Playing digital content from radio-transmitted media based on taste profiles

Abstract

A portable content-playing device which automatically constructs a virtual channel of content consistent with the tastes of the user of the device, where the content originates from one or more satellites. The portable device contains software for computing similarity values between a local taste profile (representative of the songs tastes of the user of the device) by making use of downloaded pattern-matching technology representing each song, and this information is used in choosing the content of the virtual channel.

1 . A portable content-playing device for playing digital content communicated along with related data from a satellite or other one-way means of transmission of digital data, comprising:
 radio communication hardware for receiving data from said satellite or other one-way means of transmission of digital data;   a central processing unit and supporting hardware including random access memory and persistent storage,   said persistent storage storing data including locally-stored digital content and taste profile data and software programs,   said taste profile data including a local taste profile representing the tastes associated with (a) active indicators of taste entered manually by the user of the device, or (b) passive indicators of taste derived from data representing the user's actions while controlling playback, or (c) active and passive indicators of taste, said indicators indicating the tastes of a user of said portable content-playing-device as to various (A) songs, or (B) videos, or (C) spoken content, or (D) any combination of the foregoing,   said software programs including:
 (i) a software program for executing pattern-matching technologies to compute similarity values between said local taste profile and attributes associated with one or more (A) songs, or (B) videos, or (C) spoken content, or (D) any combination of the foregoing, and 
 (ii) a software program for identifying which digital content communicated from said satellite or other one-way means of transmission of digital data to play for said user in accordance with said similarity values computed with respect to said local taste profile, 
   
       whereby a virtual channel is constructed automatically by inference from said local taste profile, providing said user the experience of a digital content channel specifically geared towards that individual user's taste profile. 
     
     
         2 . The portable content-playing device of  claim 1 , wherein said pattern-matching technologies comprise a plurality of neural nets, each one of said neural nets corresponding to (a) a song, or (b) a video, or (c) an item of spoken content. 
     
     
         3 . The portable content-playing device of  claim 1 , further comprising
 a save button enabling the user to indicate that the user wishes to save the digital content item being played at the time the button is pressed so that it may played again later, and   software responsive to activation of said save button for generating an element of said local taste profile as a passive indicator that the user likes the digital content item being played at said time.   
     
     
         4 . The portable content-playing device of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 hardware responsive to command by the user so as to selectively cause the device to save a particular item of content or to replay a particular item of content;   said software programs further including:   software for generating elements of said local taste profile from passive indicators of taste of the user, generated upon the user's
 (a) causing the device to save a particular item of content; or 
 (b) causing the device to replay a particular item of content; 
   
       wherein said software causes to be stored in said taste profile data indicating that the user likes said particular item of content. 
     
     
         5 . The portable content-playing device of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 hardware responsive to command by the user so as to selectively cause the device to skip all or part of a particular item of content;   said software programs further including:
 software for generating elements of said local taste profile from passive indicators of taste of the user, generated upon the user's causing the device to skip all or part of a particular item of content; 
   
       wherein said software causes to be stored in said taste profile data indicating that the user does not like said particular item of content. 
     
     
         6 . The portable content-playing device of  claim 1 , said software programs further including:
 software for generating elements of said local taste profile from active indicators of taste of the user, generated upon the user's activating a sensor on the device that the user likes a particular item of content   wherein said software causes to be stored in said taste profile data indicating that the user likes said particular item of content.   
     
     
         7 . The portable content-playing device of  claim 1 , said software programs further including:
 software for generating elements of said local taste profile from active indicators of taste of the user, generated upon the user's activating a sensor on the device that the user dislikes a particular item of content   wherein said software causes to be stored in said taste profile data indicating that the user does not like said particular item of content.   
     
     
         8 . A portable content-playing device for playing digital content communicated along with related data from at least one satellite, comprising
 radio communication hardware for receiving data from said at least one satellite,   a central processing unit and supporting hardware including random access memory and persistent storage,   said persistent storage storing data including locally-stored digital content and taste profile data and software programs,   said taste profile data including a local taste profile comprising identifiers of content items liked by a user of said portable content-playing-device, each of said identifiers having associated therewith data corresponding to one or more attributes pertaining to said content item,   said software programs including:
 software for downloading lists of identifiers of content items and their associated attributes from said at least one satellite, and 
 software for computing the similarity of the attributes associated with each of said content items on said lists with said local taste profile and recommending the identifier associated with those of said content items for which the results of such computations have similarity to the local taste profile; and 
 software for acquiring and playing within a channel on said portable content-playing device a plurality of the content items associated with said recommended identifiers, 
   
       whereby a virtual channel is constructed automatically by inference from said local taste profile and identifiers of content items by acquiring and playing the content items associated with said identifiers for the benefit of said user, providing said user the experience of a digital content channel specifically geared towards that individual user's taste profile.