Verizon Patent and Licensing Inc.

Haiyan Zhou

Zhiying Jin

Haosheng Guo

Jianxiu Hao

Xuefeng Yao

Shuai Wu

Fang Zhu

Wenjie Liu

Juhong Liu

Sarma Pydipally

Jack Jianxiu Hao

Dahai Ren

Hong Xiao

Azim Nasir

Christopher L Helbling

Martin Busse

Robert C Baruch

Jimena Velarde

Gerald Honma

An exemplary method includes a remote support management system 1) receiving a television support request from a user of a television, 2) generating, in response to the television support request, a ticket identifier associated with the television support request, and 3) facilitating, in accordance with the ticket identifier, remote control of the television by a support technician by way of a computing device associated with the support technician. Corresponding methods and systems are also disclosed.

Methods and systems for facilitating remote control of a television by a support technician

A method and devices for obtaining metadata associated with programs from multiple metadata sources. Title metadata is compared to determine if any title metadata match. Transformation rules are applied to the title metadata when title metadata does not match with other title metadata. The transformation rules transform the title metadata into a common format. The title metadata is compared after transformation to determine whether the title metadata matches other title metadata. Title metadata that matches other title metadata, the metadata associated with a program is aggregated.

Rule-based metadata transformation and aggregation for programs

A video service provider system may include one or more devices. The one or more device may receive thumbnails of programs that are currently airing on a group of television channels and match the received thumbnails with metadata. The metadata may include information relating to at least one of the television channels or the programs. The one or more devices may further provide, to a remote device, a set of thumbnails, of the captured thumbnails, and the metadata matching the set of thumbnails. The remote device may make the set of thumbnails and the metadata available to a user.

Thumbnail publication

A system is configured to receive a portion of a word; retrieve a group of words matching the portion of the word; retrieve information associated with a set of words in the group, where the information, for a particular one of the words, indicates a measure of popularity of the particular word, geographic location information associated with the particular word, time information associated with the particular word, or user preference information associated with the particular word; rank the set of words based on the information; present a list of words from the set of words for display based on the ranking; receive selection of a word from the list of words; perform a search for television content based on the selected word to identify a group of television content; receive selection of television content from the group of television content; and present the selected television content for display.

Automated query generation for televison content searching

A method includes receiving viewership data associated with television contents; calculating one or more local boosting factors and a national boosting factor for each of the television contents based on the viewership data; applying boosting factor assignment heuristics to the one or more local and national boosting factors for each of the television contents; selecting one or more boosting factors based the applying of the boosting factor assignment heuristics for each of the television contents; and publishing the one or more boosting factors to one or more television distribution sites for each of the television contents.

Boosting factor for television content

A system may include a load balancer that includes a receiver configured to receive a first notification of voicemail message information associated with a voicemail mailbox. The system may also include a group of servers and each of the group of servers may include a receiver and a transmitter. The receiver may be configured to receive the first notification of the voicemail message information from the load balancer, and the transmitter may be configured to send a second notification of the voicemail message information to a communication device associated with the voicemail mailbox, wherein the second notification causes the communication device to determine whether to request a list of voicemail messages. The load balancer may also include a processor to select a first one of the plurality of servers and a transmitter to send the first notification to the first one of the plurality of servers.

Visual voicemail network architecture

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Winchester, MA, United States of America

Haiyan Zhou