System and method for real-time media searching and alerting

Abstract

A method and system for continually storing and cataloguing streams of broadcast content, allowing real-time searching and real-time results display of all catalogued video. A bank of video recording devices store and index all video content on any number of broadcast sources. This video is stored along with the associated program information such as program name, description, airdate and channel. A parallel process obtains the text of the program, either from the closed captioning data stream, or by using a speech-to-text system. Once the text is decoded, stored, and indexed, users can then perform searches against the text, and view matching video immediately along with its associated text and broadcast information. Users can retrieve program information by other methods, such as by airdate, originating station, program name and program description. An alerting mechanism scans all content in real-time and can be configured to notify users by various means upon the occurrence of a specified search criteria in the video stream. The system is preferably designed to be used on publicly available broadcast video content, but can also be used to catalog private video, such as conference speeches or audio-only content such as radio broadcasts.

1 . A media monitoring system for receiving at least one video channel having corresponding closed captioned text in real time, comprising: 
 a media management system for continuously storing all the data of the at least one video channel locally and for extracting the corresponding closed captioned text into decoded text, the decoded text being provided to a global storage database, the media management system having 
 a search engine for comparing the decoded text against search terms to provide matching results, and  
 an indexing engine for indexing units of the decoded text by time; and  
   a user access system for receiving and displaying the matching results, the user access system transmitting a request for stored data corresponding to specific units of the decoded text from the media management system, the media management system providing said stored data corresponding to specific units of the decoded text in response to the request.    
   
   
       2 . The media monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein the media management system includes 
 a media server pod for receiving the at least one video channel and for locally storing the data of the at least one video channel, the media server pod including a close caption decoder for extracting the corresponding closed captioning text into the decoded text,    an index server for receiving the decoded text from the media server pod over a first network, the index servers having the index engine, and    a web server including the global storage database for storing the decoded text received from the index servers over a second network, the web servers having the search engine and a search term database for storing the search terms.    
   
   
       3 . The media monitoring system of  claim 2 , wherein the media server pod includes 
 at least one media source for providing the at least one video channel, and    a media server in direct communication with the at least one media source for receiving the at least one video channel, the media server having a decoder for extracting the corresponding closed captioned text into decoded text from a vertical blanking interval of the at least one video channel, the media server including mass storage media for storing the data of the at least one video channel.    
   
   
       4 . The media monitoring system of  claim 3 , wherein the media server includes a parser for generating the stored data corresponding to specific units of the decoded text.  
   
   
       5 . The media monitoring system of  claim 3 , wherein the media server pod includes a plurality of media sources for providing a corresponding number of video channels.  
   
   
       6 . The media monitoring system of  claim 3 , wherein the media server includes a video/audio compression system for compressing the data of the at least one video channel prior to storage onto the mass storage media.  
   
   
       7 . The media monitoring system of  claim 6 , wherein the media server includes a speech-to-text system for converting audio signals corresponding to the at least one video channel into text.  
   
   
       8 . The media monitoring system of  claim 6 , wherein the media server includes a text detector for detecting an absence of the corresponding closed captioned text, the text detector generating an alert indicating the absence of the corresponding closed captioned text.  
   
   
       9 . The media monitoring system of  claim 3 , wherein the media source includes one of a satellite receiver, a cable box, an antenna, and a digital radio source.  
   
   
       10 . The media monitoring system of  claim 2 , wherein the index server includes the global storage database.  
   
   
       11 . The media monitoring system of  claim 2 , wherein the web server includes the global storage database.  
   
   
       12 . The media monitoring system of  claim 3 , wherein the first network includes a wide area network.  
   
   
       13 . The media monitoring system of  claim 12 , wherein the media management system further includes a second media server pod for receiving data of a different video channel, the second media server pod being in communication with the first network.  
   
   
       14 . The media monitoring system of  claim 13 , wherein the media server pod and the second media server pod are geographically distant from each other.  
   
   
       15 . The media monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein the user access system includes a duplicate video clip detector for identifying the matching results that are duplicates of each other.  
   
   
       16 . The media monitoring system of  claim 2 , wherein the user access system includes a user access device in communication with the web server over a third network, for receiving and displaying the matching results.  
   
   
       17 . The media monitoring system of  claim 16 , wherein the user access system includes a fourth network in communication with the user access device and the media server pod, the user access device receiving said stored data corresponding to specific units of the decoded text in response to the request over the fourth network.  
   
   
       18 . The media monitoring system of  claim 16 , wherein the user access device provides the search terms to the media management system.  
   
   
       19 . A method for searching video data corresponding to at least one video channel collected and stored in a media monitoring system, comprising: 
 (a) providing search terms;    (b) comparing the search terms to stored closed captioned text corresponding to the video data, the closed captioned text being indexed by channel and time;    (c) displaying matching results from the step of comparing;    (d) requesting selected video data corresponding to one of the matching results; and    (e) providing the selected video data corresponding to one of the matching results.    
   
   
       20 . The method of  claim 19 , wherein the step of requesting includes selecting a time indexed segment of the closed captioned text of one of the matching results.  
   
   
       21 . The method of  claim 20 , wherein the step of selecting includes setting a video start time and a video end time for the selected time indexed segment.  
   
   
       22 . The method of  claim 21 , wherein the step of providing the selected video data includes parsing the video data to correspond with the selected time indexed segment to provide the selected video data.  
   
   
       23 . The method of  claim 19 , wherein the step of providing search terms includes storing the search terms.  
   
   
       24 . The method of  claim 19 , wherein the search terms are provided to a web server over a first network, the web server executing the step of comparing and providing the matching results to a user access device for display over the first network.  
   
   
       25 . The method of  claim 24 , wherein the step of providing the video data includes transferring the video data over a second network to the user access device.  
   
   
       26 . The method of  claim 24 , wherein the step of providing the video data includes parsing the video data to provide the portion of the video data.  
   
   
       27 . A method for automatic identification of video clips matching stored search terms comprising: 
 (a) continuously receiving and locally storing video data corresponding to at least one video channel in real time;    (b) extracting and globally storing the closed captioned text from the video data;    (c) indexing the closed captioned text by channel and time;    (d) comparing the stored closed captioned text to the stored search terms; and,    (e) providing match results of the closed captioned text matching the search terms, each match result having an optionally viewable video clip.    
   
   
       28 . The method of  claim 27 , further including the steps of: 
 displaying the match results on a user access device, requesting the video clip corresponding to a selected match result, and displaying the video clip on the user access device.    
   
   
       29 . The method of  claim 28 , wherein the step of requesting includes viewing the closed captioned text corresponding to the selected match result with time indices, 
 setting a video start time and a video end time, and,    providing a request having the video start time and the video end time, and channel information corresponding to the selected match result.    
   
   
       30 . The method of  claim 29 , wherein the step of displaying the video clip includes 
 receiving the request, and,    parsing the video data to provide the video clip having the video start time and the video end time.    
   
   
       31 . The method of  claim 27 , wherein the video data is compressed prior to being stored.  
   
   
       32 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein the extracted closed captioned text is transmitted over a first network to an indexing server for indexing the closed captioned text by channel and time.  
   
   
       33 . The method of  claim 32 , wherein the closed captioned text is transmitted over a second network for storage on a web server.  
   
   
       34 . The method of  claim 33 , wherein the step of comparing is executed on the web server, and the match results are transmitted over a third network to a user access device.  
   
   
       35 . The method of  claim 34 , wherein the step of displaying the video clip includes transmitting the video clip over a fourth network to the user access device.  
   
   
       36 . The method of  claim 27 , wherein the step of comparing includes 
 (i) providing a segment of the closed captioned text,    (ii) iteratively obtaining search terms from the stored search terms for comparing to the segment of the closed captioned text until all of the stored search terms have been compared to the segment of the closed captioned text, and    (iii) storing details of all matches to the stored search terms as the match results.    
   
   
       37 . The method of  claim 36 , wherein the step of storing includes selectively generating an alert when the segment of the closed captioned text matches the stored search terms.  
   
   
       38 . The method of  claim 37 , wherein the step of selectively generating includes generating the alert only when the matching search term has an associated alerting status.  
   
   
       39 . The method of  claim 38 , wherein the alert can include one of in-system alerts, mobile device activation, pager activation and automatic email generation.  
   
   
       40 . The method of  claim 27 , wherein the step of extracting includes detecting an absence of the closed captioned text from the video data.  
   
   
       41 . The method of  claim 40 , wherein the step of detecting includes generating an alert message when no closed captioned text is detected.