Scheduling the recording of television programs
A television receiving system displays an advertisement for a future television program. If the future television program is identified as recordable, the system also displays an option to set a reminder for the advertised program and/or an option to record the advertised program on a video recorder. If a viewer of the advertisement selects the reminder option, then a reminder is programmed in the system. If the viewer selects the record option, then the system automatically programs the video recorder to record the advertised program. If the viewer has established an interactive session during a television advertisement, and has not completed the interactive session when the advertisement ends, then the current television program is paused until the interactive session is completed.
1 . A method comprising:
receiving a signal containing an advertisement for a future television program;
displaying the advertised television program;
determining whether the signal contains an indicator identifying the future television program as recordable; and
if the future television program is recordable, then programming a record operation to record the advertised television program, wherein programming a record operation includes automatically programming a video recorder to record the advertised television program if the advertised television program is likely to be of interest to a user of the video recorder.
2 . A method comprising:
displaying an advertisement for a future television program, wherein the future television program has an associated program type; and
programming a record operation if a viewer has previously requested the recording of advertised television programs with the associated program type.
3 . A method as recited in claim 2 wherein programming a record operation includes determining whether a video recorder has sufficient storage space to record the advertised television program.
4 . A method as recited in claim 2 further including decoding information associated with the advertised television program from a television signal containing the advertised television program.
5 . One or more computer-readable memories containing a computer program that is executable by a processor to perform the method recited in claim 2.