Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

James E Allard

David Hendler Sloo

Steven Mark Drucker

Curtis Glenn Wong

Todd E Holmdahl

Seth B Pollack

Dawson Yee

James Charles Finger, Ii

David S Stutz

Nicholas Robert Baker

Jeffrey David Henshaw

Chad W Royal

David Alles

Adam Tipton Berns

Kyle W Geiger

Vincent Fernandes

David Rogers Treadwell, Iii

Oliver R Roup

John F Ludeman

David R Dickman

Luis Fernando Abdala

Kerry S Schwartz

Andrew David Wilson

James Morris Alkove

Pradeep Bahl

Kathleen Patricia Mulcahy

Cesare John Saretto

Murali R Krishnan

Henry L Sanders

Hadi Partovi

Michael W Thomas

Mark T Anders

Julio Estrada

Victor Keith Blanco

Douglas C Hebenthal

Anton O Andrews

Yu-ting Kuo

James Nicholas Helm

Tracy Sharpe

Eric Robert Berman

David L Kaplan

Stephen Proteau

James C Stewart

Michael Howard

Erik Jon Snapper

Bharat Shyam

Clint C Jorgenson

Kim A Stebbens

Jeffrey S Stone

Lei Jin

Julian Jiggins

Andrew David Sigal

Steven J Freedman

Frank Z Chang

David M Thompson

Michael H Cohen

Nicholas C Baker

Douglas C Henbenthal

Cameron Ferroni

Sophia Chung

Systems and methods are disclosed for customizing a user's experience with an application such as a search engine application. The user's experience is customized based on inferring a mood and/or interests of the user at least in part from an analysis of the user's posts on one or more social media sites. The search engine application is configured to include a user-following engine which follows a user's activities on social media websites. By tracking a user's posts and other activity on social media websites, and possibly those of his or her friends, the user-following engine is able to draw inferences about a user, including for example the user's emotional state, current trending interests, future plans, likes/dislikes and aspirations. The user-following engine may then customize the user's search experience based on these drawn inferences.

Following online social behavior to enhance search experience

The claimed subject matter relates to an architecture that can facilitate rich interaction with and/or management of environmental components included in an environment. The architecture can exist in whole or in part in a housing that can resemble a wand or similar object. The architecture can utilize one or more sensor from a collection of sensors to determine an orientation or gesture in connection with the wand, and can further issue an instruction to update a state of an environmental component based upon the orientation. In addition, the architecture can include an advisor component to provide contextual and/or comprehensive guidance in an intuitive manner.

Magic wand

The claimed subject matter relates to various architectures that can, inter alia, facilitate creation of a synch file as well as facilitate interpretation of the synch file. Both creation and interpretation can be accomplished in conjunction with an original media asset. The synch file can include transformation commands that can operate on a presentation of the asset rather than upon the asset itself. Accordingly, what is actually perceived by a content consumer during a presentation of the asset need not be exactly what the asset creator fixed in a tangible medium. Rather, the content consumer can observe a derivative media presentation based upon interpretation of the synch file.

Non-destructive media presentation derivatives

A client device may receive a request from a remote control device to capture a still image from content in a broadcast received at the client device. The client device may capture the still image from the content in the broadcast responsive to the request. The still image is transmitted for receipt and display at the remote control device. Image data is received from the remote control device that includes a portion of the still image displayed at the remote control device. The portion of the still image is selected by a user via a user interface output at the remote control device and includes an object to be identified using image recognition.

Techniques to consume content and metadata

Content and metadata associated with the content may be provided to a number of users. The content may be displayed on a display device while the metadata may be transmitted to a remote device corresponding to a receiving user. The user may further request desired information or metadata pertaining to the content and the requested information or metadata may be transmitted to the user's remote device. Different users may request different information on the same or different objects being displayed or presented on a display device. Each requesting user may receive requested information on the same or different objects via corresponding remote devices.

A media content programming, delivery, and consumption model is provided by which consumers can receive programming that is personalized to their tastes and interests and discover new media content that they will likely enjoy, without having to put in a lot of effort or needing to be technically adept. The received media content programming can then be played on a PC or portable media player. Consumers can access the media content programming from a cloud-based service with the same ease as tuning to a radio station, and then may simply enjoy the programming without needing to take any additional steps. However, unlike traditional linear programming, the programming here is curated so that the delivered content is highly relevant to the consumer. Navigation within a programmed sequence is enabled by skipping ahead or going back in a playlist, and consumers can learn more about particular content by interacting with rich metadata.

Media content programming, delivery, and consumption

The claimed subject matter relates to a first architecture that can create an intensity map based upon intensity scores, and to a second architecture that can provide intensity scores and can request and receive the intensity map. Intensity scores can relate to an approval or a level of satisfaction of a current location of a user and can be conveniently provided, in some cases with a single keystroke (e.g., 0-9 from a conventional cell phone keypad) by, say, mobile device users. Numerous intensity scores can be received and aggregated to produce an intensity map of a given area or region. Portions of the intensity map can be provided to requesting devices, potentially filtered based upon a variety of criteria. As a result, the intensity map can provide in substantially real-time a visual indication of locations or entities that might be interesting to explore.

Intensity-based maps

A portable media player is configured with a flip form factor in which a flip cover is hingedly fixed to a main body portion of the player. The flip cover rotates about the hinge between open positions that expose the display screen and user controls of the player and a closed position that covers that screen and controls to keep them clean and protected against damage when the player is being used or transported. The flip cover includes a set of secondary user controls on its exterior surface so that the user may operate the player when the flip cover is in its closed position. The hinge is configured to provide sufficient frictional torque over its angular range of motion to enable the flip cover to operate as a built-in display stand to angle the display screen for comfortable viewing. The flip cover further provides additional surface area for personalization.

Portable media player having a flip form factor

The claimed subject matter relates to an architecture that can obtain biometric data from a user as the user interacts with a device. Based upon the obtained biometric data, the architecture can determine an identity of the user and automatically apply settings associated with that particular user to the device. The settings can relate to a physical configuration of the device (or aspects, features, and/or peripherals of the device), as well as to a data set employed by the device (or components of the device). As such, a user of the device can benefit from enhanced efficiency, utility, and/or convenience.

Automatic configuration of devices based on biometric data

The apparent speed with which a media work is ripped to copy the work into a visible store is substantially reduced. When the media work is played, its content is cached onto a persistent, fast access storage media. If the user subsequently decides to rip the media work, the content of the cache is copied to a visible store in substantially less time than would be required to play the media work and convert it. The user thus perceives that the media work is ripped in a substantially shorter time, compared to that required for ripping the media work in a conventional manner. The ripping process may encode or transform the format of the content to a desired format for use within the visible store. Constraints may be imposed by the user to limit the cache, or the caching process may be hidden from the user.

Media cache control interface

In accordance with one aspect of saving audio source identifiers for soundtracks in a gaming system, an audio track is obtained from an audio source and the audio track is saved so that a copy of the audio track is available when the audio source is no longer accessible to a game console. The audio track is at least part of a user-created soundtrack and/or a user-selected soundtrack. The identifier of the audio source is also saved, and when a database containing meta data associated with the audio track is available, the meta data associated with the audio track is obtained from the database, based at least in part on the identifier saved on the storage device, and the obtained meta data is stored.

Saving audio source identifiers for soundtracks in a gaming system

Use of a media cache for subsequent copying acceleration

A system and method is provided for learning data values over time as they are entered by a user on a form such as a web page form. An Internet web browser can be modified to suggest previously used data values for any form field that is the same as or similar to a previously used form field. Application programs that use the web browser can gain access to previously used form field values even if they have no knowledge of the field names. Software in a web browser associates field names across different Universal Resource Locators (URLs), so that when a user enters a value into a field (e.g., username) at a first web site, that same value can be automatically suggested when the user displays a different form on a different web site that uses the same field name.

System and method for populating forms with previously used data values

Growing community of inventors

Seattle, WA, United States of America

James E Allard