ALEXANDRIA, Va., April 7 -- United States Patent no. 12,596,525, issued on April 7, was assigned to Comcast Cable Communications LLC (Philadelphia).

"Method to determine intended direction of a vocal command target for vocal interaction" was invented by Mark David Francisco (Clarksburg, N.J.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Systems and methods are described for recognizing and responding to commands in a virtual or physical environment. A system may receive voice data and determine an intended command. The system may then determine a position and viewpoint orientation of the user to be able to determine one or more digital assets associated with the user. The system may then determine a current...