Ex Parte Tseng et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

May 19, 2017

14025620 (P.T.A.B. May. 19, 2017)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O.Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
14/025,620 09/12/2013 Erick Tseng 26295-24456/US 6117
87851 7590 05/23/2017
Faoehnnk/Fen wi ok
EXAMINER
Silicon Valley Center LE, JESSICA N
801 California Street
Mountain View, CA 94041 ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2157
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
05/23/2017 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
ptoc @ fenwick.com
fwfacebookpatents @ fenwick.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte ERICK TSENG and LUKE SHEPARD
Appeal 2016-001881
Application 14/025,62c1
Technology Center 2100
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, NORMAN H. BEAMER, and
JAMES W. DEJMEK, Administrative Patent Judges.
DEJMEK, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final Rejection of
claims 1—21. We have jurisdiction over the pending claims under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b).
We affirm.
1 Appellants identify Facebook, Inc. as the real party in interest. App. Br. 2.
Appeal 2016-001881
Application 14/025,620
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellants’ claimed invention is directed to “synchronizing and
organizing contact information received from multiple sources.” Spec. 12.
According to the Specification, updates to contact information are based on
the reliability of that information. Spec. 16.
Claim 1 is representative of the subject matter on appeal and is
reproduced below with the disputed limitation emphasized in italics'.
1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
receiving contact information for a plurality of users from a
plurality of sources;
automatically determining reliability of the received contact
information using an algorithm implementing rules for prioritizing the
contact information based at least on sources of the received contact
information, the reliability indicating likelihood that the received
contact information is accurate',
associating the received contact information of each user in
connection with a source of the contact information in a record of a
database; and
sending contact updates to a plurality of client devices for
updating contact information in the client devices based on the
reliability of the received contact information and the contact
information in the database.
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Appeal 2016-001881
Application 14/025,620
The Examiner’s Rejections2
1. Claims 1—21 stand provisionally rejected under the doctrine of
obviousness-type double patenting over co-pending application
no. 12/975,201. Final Act. 4—9.3
2. Claims 1—3, 6—9, 12, 14—18, and 21 stand rejected under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Cheuoua (US 2010/0268655
Al; Oct. 21, 2010); Ratnakar (US 2009/0300010 Al; Dec. 3, 2009); and
Abemethy JR et al. (US 2009/0113313 Al; Apr. 30, 2009) (“Abemethy”).
Final Act. 10—16.
3. Claims 4, 5, 10, 19, and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Cheuoua, Ratnakar, Abemethy, and
Gupta et al. (US 2011/0307455 Al; Dec. 15, 2011) (“Gupta”). Final
Act. 16—18.4
2 In an amendment filed September 22, 2014, Appellants corrected the
numbering of duplicative claim 18 and subsequent claims 19 and 20 to
claims 19—21. The Final Office Action refers to the old claim numbering.
See Final Act. 11—18. Appellants do not assert any prejudice as a result of
this error. Accordingly, we treat the error as harmless. For purposes of this
Appeal, we have corrected the identification of claims.
3 Claims 11 and 13 have been objected to as being dependent upon a rejected
base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form. Final
Act. 18—19. Even if rewritten in independent form, claims 11 and 13 are still
subject to the Examiner’s rejection under the doctrine of obviousness-type
double patenting. See Adv. Act. 2.
4 Claim 10 is mistakenly omitted from the header for this rejection, but
otherwise appears in the body of the rejection. Final Act. 17—18. We find
the Examiner’s typographical error to be harmless.
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Appeal 2016-001881
Application 14/025,620
Issues on Appeal
1. Did the Examiner err in finding the combination of Cheuoua,
Ratnakar, and Abemethy—particularly Cheuoua—teaches or suggests “the
reliability indicating likelihood that the received information is accurate,” as
recited in claim 1?
2. Did the Examiner err in finding the combination of Cheuoua,
Ratnakar, and Abemethy—particularly Abemethy—teaches or suggests “an
algorithm implementing mles for prioritizing the contact information based
at least on sources of the received contact information,” as recited in claim
1?
ANALYSIS5
Rejections under doctrine of obviousness-type double patenting
Appellants do not address the Examiner’s provisional rejection of
claims 1—21 under the doctrine of obviousness-type double patenting.
Additionally, Appellants have not filed a terminal disclaimer.
“If a ground of rejection stated by the examiner is not addressed in the
appellant’s brief, appellant has waived any challenge to that ground of
rejection and the Board may summarily sustain it unless the examiner
subsequently withdrew the rejection in the examiner’s answer.” Manual of
Patent Examining Procedure (“MPEP”) § 1205.02 (9th ed., Rev. 11.2013,
Mar. 2014). Accordingly, we summarily sustain the Examiner’s provisional
5 Throughout this Decision, we have considered the Appeal Brief, filed
April 24, 2015 (“App. Br.”); the Reply Brief, filed November 24, 2015
(“Reply Br.”); the Examiner’s Answer, mailed October 5, 2015 (“Ans.”);
and the Final Office Action, mailed January 15, 2015 (“Final Act.”), from
which this Appeal is taken.
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Application 14/025,620
rejection of claims 1—21 under the doctrine of obviousness-type double
patenting.6
Rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
Appellants assert Cheuoua fails to teach a reliability indicating the
likelihood that the received information is accurate, as required by claim 1.
App. Br. 6—8; Reply Br. 2-4. In particular, Appellants argue the Examiner
erred by conflating the trustworthiness of a user (as in Cheuoua) with the
reliability of the received information (i.e., the trustworthiness of the
information), as claimed. Reply Br. 2.
Cheuoua is generally directed to “provid[ing] feedback for social
interactions.” Cheuoua 12. In order to provide such feedback, Cheuoua
gathers and analyzes various social networking information and interactions,
including contact information of user’s that generate the information or
interactions. Cheuoua 18—24. Cheuoua teaches the user may create a
trusted contact profile, wherein the list of trusted contacts may be selected,
updated or modified based on “personal knowledge, perceived knowledge,
desired contacts, recommendations, and the like.” Cheuoua 126. Further,
Cheuoua teaches “[t]he trusted contacts mechanism which allows users to
provide information about other users on their own terms helps to ensure
that the information gathered is significant and reliable, which allows a
6 We note application no. 12/975,201 has matured into U.S. Patent
No. 8,566,328 B2. “A provisional double patenting rejection will be
converted into a double patenting rejection when the first application, which
is the basis for the rejection, publishes as an application publication or issues
as a patent.” MPEP § 1504.06. We leave it to the Examiner to revise the
rejection, as appropriate.
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Application 14/025,620
better accuracy in the computation of the social capital 234 and social
indicators 232.” Cheuoua 135 (emphasis added).
The Examiner finds Cheuoua’s teaching of a trusted contacts
mechanism and trust indicator teach or suggest a reliability indicating a
likelihood the received contact information is accurate. Ans. 13—15. As set
forth in Cheuoua, use of the trusted contacts mechanism “helps to ensure the
information gathered is significant and reliable.” Ans. 14 (emphasis
omitted) (quoting Cheuoua 135). Further, the Examiner finds the trust
indicator is determined on a number of factors including the groups to which
users belong, feedback from other users, and a depth and accuracy of
knowledge the user has regarding others or that others have of the user.
Ans. 14 (citing Cheuoua 137). Thus, the Examiner finds the trust of the
user reasonably suggests the information provided by the user is also
trustworthy (i.e., reliable). Ans. 14.
When construing claim terminology during prosecution before the
Office, claims are to be given their broadest reasonable interpretation
consistent with the Specification, reading claim language in light of the
Specification as it would be interpreted by one of ordinary skill in the art.
In re Am. Acad. ofSci. Tech. Ctr., 367 F.3d 1359, 1364 (Fed. Cir. 2004).
We are mindful, however, that limitations are not to be read into the claims
from the Specification. In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 1184 (Fed.
Cir. 1993).
The Specification describes, inter alia, a ranking module for assigning
and storing the reliability of the various sources. Spec. 141. A
prioritization scheme used by the ranking module may determine:
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Application 14/025,620
[CJontact information provided by a person closer to the user is
more likely to be accurate compared to contact information
provided by a person having no relationship or a limited
relationship with the user. The closeness of the user to a person
may be determined based on a social map database 246 available
from a social networking service.
Spec. 142. Thus, similar to Cheuoua, Appellants’ Specification discloses an
approach to assessing the accuracy (i.e., reliability) of contact information
from a user may be based in part on the relationship between the users.
Accordingly, we agree with the Examiner that Cheuoua teaches or suggests
“the reliability indicating likelihood that the received contact information is
accurate,” as recited in claim 1.
Additionally, Appellants argue the Examiner erred in finding
Abemethy teaches an algorithm implementing rules for prioritizing contact
information based on sources of the received contact information. App.
Br. 8—9; Reply Br. 4. Specifically, Appellants assert Abemethy prioritizes
received contact information based on metadata and not based on sources of
the received information. App. Br. 8—9; Reply Br. 4 (citing Abemethy
1136, 46).
Abemethy is generally directed to “updating contact information
according to metadata associated with a virtual world.” Abemethy | 6. In a
disclosed scenario, Abemethy discloses users (i.e., players) in a virtual
world (i.e., game), that otherwise may not communicate with each other,
may desire to communicate with each other using real life devices while
logged into the virtual environment to facilitate game play and interaction.
Abemethy || 4—5, 40. Accordingly, Abemethy discloses:
In response to an avatar of a first user interacting with an avatar
of a second user in a virtual world, information comprising a
name of the avatar of the second user and metadata associated
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with the avatar of the second user is sent to the first user. In
response to receiving the information, contact information
associated with the name of the avatar of the second user is
determined. The contact information is organized based on the
metadata to form organized contact information.
Abemethy | 6. In a disclosed embodiment, Abemethy discloses updating
contact information of a user’s cell phone with the contact information of
other players (i.e., avatars) to reflect the user’s current situation in the virtual
world. Abemethy 133. Further, Abemethy discloses the use of mles “to
prioritize the contact information based on the metadata and to determine
what speed dial setting the contact information is assigned to and if the
contact information and speed dial setting should be assigned as part of a
specific group.” Abemethy 147.
As set forth in the Final Office Action, the Examiner relies on
paragraphs 46 and 47 of Abemethy to teach, inter alia, an algorithm
implementing mles for prioritizing contact information. Final Act. 13.
Paragraph 47 of Abemethy discloses avatars in a virtual world interact with
other avatars, sending the avatar’s name and associated metadata to a client.
Thus, in response to Appellants’ argument, the Examiner finds the client
avatars of Abemethy are interpreted as the claimed sources. Ans. 15.
Contrary to Appellants’ assertion that “[njowhere in Abemethy does it
appear to describe avatars as being sources of contact information” (Reply
Br. 4), we agree with the Examiner that the metadata comprising contact
information is associated with the avatar. See, e.g., Abemethy || 47, 53
(“[information comprising metadata associated with the avatar and the
avatar’s name of the second user are sent to the first user”). Because the
mles to organize contact information is in relation to the received metadata
(see Abemethy 146), and the metadata is associated with the avatars (i.e.,
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Application 14/025,620
the source of the metadata), we find Abemethy teaches or suggests the rules
for prioritizing contact information is at least based on the sources of the
received contact information.
For the reasons discussed supra, we are unpersuaded of Examiner
error. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of independent
claim 1. For similar reasons, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of
independent claims 16 and 21, which recite similar limitations and were not
argued separately. See App. Br. 9. Additionally, we sustain the Examiner’s
rejections of claims 2—10, 12, 14, 15, and 17—20, which depend therefrom
and were not argued separately. See App. Br. 9.
DECISION
We summarily affirm the Examiner’s decision provisionally rejecting
claims 1—21 under the doctrine of obviousness-type double patenting.
We affirm the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1—10, 12, and 14—
21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv). See 37
C.F.R. § 41.50(f).
AFFIRMED
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