portion of the media content and associated non-entertainment content. This segmentation enables independent updating of individual segments without requiring regeneration of the entire playlist, thus allowing real-time updates while maintaining playlist structure and reducing update overhead.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #1Segmentation

2Adaptability or versatility

If a new playlist is created for each streaming session to adapt to user changes, then content relevance improves, but the system complexity and processing overhead increase significantly

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvecontent personalization capabilityVSAvoidplaylist management complexity

Core Design Contradiction:

Adaptability or versatilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The playlist is pre-segmented into manageable portions with placeholder references for non-entertainment content. This preliminary structuring allows the system to perform minimal updates by only replacing specific segment references rather than regenerating entire playlists, reducing processing overhead while maintaining personalization capability.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

Instead of creating entirely new playlists for each session, the system creates copies or modifications of existing playlist segments. This approach reuses validated playlist structures and only updates necessary portions, significantly reducing system complexity and processing requirements compared to complete playlist regeneration.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #26Copying

3Manufacturing precision

If the entire playlist is regenerated to update non-entertainment content, then content accuracy improves, but the time required for updates increases

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvecontent insertion accuracyVSAvoidplaylist update time

Core Design Contradiction:

Manufacturing precisionVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The non-entertainment content references are extracted as separate, independently replaceable elements within the playlist structure. This extraction allows the system to update only the specific content references that need changing while leaving the rest of the playlist intact, ensuring accurate content insertion without the time cost of complete playlist regeneration.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Data Source

PatentUS9661050B2Systems and methods for segmentation of content playlist and dynamic content insertion

Publication Date: 2017.05.23 COX COMMUNICATIONS INC

AI summary

This disclosure describes systems, methods, and computer-readable media related to segmenting media content playlist for dynamic insertion of non-entertainment content during a streaming session.A request for media content associated with a streaming session in a network may be received from one or more client devices. In response to the received request, a media content playlist may be identified. In response to the received request, a non-entertainment playlist may be identified, where the non-entertainment playlist comprises one or more references pointing to one or more non-entertainment content, the one or more references including at least a first reference pointing to a first non-entertainment content and a second reference pointing to a second non-entertainment content. the media content playlist may be segmented into one or more segments including at least a first segment and a second segment. the first reference may be appended to the first segment and the second reference may be appended to the second segment. the first segment and the appended first reference may be transmitted for consumption by the one or more client devices. based at least in part on a received indication, it may be determined to update the second non-entertainment content with a third non-entertainment content using the second reference. the second non-entertainment content may be updated with the third non-entertainment content.