PTAB

IPR2014-01527

Amazon.com Inc v. Personalized Media Communications LLC

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Key Events
Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Method for Coordinating Display of Data with Mass Medium Programming
  • Brief Description: The ’243 patent describes a method for personalizing mass media programming, such as a television broadcast. In an exemplary embodiment, a subscriber station downloads and stores data of interest (e.g., a stock portfolio) from a remote database and, upon receiving a cueing signal from a second source (e.g., a television broadcast), coordinates the presentation of that data by superimposing it over the broadcast program.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Summers, Fedida, and Captioning Art - Claim 13 is obvious over Summers in view of Fedida and in combination with CBS, Blatt, or Millar.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Summers (Patent 4,306,250), Fedida (a series of articles from Wireless World), and one of CBS (1980 Rulemaking Petition), Blatt (an IEEE article), or Millar (U.K. Patent 1,370,535).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Summers disclosed a television receiver capable of displaying data received either through a television signal or from another source via a telephone line, such as the Viewdata system. Summers expressly referenced the Fedida articles, which described Viewdata’s two-way, query-response capabilities for retrieving data from a remote database, thereby teaching the storing, querying, and transmitting steps of claim 13. Summers further taught superimposing this data on a television picture (e.g., as subtitles), with the display coordinated by synchronization pulses from the broadcast signal. This combination, Petitioner asserted, met all limitations of claim 13.
    • Motivation to Combine: Petitioner contended that Summers itself suggested using its disclosed techniques for subtitles or closed captioning. A POSITA would combine Summers with the well-known closed captioning technology of CBS, Blatt, or Millar to enhance functionality. Furthermore, the CBS reference stated that any proposed captioning system should be compatible with videotex systems like Viewdata, providing an explicit reason to combine the teachings.
    • Expectation of Success: The express suggestion in Summers to apply its teachings to captioning, combined with the stated goal of compatibility in CBS, demonstrated that a POSITA would have had a high expectation of successfully implementing the combination.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Ciciora and Captioning Art - Claim 13 is obvious over Ciciora in view of CBS, Blatt, or Millar.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Ciciora (Patent 4,233,628) and one of CBS (1980 Rulemaking Petition), Blatt (an IEEE article), or Millar (U.K. Patent 1,370,535).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner asserted that Ciciora taught a teletext receiver that could obtain data via broadcast or telephone lines (explicitly mentioning Viewdata) and display it in a "mixed" mode, superimposed on the television video. The coordination of this mixed display was governed by a timing chain circuit that derived its input from the broadcast video signal. Petitioner argued this broadcast signal constituted the "second remote source" transmitting a signal that controls the coordination of the remotely-queried data with the mass media program, thus teaching all elements of the claim.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Ciciora with the advanced closed captioning technologies of CBS, Blatt, or Millar to enhance the user experience. For example, incorporating the control codes from the secondary references would allow for better timing, placement, and coloring of subtitles. Using Ciciora's Viewdata capability to download captions in advance would enable broadcasters to offer more languages and create a chargeable service.
    • Expectation of Success: Given that both Ciciora and the secondary references operated in the same technical field of displaying text over video, a POSITA would have found it straightforward to integrate the known captioning control signals into Ciciora’s system.

Ground 3: Anticipation/Obviousness over Reiter - Claim 13 is anticipated or obvious over Reiter and the knowledge of one of ordinary skill in the art.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Reiter (Patent 4,751,578).

  • Core Argument for this Ground:

    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued Reiter disclosed a system that enabled users to view television program guides on their screens. The system downloaded guide data from a remote central computer via a telephone "Tel-Link," which Petitioner contended inherently disclosed storing data at a remote source, receiving a query from the subscriber, and transmitting the data in response. Reiter then taught that the downloaded guide information is overlaid on the television picture based on a signal from a remote control. Petitioner asserted the remote control is a "second remote source" that transmits an instruct signal to coordinate the presentation of the downloaded data with the television program, meeting all limitations of claim 13.
    • Motivation to Combine: To the extent any limitation was found missing, Petitioner argued it would have been obvious for a POSITA to incorporate known Viewdata-style query methods to obtain the program information, as this was a standard approach for remote data retrieval at the time.

  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted an additional obviousness challenge based on Gargini (Patent 4,538,174) alone or in combination with the Chambers or Crowther publications.

4. Key Technical Contentions (Beyond Claim Construction)

  • Priority Date Entitlement: A central argument of the petition was that claim 13 of the ’243 patent was not entitled to the 1981 priority date of its parent application. Petitioner argued that the 1987 continuation-in-part application, from which the ’243 patent descends, introduced new matter by substantially rewriting and broadening the specification. Specifically, the definition of "programming" was expanded from just "television or radio" transmissions to "everything that is transmitted electronically," and the concept of transmitting only "a portion" of data in response to a query was added. Petitioner contended that because claim 13 relied on this new matter for support, its effective filing date could be no earlier than September 11, 1987, making intervening publications like Summers, Ciciora, and Reiter valid prior art.

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requested institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claim 13 of the ’243 patent as unpatentable.