WO2007036970A1

WO2007036970A1 - Multimedia publication

Info

Publication number: WO2007036970A1
Application number: PCT/IT2006/000679
Authority: WO
Inventors: Pietro Marietti; Luigi Bavagnoli; Giuseppe Mazzoleni
Original assignee: Atlantyca S.P.A.
Priority date: 2005-09-28
Filing date: 2006-09-25
Publication date: 2007-04-05
Also published as: EP1941439A1; ITMI20051809A1

Abstract

The invention relates to a multimedia publication, (1) in which a book or other publication (2) on printed paper is combined with a display device (3). By reading with an optical reading or magnetic pen (4) the words or symbols printed in the book (2), the user is able to access with the display device (3) information and additional contents stored on a medium provided in the said device. In this way it is possible to provide a portable publication which offers the reader tactile and olfactory sensations which are typical of printed paper in addition to a large amount of additional information.

Description

"Multimedia publication"

The invention relates to a multimedia publication in which a book, pamphlet or other similar printed publication is functionally combined with an electronic display system.

In the publishing sector for some time it is known of attempts to produce electronic books (so-called "e-books") in which the pages of a book are displayed on the screen of a pocket-size reading device; the latter is basically a small electronic computer provided with certain functions such as, for example, that of changing the page or screen illumination, while the contents of the book are stored on a disc of the CD type or other replaceable storage medium, or can be downloaded from the Internet.

Examples of electronic books are described in the international patent application PCT/USOO/40429 and in the American patent application US2002/0007349.

Electronic books have the intrinsic limitation that they are unable to provide the reader with the same tactile and olfactory sensations which are provided by conventional printed paper (and this is perhaps one of the reasons for which they have not been very popular in the past) and are also unable to allow the reader to "flick through" them as one can with a book or magazine. On the other hand, electronic books nevertheless have the important advantage that they allow a person to read large amounts of information using a pocket-size device: the saving in weight and space compared to paper books is obvious.

The object of the present invention is to improve the present state of the art: it in fact aims to provide a book or other printed publication, the contents of which may be amplified with text, pictures and other additional features which can be easily consulted.

The idea for achieving this object consists in combining functionally, by means of an electronic display device, the paper publication with additional texts and contents; the latter are shown on the screen of the device after scanning in words or other symbols printed in the publication, using an optical reading (OCR) or magnetic pen, or retrieving them via a microphone. These and further characteristic features of the invention are summarised in the claims which follow; they will emerge more clearly from the description provided hereinbelow of a preferred and non-exclusive embodiment of the invention illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which: - Figs. 1 and 2 are a view of a multimedia book according to the invention, in the closed and open condition, respectively;

- Fig. 3 shows a step during operation of the above book;

- Fig. 4 is a block diagram which shows the book of Figs. 1-3;

- Fig. 5 is a variant of the book shown in the preceding figures; - Fig. 6 is a further variant of the invention.

With reference to the drawings, 1 denotes overall a multimedia book according to the invention, which comprises a publication 2 on printed paper in this case consisting of a book, but could also be a magazine, a manual or the like, together with a CD or other functionally associated multimedia medium combined together with an electronic display device 3.

The multimedia book 1 also comprises an optical reading pen 4 associated with the electronic display device 3, for example of the type distributed commercially under the name "Irispen®", which allows the acquisition via an OCR (Optical Character Recognition) system of text words present in the book 2. For this purpose the device 3 is powered by a battery of the known type

(not shown in the drawings) and comprises a microprocessor (CPU) 8, memories 9 and 10 (RAM and ROM), a display screen 11, a pair of buttons 12 for scrolling through the pages which appear on the screen, a command keypad 13 and a CD reader 14; the device 3 is also equipped with an access port for connection to the Internet, as schematically shown in broken lines in Figure 3, for the purposes which will become clearer during the explanation below of operation of the invention.

In fact, as a result of the invention, a person is able to read a printed book 2 in the normal way; in addition, for any desired topic the reader is able to gain access to the additional features stored on the CD which has contents functionally associated with the individual words of the paper book and is inserted in the reader 14. In order to do so, it is sufficient to perform with the optical pen 4 scanning of a word printed in the book 2 relating to a topic of interest for the reader (e.g.

"nature", "science", "history", "name of person", etc.) in order for the text or further information and contents of the additional feature stored on the CD inserted in the reader 14 to appear on the screen 11 of the display device 3.

The additional features may be written text and/or fixed or animated pictures, with sounds or the like, depending on the topic associated with the word acquired by the optical pen 4; the user is able to scroll through the pages on the device 11 using the pushbuttons 12 or carry out other operations by means of the keypad 13 (for example highlight phrases, etc.).

In order to facilitate identification in the book 2 of the words or symbols with which the additional features are associated in the device 3, various solutions may be used, for example they may be highlighted in the text using particular colours or printed characters (bold, capitals, etc.) or a special index containing these words or symbols may be provided at the bottom of the book 2.

By way of a further application, all the words in the paper text may also be linked by means of the pen to dictionaries, encyclopaedias or atlases contained in other CDs or in the memory of the electronic medium.

As can be seen, therefore, the invention constitutes a synergic combination between a printed publication combined with a CD or other multimedia medium and an electronic device, the printed publication allowing the reader to experience the typical tactile and olfactory sensations and also to "flick through" a publication, uniquely possible with printed paper, at the same time offering the possibility of having access to a large amount of additional information in the electronic device 3, all of which by means of portable multimedia book which may also be "pocket-size".

In this connection it is important to underline the difference between the present invention and some known devices (for example those described in the American patent Nos. 5,059,126 and 6,089,943) in which a pen is used for the optical reading of a bar code in order to produce a sound recording by means of a

CD or via a loudspeaker in a toy.

In fact, the use of a bar code cannot be applied to the normal printed text of a book or a magazine, both because there is not sufficient space between the lines to insert a code associated with a word and because this would alter in an unacceptable manner the aesthetic appearance of the book.

Moreover, it must be emphasized how, in the example considered, the display device 3 is advantageously combined with the book 2 so as to be portable, thus making it possible to gain access easily and at any moment to huge quantities of data and information both on paper and on the screen 11.

In this respect it must be considered that the printed publication may be a book of any kind (fiction, non-fiction, technical publications, etc.) even though the invention is particularly suitable for teaching purposes; in fact it is easy to understand that, when using a printed educational text, the invention constitutes an important teaching aid for a pupil who merely has to highlight the words associated with the study topics using an optical pen, in order to have immediate access to the additional features and the contents useful for study. The invention may also be advantageously used with tourist guides: in fact, in such a case, a person is able to select with a pen 4 the name of a city, a monument, a road or the like in order to obtain on the screen 11 all the useful information on that topic.

In such situations it is possible to appreciate the important advantage represented by being able to connect the display device 3 to the Internet, as schematically shown in the drawings; in fact, in this way it is possible to update periodically the programs and the functions which are stored inside it, thereby increasing the potential of the multimedia book and ensuring that it is always updated. Moreover, the author or the publisher of the book is able to include on the CD or the multimedia medium accompanying the book a large variety of links which allow the user to access a lot of additional information or applications which are available on the Internet.

It also hardly need be mentioned that the connection" to Internet of the device 3 may be performed by cable or wirelessly; depending on the systems used, the device 3 will be provided with suitable electronic means (USB port, etc.), which are known per se, in addition to those shown in the block diagrams according to Fig. 4. Obviously variants of the invention with respect to that described hitherto are possible; for example, it is possible to consider also the possibility of having a magnetic reading pen instead of the optical (OCR) pen mentioned above; an example would be a device with a magnetic reading head. In this case, the words or the symbols to be acquired will be printed on paper with a special ink containing magnetic particles so as to be able to transfer them onto the display device 3 using a pen provided with a magnetic reading head. A pen or an ink of this type are known, for example, from Japanese patent No. 5061589, the proprietors of which are Sanyo Electric. Another possible variant is shown in Figure 5 where the same reference numbers as above have been used.

Basically this variant differs from the example of Fig. 2 in that a microphone 15 is used instead of the optical reading pen 4: in this case acquisition of the printed words in the book 2 is performed by dictating them directly into the microphone 15 connected to the display device 3.

The latter is provided with electronic means which are known per se (not shown in the drawing) for processing the voice signal transmitted by the microphone 15 and then performing display of the additional features stored in the device, as in the example already described above. It must also be pointed out that, in all the above embodiments, instead of

(or in addition to) the pushbuttons 12 and keyboard 13, the screen 11 of the display device may be a so-called touch screen.

In this case, the user, after acquiring the words from the printed publication 2 using the optical or magnetic pen 4 or the microphone 15, as already explained above, scrolls through the various contents of the additional features, touching with a finger the relevant part of the screen 11 or using the said optical pen; the latter will be obviously of the liquid crystal type or the like so as to allow touch-type operation.

In connection with the screens which may be used, it is also possible to mention folding or roll-up screens which have recently been developed by Philips using a technology called E-ink.

Finally, by way of last possible variant, it is nevertheless possible to consider that shown in Fig. 6 where the display device is replaced by a computer 18 such as a PC to which the pen 4 (of the optical or magnetic type) is connected by means of a USB port or the like.

Operation in this case is entirely similar to that already explained above with reference to the other examples.

This variant of the invention is, as can be easily understood, intended in particular for domestic use or office use; as a result, the book 2 together with the CD which contains the additional features and the pen 4 may be commercially distributed in bookshops or in kiosks. With respect to this last variant it can also be understood how the printed book 2 and the display device 3 do not necessarily have to be bound together, but may be associated in a different - also interchangeable - manner; a possibility, for example, is a sleeve or a band which holds the device and the printed publication, be it a book, a magazine or the like, together with its CD or other functionally associated multimedia medium.

It must also be mentioned that, instead of printed paper, equivalent materials, such as sheets of plastic and the like, could also be used for the publication.

All these variants nevertheless fall within the scope of the following claims.

Claims

1. Multimedia publication, characterized in that it consists in the combination of a printed publication (2) and a display device (3, 18) of the electronic type provided with a screen (11) and in that it comprises means (4, 15) for acquiring words or symbols present in the printed publication (2) such that information following acquisition of said words or symbols is displayed on the screen (11).

2. Multimedia publication according to Claim 1, in which the information is stored on a storage medium (14) of the type which can be inserted into and extracted from the display device (3, 18).

3. Publication according to Claim 2, in which the storage medium (14) is a disk such as CD or the like.

4. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the printed publication (2) and the display device (3) are combined in a book-type configuration.

5. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the printed publication (2) is made of paper or the like.

6. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the printed publication (2) is a book.

7. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the means for acquiring the words or symbols comprise a pen (4) or similar optical reading (OCR) device.

8. Multimedia publication according to Claim 7, in which the publication (2) contains words and/or symbols printed using characters different from the others so that they may be read using the pen (4) or similar optical reading device.

9. Multimedia publication according to any one of Claims 1 to 6, in which the means (4) for acquiring the words or symbols corriprise a pen or similar magnetic reading device.

10. Multimedia publication according to Claim 9, in which the printed publication (2) contains words and/or symbols printed with ink containing magnetic particles so that they may be read with a pen or similar magnetic reading device.

11. Multimedia publication according to any one of Claims 1 to 6, in which the means for acquiring words or symbols comprise a microphone (15).

12. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the display device (3) comprises keys (12, 13) for scrolling thorough and accessing the information displayed on the screen (11).

13. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the screen (11) of the display device is a touch screen so as to allow the user to scroll through and access the information displayed, by touching various parts of the screen (11).

14. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the display device (3) is provided with means for connection to the Internet, in order to update the programs or the information displayed following acquisition of the words or symbols or in order to access further information or applications present on the Internet.

15. Multimedia publication according to any one of the preceding claims, in which the display device (3) is able to transmit information also in sound form.

16. Combination of a printed publication together with a CD and other functionally associated multimedia medium (2) and a pen (4) or similar device for optical or magnetic reading, for use with a display device (3, 18) according to any one of the preceding claims.