[vdr] Tivo patent info

[jori.hamalainen at teliasonera.com]

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Converge! Network Digest  02-March-2005  Volume 12, Number 039 

TIVO GRANTED EIGHT NEW DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN PATENTS 
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) recently 
issued new patents to TiVo covering important aspects of DVR 
software and hardware design. TiVo also announced that it has 
obtained an exclusive license to an early DVR-related patent and 
has been granted Japanese and Chinese patents. Today's 
announcement brings TiVo's patent portfolio to 70 granted patents 
(domestic and foreign). In addition, TiVo has 106 domestic and 
foreign patent applications pending. Some of these include: 

* U.S. patent number 6,850,691, entitled Automatic Playback 
Overshoot Correction System, describing a system that 
compensates for a user's reaction time when the user stops 
fast-forwarding or rewinding through program material. 

* U.S. patent number 6,847,778, entitled Multimedia Visual 
Progress Indication System, which describes, among other 
things, methods for displaying a trick play bar to a user 
which visually indicates the amount of stored program 
material or the length of a recording session as well as 
the user's current position within the stored program 
material. 

* U.S. patent number 6,792,195, entitled Method and Apparatus 
Implementing Random Access and Time-Based Functions on a 
Continuous Stream of Formatted Digital Data, which 
describes methods of controlling streaming media in a 
digital device, including the functions that enable DVRs to 
pause live TV as well as rewind, fast-forward, play, play 
faster, play slower, and play in reverse television signals 
cached by the DVR. 

* TiVo has also acquired the exclusive right to license and 
enforce U.S. patent number 5,241,428 entitled Variable-
Delay Video Recorder known in the industry as the 
Goldwasser Patent. Filed in March 1991, the Goldwasser 
Patent is one of the earliest patents regarding digital 
video recorders of which TiVo is aware. This patent covers 
devices that permit the simultaneous recording and playback 
of video material with a variable time delay between 
recording and playback of a given video program segment.
 
http://www.tivo.com  
01-Mar-05