Patent ID: 8505058

Claim:
A method in a receiving device for synchronizing an interactive television (ITV) event with a content element, the method comprising: receiving a content element; receiving a plurality of synchronization triggers, wherein the content element is associated with a plurality of synchronization triggers, the plurality of synchronization triggers are inserted into a transport medium, and each synchronization trigger among the plurality of synchronization triggers further include a time indicia representing a time of a frame of the content element; retrieving time indicia from each of the plurality of synchronization triggers; synchronizing the receiving device based on the retrieved time indicia, wherein the synchronizing includes locking the receiving device to a time represented by the retrieved time indicia instead of a time indicated by a local time source; and wherein the receiving device is configured to synchronize the local time source by: obtaining a first time value recorded by the local time source upon receipt of a first one of the plurality of synchronization triggers, computing a first offset between the first time value and the second time value corresponding to the time indicia in the first one of the plurality of synchronization triggers, applying the first offset to the first time value, obtaining a third time value recorded by the local time sources upon receipt of second one of the plurality of synchronization triggers, applying the first offset to the third time value, determining a fourth time value corresponding to the time indicia in the second one of the plurality of synchronization triggers, identifying a variance between the fourth time value and the third time value with the first offset applied, and computing a second offset based on the first offset and the identified variance, wherein the second offset is an average of the first offset and the identified variance.