Reconstructing Trick Play Activities from Video Offset Events
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing systems fail to accurately track and reconstruct trick play events such as fast-forward, rewind, and pause actions for recorded audio/video programs, especially when data is received out of order or missing, making it difficult to estimate the actual time consumers spend watching programs or advertisements.
Innovation Solution
A system and method that utilize time-stamped video offset events to reconstruct trick play activities by analyzing sequences of data points, merging additional information received after initial reconstruction attempts, and using progress ratios to determine the type of trick play action, ensuring completeness and accuracy of analytics.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If trick play actions (fast-forward, rewind, pause) are allowed for recorded programs, then consumer flexibility and control are improved, but accurate tracking of actual viewing time becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the playback session into distinct trick play actions (fast-forward, rewind, pause, play) by analyzing sequences of video offset events. Each trick play action is identified and measured separately, allowing accurate tracking of actual viewing time versus skipped content by breaking down the continuous playback into discrete measurable segments.
2Loss of energy
If data is collected at spaced intervals for playback analysis, then system resource usage is reduced, but completeness and accuracy of trick play reconstruction deteriorates when data is missing or out of order
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a feedback mechanism where additional video offset events received after initial reconstruction are re-analyzed and merged with the existing trick play action sequence. The system continuously monitors for new data and updates the reconstruction when additional events are received, improving completeness without requiring continuous high-resource data collection.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent performs preliminary reconstruction of trick play actions using available data at spaced intervals, creating an initial sequence that can be refined later. This preliminary action allows the system to provide immediate analytics with limited data while maintaining the option to improve accuracy when additional events are received.
3Measurement precision
If continuous monitoring of playback events is implemented, then accuracy of trick play detection is improved, but system complexity and computational load increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses periodic sampling of video offset events at predetermined intervals rather than continuous monitoring. This periodic approach maintains sufficient accuracy for detecting trick play actions while significantly reducing computational load and system complexity compared to continuous event-by-event analysis.
Data Source
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AI summary
A system and method for reconstructing trick play user activity are provided and include analyzing playback information of a recorded program during a playback session to identify trick play actions believed to occur during the playback session. The playback information includes a first sequence of separate video offset events associated with different points of time during the playback session at spaced intervals. For each adjacent pair of video offset events separated by one of the spaced intervals, a change of video offset is compared relative to a change of time to determine a type of trick play action occurring between the adjacent pair of video offset events. A sequence of trick play actions is reconstructed from the trick play actions identified. The method may include analyzing additional playback information and merging such information with the reconstructed sequence of trick play actions to further refine the reconstructed sequence.