International Business Machines Corporation

Sirius Xm Radio Inc.

Sarnoff Corporation

Crystalmedia Technology, Inc.

Christopher Ward

Raymond Lowe

Melissa J Buco

Rong Nickle Chang

Laura Zaihua Luan

Larisa Shwartz

Charles W Christine

Robert Norman Hurst

Genady Grabarnik

Charles M Wine

Deepen Sinha

Naga A Ayachitula

David Matthew Loewenstern

Mark Kalman

Chunqiang Tang

Jean-Marc Berthaud

Joel D Dalsky

Shih-Chung Fang

Lee Tsiao

Lalitha P Kamesam

Philip Shi-lung Yu

Joel Leonard Wolf

Maheswaran Surendra

Brian L Peterson

Gary Hughes

Stefan Tai

Xiaobing Lee

Glenn Clement Aikens

Clifford Arthur Pecota

Steve Weinberger

Markus Klems

Sam Shixiong Yang

David B Homan

Birgit Monika Pfitzmann

Jarir Kamel Chaar

John Joseph Rofrano

Daniela Rosu

Paul Wallace Lyons

Kamal Bhattacharya

Krishna Sastry Garimella

Bradford Austin Fisher

Kunwadee Sripanidkulchai

Guerney Douglass Holloway Hunt

Yarden Nir-Buchbinder

William Edward Stephens

Allen M Gilbert

James R Barros

Maheswaran Surenda

Gabriela P Marcu

Christian Bartsch

Miroslaw Kalinowski

Larisa Schwartz

Systems and methods are presented for cross-fading (or other multiple clip processing) of information streams on a user or client device, such as a telephone, tablet, computer or MP3 player, or any consumer device with audio playback. Multiple clip processing can be accomplished at a client end according to directions sent from a service provider that specify a combination of (i) the clips involved; (ii) the device on which the cross-fade or other processing is to occur and its parameters; and (iii) the service provider system. For example, a consumer device with only one decoder, can utilize that decoder (typically hardware) to decompress one or more elements that are involved in a cross-fade at faster than real time, thus pre-fetching the next element(s) to be played in the cross-fade at the end of the currently being played element. The next elements(s) can, for example, be stored in an input buffer, then decoded and stored in a decoded sample buffer, all prior to the required presentation time of the multiple element effect. At the requisite time, a client device component can access the respective samples of the decoded audio clips as it performs the cross-fade, mix or other effect. Such exemplary embodiments use a single decoder and thus do not require synchronized simultaneous decodes.

Systems and methods for implementing cross-fading, interstitials and other effects downstream

Systems and methods are provided to implement and facilitate cross-fading, interstitials and other effects/processing of two or more media elements in a personalized media delivery service to experience consistent high quality. The effects or crossfade processing may occur on the broadcast/publisher/server-side, but may be personalized to a specific user, allowing a personalized experience for each user, where the processing burden is minimized on the downstream side/client device. This approach enables a consistent user experience, independent of client device capabilities. A large-scale personalized content delivery service may be implemented by limiting the processing to the first and last chunks of any file. In exemplary embodiments, this type of processing may easily be accommodated in cloud computing technology, where first and last files are extracted and processed within the cloud to meet the required load. Processing may be done locally, by the broadcaster, with sufficient processing power to manage peak load.

Server side crossfading for progressive download media

Systems and methods are presented for efficient cross-fading of compressed domain information streams on a user/client device. Exemplary systems may provide cross-fade between AAC/Enhanced AAC Plus information streams, between MP3 information streams, or between information streams of unmatched formats. These systems are distinguished in that cross-fade is directly applied to compressed bitstreams so a single decode operation is performed on the resulting bitstream. Thus, a set of frames from each input stream associated with the time interval in which a cross fade is decoded, and combined and recoded with a cross fade or other effect now in the compressed bitstream. Once sent through the client device's decoder, the user hears the transitional effect. The only input data that is decoded and processed is that associated with the portion of each stream used the crossfade, blend or other interstitial, and thus the vast majority of input streams are left compressed.

Systems and methods for implementing efficient cross-fading between compressed audio streams

Systems, methods and apparatus for generating music recommendations based on combining song and user influencers with channel rule characterizations are presented. Such systems and methods output a playlist, which may be delivered as an information stream of audio on a user or client device, such as a telephone or smartphone, tablet, computer or MP3 player, or any consumer device with audio play capabilities. The playlist may comprise various individual audio clips of one genre or type, such as songs, or of multiple types, such as music, talk, sports and comedy. The individual audio clips may be ordered by a sequencer, which, using large amounts of data, generates both (i) user independent and (i) user dependent influencer weightings for each clip, and then combines all of such influencer weightings into a combined play weighting W for a given audio clip, for a given user. Taking the various play weightings W(Ui, Sj), a set of rules may be applied to generate a set of candidates C(Ui, Sj, Tk) to play to User j in each of Time slots k through k+m. Real time playlists may then be generated from the m sets of candidates by application of a set of rules, which may be channel rules, for example. The data used to generate influencer weightings may include user-specific data including preferences and detailed listening history, audio clip specific data, and data gleaned from various Internet accessible sources, including social media. In some embodiments a feedback loop may be implemented to gauge the accuracy of the dynamically generated playlists and modify the influencer weightings in response.

Systems, methods and apparatus for generating music recommendations based on combining song and user influencers with channel rule characterizations

In exemplary embodiments of the present invention systems and methods are provided to implement and facilitate cross-fading, interstitials and other effects/processing of two or more media elements in a personalized media delivery service so that each client or user has a consistent high quality experience. The effects or crossfade processing can occur on the broadcast, publisher or server-side, but can still be personalized to a specific user, thus still allowing a personalized experience for each individual user, in a manner where the processing burden is minimized on the downstream side or client device. This approach enables a consistent user experience, independent of client device capabilities, both static and dynamic. The cross-fade can be implemented after decoding the relevant chunks of each component clip, processing, recoding and rechunking, or, in a preferred embodiment, the cross-fade or other effect can be implemented on the relevant chunks to the effect in the compressed domain, thus obviating any loss of quality by re-encoding. A large scale personalized content delivery service can be implemented by limiting the processing to essentially the first and last chunks of any file, since there is no need to processing the full clip. In exemplary embodiments of the present invention this type of processing can easily be accommodated in cloud computing technology, where the first and last files may be conveniently extracted and processed within the cloud to meet the required load. Processing may also be done locally, for example, by the broadcaster, with sufficient processing power to manage peak load.

Systems and methods for implementing crossfading, interstitials and other effects downstream

Systems and methods are presented for efficient cross-fading (or other multiple clip processing) of compressed domain information streams on a user or client device, such as a telephone, tablet, computer or MP3 player, or any consumer device with audio playback. Exemplary implementation systems may provide cross-fade between AAC/Enhanced AAC Plus (EAACPlus) information streams or between MP3 information streams or even between information streams of unmatched formats (e.g. AAC to MP3 or MP3 to AAC). Furthermore, these systems are distinguished by the fact that cross-fade is directly applied to the compressed bitstreams so that a single decode operation may be performed on the resulting bitstream. Moreover, using the described methods, similar cross fade in the compressed domain between information streams utilizing other formats of compression, such as, for example, MP2, AC-3, PAC, etc. can also be advantageously implemented. Thus, in exemplary embodiments of the present invention a set of frames from each input stream associated with the time interval in which a cross fade is decoded, and combined and recoded with a cross fade or other effect now in the compressed bitstream. Once sent through the client device's decoder, the user hears the transitional effect. The only input data that is decoded and processed is that associated with the portion of each stream used in the crossfade, blend or other interstitial, and thus the vast majority of the input streams are left compressed.

A method and system for managing at least one service level of a service provided by a service provider to a customer of the service provider under a service level agreement. The service level agreement is a contract between the service provider and the customer. Measurement data and at least one adjudication element associated with a service level of the at least one service level are adjudicated in accordance with the at least one adjudication element such that the adjudication generates a respective adjudicated data point for each data point of the measurement data. The measurement data includes at least one data point measured on a respective resource that provides the service. A modification history chain is generated by: initially establishing the modification history chain as being empty; and adding an identification of each adjudicated element applied to each data point of the measurement data to the modification history chain.

Managing service levels provided by service providers

A system and method for reducing service latency includes dividing an information technology service for a customer into an infrastructure management service and a data management service. Data associated with the information technology service is stored in a backup memory. A set of infrastructure images related to the information technology service is stored at a cloud service provider. The infrastructure images are updated with software updates and hardware updates, as needed, and the data associated with the information technology service is updated through backup and restore mechanisms. The set of infrastructure images that have been updated with data with latest updates are started for recovery, continuity, testing, etc.

System and method for reducing latency time with cloud services

Systems and methods are provided to implement and facilitate cross-fading, interstitials and other effects/processing of two or more media elements in a personalized media delivery service. Effects or crossfade processing can occur on the broadcast, publisher or server-side, but can still be personalized to a specific user, in a manner that minimizes processing on the downstream side or client device. The cross-fade can be implemented after decoding, processing, re-encoding, and rechunking the relevant chunks of each component clip. Alternatively, the cross-fade or other effect can be implemented on the relevant chunks in the compressed domain, thus obviating any loss of quality by re-encoding. A large scale personalized content delivery service can limit the processing to essentially the first and last chunks of any file, there being no need to process the full clip.

Growing community of inventors

Glen Ridge, NJ, United States of America

Christopher Ward