Patent ID: 7367043

Claim:
A method for generating metadata describing a video program, the method comprising: obtaining, by a programmable device, production data corresponding to the video program from a production system used in the production of the video program; assigning, by the programmable device, respective numerical goodness of fit scores to respective predefined categories based on analysis of the production data to describe the subject matter of the video program, wherein the numerical goodness of fit score assigned to a category represents a degree to which the category is descriptive of the subject matter of the video program; assigning, by the programmable device, keywords to the video program based on analysis of the production data; and storing, by the programmable device, numerical goodness of fit scores and keywords for the video program in a computer readable medium in association with time data and descriptive data for the video program as metadata describing the video program; wherein said predefined categories are subject matter categories in a hierarchy comprising at least a set of top level categories, respective sets of first level sub-categories each corresponding to and encompassed by a top level category, and respective sets of second level sub-categories each corresponding to and encompassed by a first level sub-category.