Visual calling person display

Claim 1

A system for providing augmented CLID (Caller Identification Data) data to a called party who is a subscriber to a related CLASS feature over a public telephone switching network comprising: a telephone terminal at said called party's location, said telephone terminal having decoding and displaying means capable of decoding and displaying graphics; a terminal at the location of a calling party for originating a call to said subscriber; a central office associated with said calling party's terminal, said calling party's central office having switch means to route said call therethrough; memory means at said calling party's central office for storing said augmented CLID data, said data comprising a plurality of graphics in digitized form, each of the graphics being directly associated with the identity of a respective subscriber; retrieval means associated with said memory means for retrieving one of said digitized graphics associated with the calling party from said memory means and for routing said graphics with said call; a called party's central office associated with said called party for receiving said call and digitized graphics from said calling party's central office and for selectively routing said call and digitized graphics to said called party; and transmission means communicatively connecting said calling party's terminal to said calling party's central office, from said calling party's central office to said called party's central office, and from said called party's central office to said called party's terminal.

Claim 2

A system for providing augmented CLID (Caller Identification Data) data to a called party who is a subscriber to a related CLASS feature over a public telephone switching network comprising: a telephone terminal at said called party's location, said telephone terminal having decoding and displaying means capable of decoding and displaying graphics; a terminal at the location of a calling party for originating a call to said subscriber; a central office associated with said calling party's terminal, said calling party's central office having switch means to route said call therethrough; memory means at said calling party's central office for storing said augmented CLID data, said data comprising a plurality of graphics in digitized form, each of the graphics being directly associated with the identity of a respective subscriber; retrieval means associated with said memory means for retrieving one of said digitized graphics associated with the calling party from said memory means and for routing said graphics with said call; a called party's central office associated with said called party for receiving said call and digitized graphics from said calling party's central office and for selectively routing said call and digitized graphics to said called party; and transmission means communicatively connecting said calling party's terminal to said calling party's central office, from said calling party's central office to said called party's central office, and from said called party's central office to said called party's terminal.

Claim 6

A method for providing augmented CLID (Caller Identification Data) data to a called party who is a subscriber to a CLASS (Custom Local Area Signalling Service) feature over a telephone network comprising the steps of: at a first telephone switch associated with a calling party, storing in a memory means, augmented CLID data comprising graphics in digitized form, the graphics representing the identity of the calling party; on the origination of a call by the calling party to the called party, routing the call together with the digitized graphics data associated with the calling party to a second telephone switch associated with the called party and thence to a called party terminal; and at the called party terminal, decoding and displaying the digitized graphics data to provide the called party with a visual representation of the identity of the calling party.

Claim 7

A method for providing augmented CLID (Caller Identification Data) data to a called party who is a subscriber to a CLASS (Custom Local Area Signalling Service) feature over a telephone network comprising the steps of: at a first telephone switch associated with a calling party, storing in a memory means, augmented CLID data comprising graphics in digitized form, the graphics representing the identity of the calling party; on the origination of a call by the calling party to the called party, routing the call together with the digitized graphics data associated with the calling party to a second telephone switch associated with the called party and thence to a called party terminal; and at the called party terminal, decoding and displaying the digitized graphics data to provide the called party with a visual representation of the identity of the calling party.