FORM -2
THE PATENTS ACT, 1970
(39 of 1970) & THE PATENTS RULES, 2003
PROVISIONAL
specification
(See Section 10; rule 13)


APPARATUS AND SYSTEM FOR INFORMATION COLLATION
AND DISPLAY
TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES LTD.,
an Indian Company of Nirmal Building, 9th floor, Nariman Point, Mumbai 400 021, Maharashtra, India
THE FOLLOWING SPECIFICATION DESCRIBES THE INVENTION


Field of Invention:
This invention relates to the apparatus and system for information collation and display.
Background of the Invention:
Today, lot of content on the Internet is being produced by providers such as Editorials, Analysts, Consumer Generated Media (News, Blogs and Reviews etc). Most of the content is being refreshed at a rapid pace and is shared using universal accepted mechanisms such as RSS and ATOM Feeds. These feeds provide web content or summaries of web content together with links to the full versions of the content, and other meta-data. Users of these feeds are reading the content provided by these feeds in clients known generally as RSS Readers. While such RSS readers provide a very simple usage where each item in the RSS feed is presented as a block of content, looking at the content in an interactive manner remains a challenge.
Thus, it is with respect to these considerations and others, that the present invention has been made.
Objects of the Invention:
An object of this invention is to provide a system and apparatus for collating information and viewing such collated information in a dynamic and interactive manner.
An object of the invention is to provide a web based implementation system that targets users accessing the platform using a Web browser.
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An object of the invention is to provide a mobile based implementation system, for touch enabled mobile phones that targets users accessing the platform through a mobile application.
Summary of the Invention:
According to this invention, there is provided an apparatus and method for collation and display of information. 'Information' for the purposes of this invention includes various kinds of feeds data (including the popular RSS/ATOM feeds) and social content (User Generated Media - pictures, documents, videos, audio) and the like.
In accordance with an embodiment of this invention, there is provided a display creation and viewing means for display of, and for enabling interaction with said information. The display creation and viewing means is adapted to create a multi-dimensional template for providing surfaces for display of information. Typically, it is 3-dimensional template. Particularly, said display creation and viewing means is an interactive Cube based structure, which can be moved/rotated/Scaled (zoom) around providing an enhanced/immersive user experience. Typically, this is by means of 3D Media cubes i.e. said cube is an interactive three dimensional structure. Said system also includes messaging (of information) over a network.
The system and apparatus, in accordance with this invention, enables information from all such feeds to be presented in a cube like structure. A cube is a three dimensional structure that has six faces and each face has n2 cell where n is the number from 1 to 6. In accordance with an embodiment o f this invention, each cell can be bound with a distinct piece of information. The
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information which can be bound to each cell/face of the cube can be web feeds, consumer generated content i.e. uploading and displaying personalized contents like photos, documents and videos that user can upload from a computer. Whenever the user binds the cube's face/cell to consumer generated content, the data (e.g. Videos/Photos/Documents etc) and metadata associated with this data is stored on a remote cloud storage platform. A cloud storage platform allows an application to automatically scale based upon the user load. It also allows data to be accessible to various devices or platforms over Internet.
The three dimensional cube structures are visually appealing and allow users to interact with the cubes with actions like rotation, zoom-in, zoom-out and changing color schemes. The platform encourages social networking and allows cubes to be shared with friends using the current existing popular Social Networks.
In accordance with another embodiment of this invention, there is provided a multi-platform means for social sharing of said viewing means i.e. said 3D Media Cubes by consumers, enterprises and the like entities or users. Typical use of the system in accordance with this invention is in the fields of Information Technology/Digital Media Industry. The multi-platform means includes:
1. A web-based implementation means adapted to target users accessing the means using a Web browser. The platform provides a Social Networking system and method by which interactive cubes can be created by the users working on the platform and distributed to other users on the same platform or other famous Social Networking platforms like Facebook,
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Linkedln, MySpace, Orkut and the like in order to facilitate Social Networking. 2. A mobile-based implementation means adapted for touch-enabled mobile phones that targets users accessing the platform through a mobile application. Social Networking system for said mobile-based implementation means will be provided similar to implementation of Web Browser based system.
Typically, means for displaying advertisements in a new format, that aggregate brand experiences and messages and information through a rich interactive Cube, is envisaged. This will allow Marketers to traffic the 3D Media cubes to sites of publishers using a display ad specification. Through a script, marketers will be able to traffic this to publisher's websites using any existing Ad Network means or Ad Exchange means.
In accordance with another embodiment of this invention, there is provided an Information Aggregation means adapted to:
1) Allow users to aggregate information from different content providers or from their own personally produced content. According to an exemplary embodiment, different cube faces can have latest music videos from different video sites;
2) Allow end users to aggregate information in 'mixed' cubes. According to another exemplary embodiment, end users can have photos of their recent vacation on one face; they can have videos of the same trip bound to other face; they can have blogs or articles for the same trip bound to other face of the same cube.
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In accordance with yet another embodiment of this invention, there is provided a Social networking platform means in order to:
1. Allow a user to share cubes, created by anyone, with their friends. The platform is also adapted to allow sharing of cubes through several means like through email and through other popular social networking sites;
2. Allow Interactive and visually appealing access to information;
3. Allow an end user to play around with the cube. He\She can rotate, zoom, scatter (in case of photos) and change color schemes of the cube. Hence a cube filled with the information is more appealing to the end user rather than a list of articles, videos or photos.
In accordance with still another embodiment of this invention, there is provided means for a touch enabled mobile phone, said means adapted to:
1. Allow viewing of a 3 dimension cube structure which gives a
unique experience on a touch enabled mobile phones. Using figure
tips, a user can invoke the functionalities to:
■ Rotate a cube
■ Zoom in or zoom out a cube
■ Select a cube
2. Allow a user to tap on a cell of a cube to view the article
description, photos or videos.
In accordance with an additional embodiment of this invention, there is provided an enterprise management means which is adapted to:
1. Allow enterprises to create and promote their own channels by publishing their content using cubes. Typical enterprises which
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would use this form of promotion will include, Media & Entertainment companies, Content Providers, Publishers and the like;
2. Allow enterprises an innovative way to allow users to play with their content and a new medium to bring traffic to their respective websites using the cubes built on the Platform;
3. Allow Advertisers to create Online Campaigns using the Platform;
4. Allow advertisers to put advertisements and promotions on the web and mobile implementations. These advertisements and promotions are displayed when the user is working with the platform.
In accordance with yet an additional embodiment of this invention, there is
provided a 3rd party application interface means such that:
1. Platform supports an Application Programming Interface (API) which can be exposed to the 3rd party applications. Using the API, 3rd party applications can develop their own widgets to interact with the platform.
Brief Description of the accompanying Drawings:
The invention will now be described in relation to the accompanying drawings,
in which:
Figure 1 shows the different activities that can be performed on the apparatus;
Figure 2 shows the zoom-in/zoom-out operation on a cube;
Figure 3 shows the rotate operation on a cube; and
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Figure 4 shows a cloud platform as the data store for the personal contents and cube's metadata.
Detailed Description of the Accompanying Drawings:
The invention will be described in relation to a preferred non-limiting exemplary embodiment of the system.
Figure 1 of the accompanying drawings shows the different (exemplary) activities that can be performed on the apparatus. The system and apparatus in accordance with this invention is adapted to: 1.Interact (via an interacting mechanism) with an existing cube: User can view the cubes created by him/her or any other person using the platform.
■ He/she can Zoom-in or Zoom out to see the information more clearly (as
illustrated in figure 2 of the accompanying drawings).
■ He/she can rotate the cube interactively to see the information present on
different faces of the cube (as illustrated in figure 3 of the accompanying drawings).
■ He/she can view the items that are present in different faces/cells of the
cube. These items are either photos/videos/articles. User can see the basic details like thumbnail/brief description as provided by the web feed. For the detailed content, user is redirected to the actual site hosting that content. Content uploaded by the user is displayed on the Platform itself. 2.Create/Edit (via a creating and editing means) a cube: End user can create his/her own cube. He/she needs to sign-up with the Platform first. Once user does a sign-in, he/she can create their own cube. User binds each cube face to a web feed using the web feed URL. There are different types of cubes user can create, some examples include ■ Photo cube: In a photo cube, each face can be bound with
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• Photos from the user machine
• Web feed of popular online photo management sites.
■ Text cube: In a text cube, each face can be bound with a web feed of a
site providing text/articles/news.
■ Video cube: In a video cube, each face can be bound with a web feed of
site providing online videos.
■ Mixed cube: In a video cube, each face can be bound with either of the
below, for e.g.
• A web feed of Site providing online videos
• A web feed of online photo management site.
• A web feed of textual content.
• Photos from the user's computer
• Documents from feeds or user's computers
Once the cube is created; user can edit the cube details like Name, description, tags and the face bindings with feed URL. 3.Publish (via publishing means) a cube: Once the cube faces are bound with the web feeds, user publishes the cube with a name, short description, tags to define the cube and the channel associated with the cube. Channels are a way to categorize a cube. A channel can be a generic channel like Arts/ Movies/Entertainment or it can be a private channel used by enterprises or individuals to promote their contents. User can choose to publish the cube to allow it to be viewed publicly by all users of the platform or keep it private which means the cube is not visible to the other users.
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4. Search (via searching means) a cube: User can search for the cubes based
upon the channels, cube name and tags associated with the cubes. Search results can be further filtered based upon
■ Most recent cubes
■ Highest rated cubes
■ Most viewed cubes

5. Delete (via deleting means) a cube: User can delete a cube that was previously created by him.
6. Share (via sharing means) a cube: User can share any cube with his friend using

■ Email
■ Popular social networking sites
■ The system will allow Cubes to be shared through a script that enables rendering on third party sites

7. Favorite (via tagging means) a cube: User can add a cube to his favorites. User can later on visit his favorite cubes and can view the contents of the cube.
8. Activity Stream (via updating means): User can see what their friends are doing using Activity stream. They are able to see:

■ When their friend shares cubes with others
■ When their friend favorites any cube
9.Browse channels (via browsing means): User can also see the cubes belonging to different channels like Arts/Entertainment/Movies or custom channels by enterprises or individuals.
10.Create and manage channels (via managing means): The platform can be used by enterprises or individual who wants to promote their own contents using cubes. The platform allows the publishers to create and manage their
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own channels. In their channel space, these publishers can create their own cubes and promote their own contents. 1 l._Cube Storage (via repository means): The cubes once built and published are stored on a cloud storage platform (as illustrated in figure 4 of the accompanying means). The platform enables the data being tied to cube faces to be uploaded and stored on the cloud so that the same is available anytime to any device. It also takes care of scalability requirements of the platform.
Thus this invention envisages a platform that enables users to aggregate information to a large extent using web feeds and presents this information in the form of an interactive three dimension cube structures.
While considerable emphasis has been placed herein on the particular features of the preferred embodiment and the improvisation with regards to it, it will be appreciated the various modifications can be made in the preferred embodiments without departing from the principles of the invention. These and the other modifications in the nature of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in art from disclosure herein, whereby it is to be distinctly understood that the foregoing descriptive matter is to interpreted merely as illustrative of the invention and not as a limitation.

MOHAN DEWAN
Of R. K. DEWAN & CO.
APPLICANTS' PATENT ATTORNEY
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