Patent Publication Number: US-10332522-B2

Title: Speed podcasting

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
     This application is a Continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/180,906, filed on Jul. 28, 2008, the entirety of which is herein incorporated by reference. 
    
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     Field of the Invention 
     The present invention relates to the field of media playback and more particularly to the field of podcasting for computer communications networks. 
     Description of the Related Art 
     Historically, content has been disseminated for public consumption through each of the print medium, video medium and audio medium. Early forms of content publication relied exclusively upon print media such as newspapers, books and magazines. The early age of motion pictures provided and alternative mode of content distribution—typically through news reels preceding a feature film. Radio also provided a mode of content distribution in which consumers listen to content rather than view or read content. The dawn of television further advanced the distribution of content in an audiovisual medium to a degree rivaling print media. The explosive adoption of the World Wide Web as a primary source of content for consumption, however, remains unprecedented. 
     Media storage and handling technologies including modern audio and video compression algorithms when merged with the accessibility of the World Wide Web, provide for wide variety of modes of content distribution to please every conceivable type of prospective content consumer. Through the gateway of a simple Web page, content browsers can retrieve text, imagery, audio, video and audiovisual materials with a single click of a mouse button. Recent advances in broadband connectivity render the exercise of streaming media for viewing in a Web browser a simplistic exercise. However, most media browsing technologies of the Internet require persistent connectivity to the Internet. 
     Notwithstanding, computing users of today are a mobile sort and seldom enjoy broadband connectivity at all times. Yet, computing users have become accustomed to consuming network distributed media content at all hours—particularly at home, while exercising or when traveling out of range of wireless network connectivity. Capitalizing on the mobile nature of computing users, well known large manufacturers of consumer electronics have engaged in a protracted effort to manufacture mobile media playback devices enabled to retrieve and store content from over the Internet—particularly music and videos—and to permit playback through the devices while lacking a network connection at a subsequent time. 
     Arising out of this protracted effort, new forms of media have been developed to capitalize on the nature of the mobile content consumer. Podcasting represents one such new form of media. A podcast is a brief segment of audiovisual material recorded for distribution to mobile video playback devices for playback that is not dependant upon network connectivity. Podcasts are periodic in nature in that end users often subscribe to a podcast and in consequence of a subscription, new editions of the subscribed podcast are downloaded to the mobile video playback device as those new editions become available and as the mobile video playback device obtains network connectivity to the source of the new edition of the podcast. 
     Despite the utility of podcasts as a content distribution medium, podcasts lack some of the elemental convenience factors of traditional print media. For example, in traditional print media a content consumer can scan an article to quickly ascertain whether the article is of interest. To the extent the article is not of interest, there is no need for the content consumer to read the entire article. So much is not so with a podcast. In a podcast, the content consumer must listen to the entirety of the podcast in order to determine whether the podcast is of interest. Recent technologies attempt to address this shortcoming of podcasting through the speech recognition of the audio portion of a podcast to permit keyword searching of the relevant portions of the podcast. Exemplary products produce a heatmap within the playback control of the podcast to indicate where in the podcast a word of interest can be found. 
     BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     Embodiments of the present invention address deficiencies of the art in respect to podcasting and provide a novel and non-obvious method, system and computer program product for speed podcasting. In an embodiment of the invention, a speed podcasting method can include speech recognizing an audio portion of a podcast, parsing the speech recognized audio portion to identify essential words, and playing back only audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including the essential words while excluding from playback audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including non-essential words. In this regard, an audio segment can correspond to a phrase or sentence proximate to an identified essential word. 
     In one aspect of the embodiment, playing back only audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including the essential words while excluding from playback audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including non-essential words can include matching words in the speech recognized audio portion to essential words in a data store of essential words, determining audio segments of the audio portion including the matched words, and playing back the determined audio segments while excluding other audio segments of the audio portion from playback. 
     In another aspect of the embodiment, playing back only audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including the essential words while excluding from playback audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including non-essential words can include identifying non-essential words in the speech recognized audio portion, and excluding audio segments of the audio portion from playback including the identified non-essential words while playing back other audio segments of the audio portion. 
     In yet another aspect of the embodiment, the method also can include consulting a thesaurus to retrieve words synonymous with the matched words, and adding the synonymous words to the data store of essential words. In even yet another aspect of the embodiment, playing back the determined audio segments while excluding other audio segments of the audio portion from playback can include applying a rating to each word in the data store of essential words, associating a playback speed with each rating, excluding from the determined audio segments audio segments with essential words associated with a rating inconsistent with a contemporaneously selected playback speed, and playing back only the determined audio segments while excluding other audio segments of the audio portion from playback. 
     In another embodiment of the invention, a mobile video playback device can be provided. The device can include a computer program and system configured to playback podcasts stored in the mobile video playback device, a datastore of essential words, a speech recognition engine, and speed podcasting logic executing under management of the operating system. The logic can include program code enabled to speech recognize an audio portion of a selected podcast, to parse the speech recognized audio portion to identify words present in the datastore of essential words, and to play back only audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including the matched words while excluding from playback audio segments and corresponding video segments of the podcast including non-essential words. Optionally, the device also can include a thesaurus such that the program code can be further enabled to locate in the thesaurus words synonymous with the identified words present in the datastore of essential words and to add the synonymous words to the datastore of essential words. 
     Additional aspects of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The aspects of the invention will be realized and attained by means of the elements and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims. It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are not restrictive of the invention, as claimed. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS 
       The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the invention. The embodiments illustrated herein are presently preferred, it being understood, however, that the invention is not limited to the precise arrangements and instrumentalities shown, wherein: 
         FIG. 1  is a schematic illustration of a process for speed podcasting; 
         FIG. 2  is a schematic illustration of a mobile podcasting playback device configured for speed podcasting; and, 
         FIG. 3  is a flow chart illustrating a process for speed podcasting in the mobile podcasting playback device of  FIG. 2 . 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
     Embodiments of the present invention provide a method, system and computer program product for speed podcasting. In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, an audio portion of a podcast can be speech recognized into a transcript and the words of the transcript can be filtered into a set of essential words and non-essential words. Thereafter, during a speed playback of the podcast, only the video and audio portions corresponding to the essential words can be played back while the portions of the video and audio of the podcast corresponding to the non-essential words can be skipped. Consequently, a content consumer speed podcasting a podcast can quickly ascertain the “gist” of the podcast without being compelled to listen to the entire podcast. 
     In illustration,  FIG. 1  schematic depicts a process for speed podcasting. As shown in  FIG. 1 , a mobile video playback device  110  can be configured to playback a podcast  120  including synchronized audio and video portions. The audio portions  130  of the podcast  120  can be speech recognized to produce a transcript of both essential words  150 A and non-essential words  150 B. In this regard, non-essential words  150 B can include articles, adverbs and adjectives not essential to the subject matter of the podcast  120 , while essential words  150 A can include nouns and verbs directed to the subject matter of the podcast  120 . The placement of the nouns and verbs in a phrase can be determinative in classifying a word as non-essential or essential. Optionally, thesaurus  160  can be consulted to expand the essential words  150 A to include synonymous words. 
     Once the speech recognized audio portions  130  of the podcast  120  have been parsed into essential words  150 A and non-essential words  150 B, only essential audio segments  140 A of the audio portions  130  with essential words  150 A can be played back during speed podcasting, while non-essential audio segments  140 B of the audio portions  130  with non-essential words  150 B can be omitted from playback of the podcast  120 . As yet another option, some of the essential words  150 A can be rated as more relevant than others of the essential words  150 A. Consequently, a playback speed setting  170  can specify which of the essential words  150 A are to be associated with the essential audio segments  140 A during speed podcasting of the podcast  120 . 
     In further illustration,  FIG. 2  is a schematic illustration of a mobile podcasting playback device configured for speed podcasting. As shown in  FIG. 2 , mobile video playback device  210  can include a podcast playback computer program or system  220  and a data store  230  of podcasts  240 . The podcast playback computer program or system  220  of the mobile video playback device  210  can be configured to playback selected ones of the podcasts including both audio and video portions of the selected ones of the podcasts. Speed podcasting logic  250  can be coupled to the podcast playback computer program or system  220  and also to a speech recognition engine  260 . The speed podcasting logic  250  can include program code enabled to play back only audio segments of a selected one of the podcasts  240  that contains essential words  270  stored in the data store  230  and present in a transcript of the selected one of the podcasts  240  produced by speech recognition engine  260 . 
     In operation, the program code of the speed podcasting logic  250  can direct speech recognition engine  260  to speech recognize an audio portion of a selected one of the podcasts  240  into a transcript. The program code of the speed podcasting logic  250  further can parse the transcript into audio segments containing words matching the essential words  270  disposed in data store  230  while excluding other audio segments (presumptively containing non-essential words). Optionally, thesaurus  280  can be consulted to identify words synonymous with the words matching the essential words  270  to augment the essential words  270  in the data store  230 . In any event, a subset of audio segments of the audio of the selected one of the podcasts  240  can be produced that contain only essential words  270  in the data store  230 . Finally, the program code of the speed podcasting logic  250  can direct the podcast playback computer program or system  220  to playback only the audio segments in the subset during a speed podcasting operation. 
     In yet further illustration of the operation of the mobile podcasting playback device,  FIG. 3  is a flow chart illustrating a process for speed podcasting. Beginning in block  310 , a podcast can be loaded including synchronized audio and video portions. In block  320 , the audio portions of the loaded podcast can be speech recognized to produce a transcript and in block  330 , the transcript can be indexed with the audio and video portions to maintain synchronization between the transcript, audio and video portions. In block  340 , a playback speed can be determined for speed podcasting of the loaded podcast. 
     Thereafter, in block  350  by reference to a data store of essential words and also rules for characterizing different word types like articles and pronouns, adverbs and adjectives as non-essential in nature, the transcript can be parsed to filter out non-essential words and also essential words not having a rating high enough to meet a threshold value corresponding to the determined playback speed. Further, in block  360 , additional words can be added to the data store of essential words that are synonymous with the essential words identified in the transcript. 
     Finally, in block  370 , only audio segments indexed to correspond to the essential words in the transcript can be played back while audio segments indexed to correspond to the non-essential words in the transcript can be omitted. For instance, each audio segment can correspond to a phrase or sentence proximate to an identified essential word. As an example, a set of words beginning from zero or more words preceding an essential word and concluding zero or more words following the essential word can be considered an audio segment. As another example, all words leading from an essential word to a punctuation mark can be considered an audio segment. 
     Embodiments of the invention can take the form of an entirely hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment or an embodiment containing both hardware and software elements. In a preferred embodiment, the invention is implemented in software, which includes but is not limited to firmware, resident software, microcode, and the like. Furthermore, the invention can take the form of a computer program product accessible from a computer-usable or computer-readable medium providing program code for use by or in connection with a computer or any instruction execution system. 
     For the purposes of this description, a computer-usable or computer readable medium can be any apparatus that can contain, store, communicate, propagate, or transport the program for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. The medium can be an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system (or apparatus or device) or a propagation medium. Examples of a computer-readable medium include a semiconductor or solid state memory, magnetic tape, a removable computer diskette, a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), a rigid magnetic disk and an optical disk. Current examples of optical disks include compact disk-read only memory (CD-ROM), compact disk-read/write (CD-R/W) and DVD. 
     A data processing system suitable for storing and/or executing program code will include at least one processor coupled directly or indirectly to memory elements through a system bus. The memory elements can include local memory employed during actual execution of the program code, bulk storage, and cache memories which provide temporary storage of at least some program code in order to reduce the number of times code must be retrieved from bulk storage during execution. Input/output or I/O devices (including but not limited to keyboards, displays, pointing devices, etc.) can be coupled to the system either directly or through intervening I/O controllers. Network adapters may also be coupled to the system to enable the data processing system to become coupled to other data processing systems or remote printers or storage devices through intervening private or public networks. Modems, cable modem and Ethernet cards are just a few of the currently available types of network adapters.