US Hearing Device Patents for May 2017

Made for iPhone hearing aids came first and most smart hearing aids are still not “made” for android devices. The Internet of things reachable by hearing aids is limited to a small, picky universe. In the larger universe, my android phone and Samsung washing machine may be having lively discourse, but I’m not privy to their chats via my hearing aids.

I don’t really want to talk to my home appliances, but who knows what they’re plotting? 

Samsung to the Rescue

Samsung plans to fix this, noting in its patent #9654906 that there is a need to remedy

certain limitations existing in Android platform implementations.

Samsung’s solution is an electronic device comprising a processor coupled to a Bluetooth control module which stores a “modified Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) protocol stack” of  a “plurality of audio-related commands (ATT)”. 

In that structure, “first and second” audio-related commands (ATTs) are transmitted at the same time (see flow chart labeled “Fig 6” from the patent). For example, if the electronic device is a hearing aid, the first and second ATTs could be a “media task layer and a hearing aid application layer.”

The Samsung universe of electronic device candidates with communication functions is huge and spelled out in the patent. The list is long but worth reprinting here, just to bring home the Samsung vision of non-stop communication bombardment.

 “… a smartphone, a tablet Personal Computer (PC), a mobile phone, a video phone, an electronic book (e-book) reader, a desktop PC, a laptop PC, a netbook computer, a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), a Portable Multimedia Player (PMP), an MP3 player, a mobile medical appliance, a camera, and a wearable device (e.g. a Head-Mounted-Device (HMD) such as electronic glasses, electronic clothes, an electronic bracelet, an electronic necklace, an electronic appcessory, electronic tattoos, or a smart watch)…

 a smart home appliance with a communication function [including]… a television, a Digital Versatile Disk (DVD) player, an audio, a refrigerator, an air conditioner, a vacuum cleaner, an oven, a microwave oven, a washing machine, an air cleaner, a set-top box, a TV box,… a game console, an electronic dictionary, an electronic key, a camcorder, and an electronic picture frame.

… medical appliances (e.g. Magnetic Resonance Angiography (MRA), Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Computed Tomography (CT) machine, a movie camera, and an ultrasonic machine), navigation devices, Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers, Event Data Recorders (EDRs), Flight Data Recorders (FDRs), automotive infotainment devices, electronic equipment for ships (e.g. navigation equipment for ships, gyrocompasses, or the like), avionics, security devices, head units for vehicles, industrial or home robots, Automatic Teller Machines (ATM), and Point Of Sales (POS) systems…

.at least one of a part of furniture or a building/structure having a communication function, an electronic board, an electronic signature receiving device, a projector, and various kinds of measuring instruments (e.g., a water meter, an electric meter, a gas meter, a radio wave meter, and the like). The electronic device … may be a combination of one or more of the aforementioned various devices…. may be a flexible device….[and] is not limited to the aforementioned devices.”

The May List

images fro klehanie, puppet studio