Ex Parte Yu et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jan 30, 2017

13519406 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 30, 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.
13/519,406 06/27/2012 Kuifei Yu NC70741US 3830
10949 7590
Nokia Corporation and Alston & Bird LLP
c/o Alston & Bird LLP
Bank of America Plaza, 101 South Tryon Street
Suite 4000
Charlotte, NC 28280-4000
EXAMINER
HOULIHAN, STEPHEN J
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2451
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/01/2017 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):
u sptomail @ alston .com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte KUIFEI YU, JIAN MA,
CHUNLIANG BI, and LI HAN
Appeal 2015-008299
Application 13/519,4061
Technology Center 2400
Before ALLEN R. MacDONALD, KEVIN C. TROCK, and
SHARON FENICK, Administrative Patent Judges.
FENICK, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s Non-Final Rejection of claims 33—35, 37-44, 46, 47, and 49-52,
all the pending claims in the present application. (Appeal Br. 9.) We have
jurisdiction over the appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b)(1).
We REVERSE.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Nokia Corporation.
(Appeal Br. 2.)
Appeal 2015-008299
Application 13/519,406
Invention
Appellants’ invention relates to the receipt of broadcasted information
items at a device, the determination of “fondness” of the information items
to a user of the device, and the selection of a subset of the items to be stored
in a memory of the device at least partly based on the determined fondness.
(Spec. Abstract.)
Illustrative Claim
Claim 33, reproduced below is illustrative:
33. A method comprising:
receiving a plurality of broadcasted information items in a
client device;
determining fondness F of the information items to the
user of the client device according to an equation F =a x Wcategory
+ (1- a) x wmf0;
wherein Wcategory is a weight of a category to which the
information item belongs, Winf0 is a weight of the information
item, and a represents a user specific difference influence,
wherein the difference influence is a differential weight applied
to the weight factors Wcategory and Winf0; and
selecting a subset of the information items to be stored in
a memory of the client device at least partly based on the
determined fondness of the information items.
Rejections
Appellants appeal the following rejections:
Claims 33, 37, 42, 44, 46, 47, and 49 are rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Svendsen (US 7,680,959 B2; iss. Mar. 16,
2010), Qian et al. (Chinese Pat. Pub. 1852124 A, pub. October 25, 2006)
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Appeal 2015-008299
Application 13/519,406
(“Qian”)2, and Basak et al (US 2003/0208399 Al; pub. Nov. 6, 2003)
(“Basak”). (Non-Final Action 3—13.)
Claims 34, 35, 38, 39, and 43 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Svendsen, Qian, Basak, and Farineau et al. (US
2004/0033777 Al; pub. Feb. 19, 2004) (“Farineau”). (Non-Final Action 13—
17.)
Claims 41 and 52 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Svendsen, Qian, Basak, and Cox et al. (US 8,490,136 B2;
iss. July 16, 2013). (Non-Final Action 17—18.)
Claims 50 and 51 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Svendsen, Qian, Basak, and Guthrie et al. (US
2008/0086602 Al; iss. Apr. 10, 2008) (“Guthrie”). (Non-Final Action 18—
20.)
Claim 40 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Svendsen, Qian, Basak, Farineau and Guthrie. (Non-Final Action 20-21.)
ANALYSIS
The Examiner finds that the combination of Svendsen, Qian, and
Basak teaches or suggests the limitations of claim 33, including
“determining fondness F of the information items to the user of the client
device according to an equation F =a x Wcategory + (1- a) x Wm,” “wherein
Wcategory is a weight of a category to which the information item belongs,
Winfo is a weight of the information item, and a represents a user specific
difference influence, wherein the difference influence is a differential weight
applied to the weight factors Wcategory and Winf0 ” (Non-Final Action 3—5.)
2 We reference an English translation prepared for the USPTO by Schreiber
Translations, Inc. and made of record Feb. 6, 2014.
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Appeal 2015-008299
Application 13/519,406
Specifically, the Examiner finds that Qian teaches or suggests determining
the fondness of an information item according to an equation in which the
fondness is related to the weight of the category of the information item
(Wcategory) and the weight of the information item (Wmf0). {Id. at 3 4.) The
Examiner further finds that the user specific difference influence a providing
a differential weight to the Wcategory and Winf0 is taught or suggested by
Basak’s teachings that, for an item “book” in category “gift item”, “[wjeight
of subcategory book takes into account comparison of category gift item
weight.” (Id. at 3, 5.) The different weighting assigned to these weight
factors in Basak is analogized by the Examiner to the difference influence a
in the claimed fondness equation for F. (Id. )
Appellants argue that:
While [Basak’s] “interest” weight is a user defined value, the
interest weight cannot reasonably be interpreted as the claimed
“differential weight” as the differential weight “a” is applied
formulaically as F =a x Wcategory + (1- a) x Wmf0. The degree to
which the differential weight applies to is Winf0 is inversely
proportional to the degree to which the differential weight
applies to Wcategory • Said differently, as alpha increases, the
effect of Wcategory on the fondness factor F increases while the
effect of Winfo decreases.
(Appeal Br. 11—12.)
Basak discloses that subcategories of items (such as books) inherit the
weight of broader parent category (such as gift items). (Basak | 90.)
However, the Examiner does not show or explain how Basak teaches or
suggests the inverse relationship shown in the claimed fondness formula —
where the fondness is based on adding the weight of the category, multiplied
by the user specific difference influence a, to the weight of the information
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Application 13/519,406
item, weighted to an inverse extent (multiplied by 1 - a) to yield the fondness
F.
In Basak, a user interest hierarchy is a tree with values assigned at
each node, between zero and one, to specify the degree of the user’s interest
in the category represented by the node. (Basak || 56—62, 67.)
These values (each denoted gk, where k is the node) are used with numeric
values Wklj which denote the degree of similarity between attributes of two
products at the nodes. {Id. Tflf 49-52, 90-91.) The user interests at each
node are used to determine the total degree of user-specific similarity
between two products. {Id. ]Hf 90-91.) However, the given formula shows
that at each level of the node, the similarity is multiplied by the minimum
user interest value in the hierarchy at the node being considered or higher-
level nodes. {Id. at 91.) No indication exists in the Examiner’s citations
to Basak of an inverse contribution of one of the user interest values.
Thus, we agree with Appellants. The Examiner has not shown how
Basak teaches or suggests the claimed user specific difference influence
applied in a way in which it affects two factors in calculating fondness in
inversely proportional ways, as shown in the claimed fondness formula.
Because we agree with at least one dispositive argument advanced by
Appellants, we need not reach the merits of Appellants’ other arguments.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the Examiner’s obviousness rejection
of independent claim 33. Additionally, we do not sustain the rejections of
independent claim 42 and 46, or dependent claims 34, 35, 37-41, 43, 44, 47,
and 49—52, all argued in whole or in part on the same basis.
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Application 13/519,406
DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s § 103(a) rejections of claims 33—35, 37—
44, 46, 47, and 49—52 as obvious.
REVERSED
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