101 Rejection Reference Database – Art Unit 3621
Transportation, Construction, Electronic Commerce, Agriculture, National Security and License & Review
Patent examiner: Elchanti, Tarek
| Patent Assignee | Patent Application |
| Mastercard | 15/960146 |
Digital wallet payment system and process
Patent Abstract
A system and method for carrying out a transaction using a plurality of digital wallets, in a manner whereby benefits and/or perks of using each respective digital wallet is optimized in relation to a quantum of the transaction is provided.
Reason for 101 Rejection | CTFR 9/28/2020
The patent claims are directed towards Methods Of Organizing Human Activity under prong one. Under prong two the claims amount to merely using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea. The use of a computer as a tool to implement the abstract idea does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because the additional limitations amount to acts required to carry out the abstract idea on a computer. Under step 2B the additional elements do no more than employ the computer as a tool to automate and/or implement the abstract idea and do not amount to significantly more than applying the abstract idea to a computer.
Remarks on Overcoming the 101 Rejection | REM 1/19/2021
The claims are amended to include a step where the customer authentication details are automatically transmitted to a digital wallet for authentication. The customer authentication details are stored during a previous log-in to bypass re-entry of the customer’s authentication details. Applicant points out in the remarks that the generation step and the automatic transmission step are not drawn towards organizing human activity but rather they are features related to a technological environment. Further, the automatic transmission of the claimed method permits enhanced functionality with minimal overhead thereby offering an improvement to the technological environment.
Patent examiner: Elchanti, Tarek
| Patent Assignee | Patent Application |
| Wells Fargo | 17/026585 |
Enhanced advertisement click-through customer data
Patent Abstract
A computer program product is provided for predicting ad spend for a specific media program aired or streamed on a specific network at a specific date and time using a database of media program data that includes known ad spend for a subset of media programs, and viewership data for each of the media programs, including total viewership and viewership ratings. Each of the media programs is identified by its respective network, and date and time of airing or streaming. A random forest model is trained to predict ad spend using variables that are identified as being correlated with ad spend. The trained random forest model is then used to predict ad spend for a specific media program that is aired or streamed on a specific network at a specific date and time, and which has an unknown ad spend.
Reason for 101 Rejection | CTFR 1/15/2021
The patent claims are directed to predicting ad spend and only recite elements such as perform data analysis, perform feature engineering, training, and predicting ad spend which are grouped as fundamental economic activity under Methods Of Organizing Human Activity. Under prong two of step 2A the use of a processor/computer as a tool does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application beyond generally linking the use of the abstract idea to the particular environment.
Remarks on Overcoming the 101 Rejection | REM 3/12/2021
The patent claims do not recite any commercial or legal interactions. Applicant points out that the outstanding Office Action fails to provide any further explanation of what claimed subject matter recites “commercial or legal interactions”. Further, the claims are directed to the field of “ad spend” and thus are related to the field of advertising. A commercial interaction requires that multiple parties actually interact with one another for a commercial purpose as demonstrated by the examples in the Oct. ‘19 guidelines. Examiner identified the abstract idea of “predicting ad spend for a specific media program aired or streamed on a specific network at a specific date and time”, however this identified abstract idea may be implemented in many different ways beyond what is claimed in the present application and therefore does not preempt the alleged idea.
Patent examiner: Tsui, Alfred
| Patent Assignee | Patent Application |
| IBM | 11/755905 |
Identification of users for advertising purposes
Patent Abstract
A method and system for identifying users for advertising. Users and attributes are identified. First web sites provided by ISPs accessed by the users are identified. First data received from the ISPs include content of the first web sites and user time spent thereon. The first data is analyzed to determine first attribute values indicative of interest in each attribute by each user. Second data received from ISPs include content of second web sites and user time spent thereon. Second attribute values are derived from questionnaires completed by the users, which indicate interest in each attribute by each user. Third attribute values are determined by combining the first attribute values with the second attribute values for each user. The third attribute values are processed to identify users to which a product or service may be advertised. The identified users are communicated to a provider of the product or service.
Reason for 101 Rejection | CTFR 8/28/2019
The process encompasses a human manually determining a type of user for advertising applied with generic computing components. This process is therefore directed to a mental process subject matter grouping of abstract ideas. The additional claim elements as a whole are not directed to an improvement to computer functionality/capabilities, an improvement to computer-related technology, and do not amount to a technology-based solution to a technology-based problem.
Remarks on Overcoming the 101 Rejection | REM 10/25/2019
The patent applicant asserts the patent claims improve the technical field of internet data mining by expanding the websites where user participation data can be obtained. The use of correlating two sets of user data from an ISP provider and then processing said data to determine attribute values for the plurality of users demonstrates significantly more than the abstract idea. The patent examiner did not supply clear and convincing evidence that the limitations are well-understood, routine and conventional to a skilled artisan.
- The claimed invention is not directed to a fundamental economic practice
- There is no evidentiary support to demonstrate that determining a subset of users for targeting a particular advertisement is a fundamental economic practice.
- The claimed invention contains significantly more than the alleged abstract idea
- The patent claims include significantly more which contain meaningful limitations of inventive concepts tied to a narrowly defined algorithm for implementing a particular process of determining a subset of users for targeting a particular environment.
- The patent claims contain significantly more than the alleged abstract idea since the claims are implemented by a specific purpose machine, and not a generic computer.
Patent examiner: Tsui, Alfred
| Patent Assignee | Patent Application |
| Vistar Media | 14/717952 |
Audience matching system for serving advertisements to displays
Patent Abstract
An audience matching system (“system”) maintains a plurality of audience polygons that enclose respective geographic regions and are associated with respective time periods, and respective target audiences. The system receives an advertisement request from a remote display system having a display at a particular geographic location, the request including an advertisement parameter that identifies a first target time period. The system selects a first audience polygon from the plurality of audience polygons, the selecting based in part on a geographic region associated with the first audience polygon enclosing the geographic location of the display and a time period associated with the first audience polygon being inclusive of the first target time period. The system determines a first target audience using the first audience polygon, and selects an advertisement associated with the first target audience. The system provides the advertisement to the remote display system.
Reason for 101 Rejection | CTFR 11/29/2018
The claims are directed to abstract ideas. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to more than the judicial exception. Under the broadest reasonable interpretation, the claims recite generic computer functions that are well-understood in implementing the abstract idea with a computerized system. There is no indication that the combination of elements improves the function of a computer or any other technology. The collective functions of the additional elements merely provide conventional computer implementation.
Remarks on Overcoming the 101 Rejection | REM 2/28/2019
The patent applicant submits that selecting an advertisement associated with a target audience to be provided to a display system for presentation on the display is a practical application as a display is a non-abstract component. As noted in Trading Technologies International, Inc., v. CQG, Inc. (2017) and Core Wireless Licensing v. LG Electronics (2018) the practicality of displaying information and therefore must be considered as evidence that the patent claims have been integrated into the exception into a practical application.
Independent patent claims 1,8, and 14 were amended to include elements to demonstrate the distribution of the advertisements to the mobile devices is done to satisfy the target audience within a sub-region for a set amount of time. Additionally, the remote display system is further defined to be within the particular geographic location during the set time period.
Patent examiner: Snider, Scott
| Patent Assignee | Patent Application |
| Qualtrics LLC | 13/869678 |
System for creating and distributing interactive advertisements to mobile devices
Patent Abstract
A system for mobile devices that facilitates the creation and dissemination of interactive advertisements to a plurality of mobile devices. A computer or PC comprising an interactive media creator is used to generate interactive advertisements and communicate it to a distribution server. Mobile devices have an interactive media client component to receive and present interactive media, such as these interactive advertisements, to a user. User response is collected, user interaction is monitored and reported. Charging for distributing advertisements is supported.
Reason for 101 Rejection | CTNF 4/5/2018
The claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception through the application of generic computing elements that do not impose any meaningful limits to practicing the abstract idea. Attempts to limit the use of the abstract idea to a particular technological environment amounts to no more than mere instruction to implement the idea on a computer.
Remarks on Overcoming the 101 Rejection | ADPR 1/29/2020
The claims cover a concrete improvement to an electronic survey system by creating different versions of an interactive media survey to improve the flexibility of who the survey can be distributed to and a method to determine if the device includes any interactive media client components. The board finds the additional elements solve a technological problem by improving the functioning of a mobile device, therefore the 101 rejections are reversed.
Patent examiner: Snider, Scott
| Patent Assignee | Patent Application |
| FaceBook INC. | 15/805140 |
Presenting content to an online system user assigned to a stage of a classification scheme and determining a value associated with an advancement of the user to a succeeding stage
Patent Abstract
An online system receives information describing actions performed by individuals and identifies online system users included among these individuals. Based on the actions they have performed, the users are assigned to sequentially ordered stages of a classification scheme associated with a content-providing user of the online system. The online system receives content items associated with different stages from the content-providing user, in which content items associated with a stage may be presented to users assigned to the stage. The online system may determine an expected return value associated with each stage and an expected advancement value associated with advancement of users assigned to each stage to succeeding stages of the classification scheme. The online system also may determine a value associated with a content item based on a comprehensive value received from the content-providing user, the expected advancement value, and a predicted likelihood of user advancement to a succeeding stage.
Reason for 101 Rejection | CTNF 8/6/2020
The claims are directed to an abstract idea of determining a user’s return value associated with each stage of a progressive classification scheme is grouped within Methods Of Organizing Human Activity. The claims do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application beyond using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea. The additional elements do not improve on a technological field or the way computers function such that the claim as a whole is more than a drafting effort to monopolize the abstract idea.
Remarks on Overcoming the 101 Rejection | REM 10/26/2020
The claims recite a practical application of selecting content to be displayed with a newsfeed. Particularly the system is capable of determining the pacing that content should be included as the user interacts with the newsfeed. The system determines the potential return of the displayed content and only displays the content with the highest possible return.
The independent claims were amended to include elements specifying where each stage of advertisement is associated with a different content item from the content provider. Additional elements are added to include the adjustment of the advertisement pacing vale, the selection of the content items to be presented to the user, and the presentation of the content items to the user in their newsfeed.
