Interactive program manager and methods for presenting program content

#Television users are presently able to access hundreds of channels providing a multitude of programs, only a small fraction of which will be of interest to a given user. To assist the user in determining programs of interest, current commercially available reception devices such as televisions, analog cable receivers, and digital cable and satellite receivers typically provide a program guide function that allows the user to access a grid showing programs that will be available on various channels in upcoming time slots. Brief descriptions of programs may also be accessible. Such receivers may also allow the user to search for programs in basic categories such as news, sports, movies, etc.

#Current commercially available television recording technology also provides similar tools. For example, digital video recording machines, which typically store video on a bulk storage device such as a hard disk drive, allow users to select programs for recording using an on screen program guide that provides keyword searching of program titles, a program time grid, and basic program categorization.

#Although these devices provide tools that improve over devices of earlier generations, these devices do not adequately address at least two situations. First, these devices fail to keep a user in touch with breaking news, local weather alerts, and program content that might be of interest when other program content is being viewed. Thus, these devices can create a dangerous situation for a user that is left unaware of a local severe weather alert, an evacuation order, or the like.

#The systems and methods for interactively presenting alternative content to a user can be better understood with reference to the following figures. The components within the figures are not necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon clearly illustrating the principles for enabling the interactive program manager. Moreover, in the figures, like reference numbers designate corresponding parts throughout the different views.

#FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a multimedia environment.

#FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating an embodiment of the interactive program manager of FIG. 1.

#An interactive program manager provides available broadcast and non-broadcast sources to one or more select devices in a multimedia system. As those skilled in the art will appreciate an identifying code or interactive callback address for directly invoking alternative multimedia content is used to communicate the availability of the alternative content and to controllably direct the multimedia system to the original content. Details of a system and method for providing such an interactive code and call back address are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,818,438 (the '438 patent), the contents of which are incorporated by reference. A session can be established with an interactive program manager using the interactive callback address and other information such as that described in the '438 patent, and upon completion of the session, a user can re-tune or select the original content.

#According to an exemplary embodiment, an interactive program manager associates the identifying code or interactive callback address with a location at which the presently viewed programming or application will be stored. The identifying code or interactive callback address may be a program-specific code that can be used to invoke one or more programs to configure a multimedia system.

#The multimedia system may include one or more auxiliary devices, such as a recorder/player and a monitor that are integrated with an interactive program manager that controllably presents a first channel to the monitor and additional information to a select device, which in some configurations includes the monitor. The interactive program manager, when enabled by a user, notifies the user when one or more opportunities exist for reconfiguring the multimedia system to present alternative program content from broadcast and non-broadcast sources. Broadcast sources may include live and previously recorded audio and video information or program content. Non-broadcast sources may include audio and video information forwarded by an auxiliary device such as a recorder/player and one or more data feeds. The one or more data feeds may include ancillary information regarding available or soon to be available program content (e.g., a program guide), information associated with program content stored on a medium that is forwarded by a recorder/player and/or information available from alternative sources external to a content provider such as information available via a publicly accessible data network.