Systems, methods, and devices for scanning broadcasts

Abstract

The various embodiments disclosed herein provide methods, systems, and devices for capturing broadcast streams, analyzing the broadcast streams to obtain information about the media content transmitted in the broadcast streams, obtaining additional information about the media content if available, and assigning a unique event identifier specific to the instance of broadcast of the broadcast stream and/or media segment transmitted in the broadcast stream. In other embodiments, the unique event identifier is broadcasted to broadcast receiving devices. With the unique event identifier, broadcast receiving devices can access the obtained information associated with the media content.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A centralized broadcast scanning system comprising:
 a stream scanner module fixed at a specific location, the stream scanner module configured to receive a plurality of broadcast streams from a plurality of broadcast sources, wherein each of the plurality of broadcast streams comprise at least a media content;   a dedicated scanning system module configured to periodically sample a specific broadcast stream from a specific broadcast source and to receive at least one alternate data stream pertaining to the media content in the specific broadcast stream, wherein the alternate data stream is from at least one alternate source;   a stream analysis module configured to process the specific broadcast stream to determine an identification of the media content in the specific broadcast stream, wherein the determination is based at least on the media content and the alternate data stream;   a data mining and reporting system module configured to generate a database entry comprising at least the identification of the media content from the stream analysis module;   a central management module configured to assign the media content a unique event identifier, wherein the unique event identifier is unique to a specific instance of the media content in the specific broadcast stream;   a media storage database module configured to store in the media storage database at least the unique event identifier and the database entry, wherein the unique event identifier is database linked to the database entry; and   a device monitoring module configured to access from a plurality of user devices the specific broadcast stream received by each of the plurality of user devices, to communicate to a specific user device the unique event identifier of each specific instance of the media content in the specific broadcast stream received by the specific user device and to obtain from the specific user device at least one of the unique event identifiers communicated to the specific user device, wherein the unique event identifier obtained is used to obtain the database entry in the storage database.