Audience attendance monitoring through facial recognition

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11533536-B2
Application number	US-201916506931-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 9, 2019
Priority date	Jul 18, 2012
Publication date	Dec 20, 2022
Grant date	Dec 20, 2022

Abstract

In accordance with some implementations, a method for measuring viewership of media content is disclosed. The method is performed on a client system. The client system obtains identification information for individuals who have agreed to participate in a media viewership totals measurement study, detects a first user of the client system, determines media content being presented in proximity to the first user, automatically determines if the first user is an individual who has agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study; and generates viewership data according to the determination.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for measuring viewership of media content, comprising:
on a client system having one or more processors, and memory storing one or more programs for execution by the one or more processors:
obtaining, from a participant database, identification information for individuals who have agreed to participate in a media viewership totals measurement study;
detecting a first user of the client system in which facial images of the first user are captured;
determining media content being presented in proximity to the first user;
automatically determining if the first user is an individual who has agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study based on the captured facial images of the first user;
in response to automatically determining that the first user is an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, recording, at a server system, (i) presence information of the first user indicating that the user is in proximity to the client system, wherein the presence information of the first user is counted in the media viewership totals measurement study using non-personally identifiable information of the first user, (ii) the captured facial images, wherein the captured facial images of the first user are temporarily retained to later identify the first user as an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, and (iii) information identifying the media content; and
removing the captured facial images of the first user at an end of the media content associated with the media viewership totals measurement study.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
in accordance with a determination that the first user is an individual who has agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, generating viewership data including (i) demographic information of the first user, (ii) presence information of the first user, and (iii) information identifying the media content; and
transmitting the viewership data to the server system.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:
in accordance with the determination that the first user is an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, temporarily storing the presence information of the first user to avoid redundantly counting the first user.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the client system further comprises a presence sensor, and wherein detecting the first user comprises detecting, via the presence sensor, presence information of the first user.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the presence sensor is a camera, and wherein the method further comprises:
analyzing captured visual or infrared data from the camera to determine a body position of the first user; and
estimating user interest of the first user in the presented media content based on the body position of the first user.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising:
discarding presence information of the first user after a predetermined amount of time.

7. An electronic device for determining viewer interest, comprising:
one or more processors; and
memory storing one or more programs to be executed by the one or more processors;
the one or more programs comprising instructions for:
obtaining, from a participant database, identification information for individuals who have agreed to participate in a media viewership totals measurement study;
detecting a first user of the client system in which facial images of the first user are captured;
determining media content being presented in proximity to the first user;
automatically determining if the first user is an individual who has agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study based on the captured facial images of the first user;
in response to automatically determining that the first user is an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, recording, at a server system, (i) presence information of the first user indicating that the user is in proximity to the client system, wherein the presence information of the first user is counted in the media viewership totals measurement study using non-personally identifiable information of the first user, (ii) the captured facial images, wherein the captured facial images of the first user are temporarily retained to later identify the first user as an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, and (iii) information identifying the media content; and
removing the captured facial images of the first user at an end of the media content associated with the media viewership totals measurement study.

8. The electronic device of claim 7 , further including instructions for:
in accordance with a determination that the first user is an individual who has agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, generating viewership data including (i) demographic information of the first user, (ii) presence information of the first user, and (iii) information identifying the media content; and
transmitting the viewership data to the server system.

9. The electronic device of claim 7 , further including instructions for:
in accordance with the determination that the first user is an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, temporarily storing the presence information of the first user to avoid redundantly counting the first user.

10. The electronic device of claim 7 , further comprising a presence sensor, and wherein the instructions for detecting the first user include instructions for detecting, via the presence sensor, presence information of the first user.

11. The electronic device of claim 10 , wherein the presence sensor is a camera, and wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for:
analyzing captured visual or infrared data from the camera to determine a body position of the first user; and
estimating user interest of the first user in the presented media content based on the body position of the first user.

12. The electronic device of claim 7 , further including instructions for:
discarding presence information of the first user after a predetermined amount of time.

13. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium storing one or more programs configured for execution by an electronic device, the one or more programs comprising instructions for:
obtaining, from a participant database, identification information for individuals who have agreed to participate in a media viewership totals measurement study;
detecting a first user of the client system in which facial images of the first user are captured;
determining media content being presented in proximity to the first user;
automatically determining if the first user is an individual who has agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study based on the captured facial images of the first user;
in response to automatically determining that the first user is an individual who has not agreed to participate in the media viewership totals measurement study, recording, at a server system, (i) presence information of the first user indicating that the user is in proximity to the client system, wherein the presence information of the first user is counted in the media viewership totals measurement study using non-personally identifiable information of the first user, (ii) the captured facial images, wherein the captured facial images of

Assignees

• Google Llc

Inventors

• Deephanphongs David
• Krieger Ken

Classifications

• H04H60/46

  for recognising users' preferences · CPC title

• H04H60/37

  for identifying segments of broadcast information, e.g. scenes or extracting programme ID · CPC title

• H04H2201/30

  characterised by the use of a return channel, e.g. for collecting users' opinions, for returning broadcast space/time information or for requesting data · CPC title

• H04H60/66

  for using the result on distributors' side · CPC title

• H04N21/251

  Learning process for intelligent management, e.g. learning user preferences for recommending movies (details of learning user preferences for the retrieval of video data in a video database G06F16/739; computer systems using learning methods G06N3/08) · CPC title