Information distributing system

• US 20030050979A1
• Filed: 01/24/2002
• Published: 03/13/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 02/25/2000
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Matsushita Electric Industrial Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Matsushita Electric Industrial Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Takahashi, Kazunori
• Application Number:
  US09/959,387
• Publication Number:
  US 20030050979A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/204
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/08 for authentication of entities cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication H04L9/32

Abstract

It is a problem that information and an advertisement can be only seen in the idle state of a terminal equipment, resulting in decrease of advertisement value.

A time at which an advertiser displays an advertisement to a client can be specified to the client that has its primary object to display, and a schedule of advertisement display is adjusted based on a fee for the advertisement display in a server when a competition of plural advertisers displaying advertisements at the same time or the like occurs, whereby an advertisement is displayed at a client side at a time desired by the advertiser, resulting in provision of a highly effective advertisement.

Claims

1. An information distribution system comprising:

a multi-purpose communication network which can transfer data by a wired-system cable or by wireless;

a client which is connected to the communication network and has its primary object to display contents in a storage means inside;

a content server which is connected to the communication network and provides information to the client; and

a distribution server which is connected to the communication network, receives a content profile in which contents of content and a utility fee required with content execution are described from the content server, and transfers a script file which can control the content execution in the client to the client, wherein a client execution time at which corresponding content is executed in the client can be specified in the content profile, and the distribution server adjusts the client execution time based on the utility fee when the client execution time has competition.

2. The information distribution system as defined in claim 1, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or content provider.

3. The information distribution system as defined in claim 1, wherein the client comprises:

a client communication I/F as an interface to the communication network;

a script file storage means for storing the script file from the client communication I/F;

a client content storage means for storing content data from the client communication I/F;

a content executing means for executing the contents of the client content storage means; and

a content execution control means for controlling the content executing means with reference to the contents of the script file storage means, and the distribution server comprises;

a server communication I/F as an interface to the communication network;

a content profile storage means for holding the content profile from the server communication I/F; and

a content scheduler which executes scheduling of content to be distributed to the client with reference to the contents of the content profile storage means.

4. The information distribution system as defined in claim 1, wherein a description indicating urgency can be given in the content profile, the distribution server confirms the description indicating urgency given in the content profile to transfer a script file indicating urgency to a target client immediately, and the client which received the script file immediately receives and executes target content.

5. The information distribution system as defined in claim 4, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider.

6. The information distribution system as defined in claim 1, wherein a keyword and price information of corresponding content can be described in the content profile, the distribution server holds a search engine which enables a search of the content profile by a keyword sent from the client, and content can be selected by communicating the keyword and its search result between the client and the distribution server.

7. The information distribution system as defined in claim 6, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider, and the accounting processing is performed when the client executes a candidates of the content.

8. An information distribution system comprising:

a multi-purpose communication network which can transfer data by a wired-system cable or by wireless;

a client which is connected to the communication network and has its primary object to display contents in a storage means inside;

a content server which is connected to the communication network and provides information to the client; and

a distribution server which is connected to the communication network, is provided with a content scheduler which receives a content profile describing contents of content from the content server and executes scheduling of content to be distributed to the client with reference to the contents of the content profile, and transfers a script file which can control the content execution in the client to the client, wherein

a keyword of corresponding content can be described in the content profile, the distribution server holds a search engine which enables a search of the content profile by a keyword sent from the client, and content selection can be performed by communicating the keyword and its search result between the client and the distribution server, and

information for identifying target content to be accompanied and a fee to be displayed to the client are described in the content profile, information that accompanies the target content to be accompanied is decided according to the contents of the fee in the content profile in the content scheduler, and the client executes the accompanying information before or after the target content to be accompanied is executed.

9. The information distribution system as defined in claim 8, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider.

10. An information distribution system comprising:

a multi-purpose communication network which can transfer data by a wired-system cable or by wireless;

a client which is connected to the communication network and has its primary object to display contents in a storage means inside;

a content server which is connected to the communication network and provides information to the client; and

a distribution server which is connected to the communication network, is provided with a content scheduler which receives a content profile describing contents of content from the content server and executes scheduling of content to be distributed to the client with reference to the contents of the content profile, and transfers a script file which can control the content execution in the client to the client, wherein

a keyword of corresponding content can be described in the content profile, the distribution server holds a search engine which enables a search of the content profile by a keyword sent from the client, and content selection can be performed by communicating the keyword and its search result between the client and the distribution server, and

the content server can freely set a fee to display to the client in the content profile, and an order at displaying a list to the client according to the contents of the fee is decided in the content scheduler.

11. The information distribution system as defined in 10, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider.

12. An information distribution system comprising:

a multi-purpose communication network which can transfer data by a wired-system cable or by wireless;

a client which is connected to the communication network and has its primary object to display contents in a storage means inside;

a content server which is connected to the communication network and provides information to the client; and

a distribution server which is connected to the communication network, is provided with a content scheduler which receives a content profile describing contents of content from the content server and executes scheduling of content to be distributed to the client with reference to the contents of the content profile, and transfers a script file which can control the content execution in the client to the client, wherein

a keyword of corresponding content can be described in the content profile, the distribution server holds a search engine which enables a search of the content profile by a keyword sent from the client, and content selection can be performed by communicating the keyword and its search result between the client and the distribution server, and

a description indicating that an advertisement is displayed during a content search operation by the client and a description of a fee for displaying the advertisement are included in the content profile, an advertisement related to the keyword employed for the content search by the client is selected in the content scheduler, and an adjustment is made to display an advertisement which is high in the advertisement display fee preferentially, when there are plural advertisements.

13. The information distribution system as defined in 12, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider.

14. An information distribution system comprising:

a multi-purpose communication network which can transfer data by a wired-system cable or by wireless;

a client which is connected to the communication network and has its primary object to display contents in a storage means inside;

a content server which is connected to the communication network and provides information to the client; and

a distribution server which is connected to the communication network, is provided with a content scheduler which receives a content profile describing contents of content from the content server and executes scheduling of content to be distributed to the client with reference to the contents of the content profile, and transfers a script file which can control the content execution in the client to the client, wherein

a keyword of corresponding content can be described in the content profile, the distribution server holds a search engine which enables a search of the content profile by a keyword specified by the client, and content selection can be performed by communicating the keyword and its search result between the client and the distribution server, and

the distribution server is provided with an authenticating means for authenticating a user and a user information storage means for storing individual information of a user, and the content scheduler is provided with a keyword mask means which masks a keyword to be sent to the client based on the individual information stored in the user information storage means so as to suppress its sending to the client, thereby suppressing display of a keyword unnecessary for the user.

15. The information distribution system as defined in claim 14, wherein the keyword to be masked can be set from the client.

16. The information distribution system as defined in claim 14, wherein the user information storage means is also provided with a function of managing the individual information of a user as well as keyword information selected by the user as statistical data, a keyword related to a description for identifying an advertisement distribution according to the keyword is described in the content profile, and the distribution server distributes an advertisement with reference to the statistical data of the user in the user information storage means.

18. The information distribution system as defined in claim 16, wherein an inputting means which enables a user to input an information filed desired by himself/herself subjectively is provided, the user information storage means is also provided with a function of managing the information field as statistical data, and the distribution server distributes an advertisement with reference to the statistical data of the user in the user information storage means.

17. The information distribution system as defined in 16, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider.

19. The information distribution system as defined in 18, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider.

20. An information distribution system comprising:

a multi-purpose communication network which can transfer data by a wired-system cable or by wireless;

a client which is connected to the communication network and has its primary object to display contents in a storage means inside;

a content server which is connected to the communication network and provides information to the client; and

a distribution server which is connected to the communication network, is provided with a content scheduler which receives a content profile describing contents of content from the content server and executes scheduling of content to be distributed to the client with reference to the contents of the content profile, and transfers a script file which can control the content execution in the client to the client, wherein

a keyword of corresponding content can be described in the content profile, the distribution server holds a search engine which enables a search of the content profile by a keyword specified by the client, and content selection can be performed by communicating the keyword and its search result between the client and the distribution server, and

information required to create an application executable in the client is previously disclosed, purchase price, rental price, and keyword information of content are described in the content profile issued by the content server which holds the content including the application, a user can select trial, purchase, or rental of the content, and the execution in the client automatically becomes impossible when trial or rental is selected and its validity period passes.

22. The information distribution system as defined in claim 20, wherein the user information storage means holds individual information of a user as well as information of content purchased by the user, and a fee is not charged when the content is found to be already purchased with reference to the contents of the user information storage means, when the content is transmitted to the client.

23. The information distribution system as defined in claim 20, wherein the distribution server holds a file which includes an application for setting executional environment of a terminal equipment of the client and a typical pattern of the executional environment of the terminal equipment, and the file including the application and the pattern is transmitted from the distribution server to the terminal equipment, so that the executional environment of the terminal equipment can be set by a simple menu operation, when a user sets the executional environment.

24. The information distribution system as defined in claim 23, wherein the user information storage means hold individual information of a user as well as information for identifying the executional environment set by the user, and the executional environment of the client can be returned to its original state.

25. The information distribution system as defined in claim 24, wherein an application for setting the executional environment of the terminal equipment of a client and a background picture for the executional environment of the terminal equipment can be obtained from the content server, and the background picture can be selected from the content server when the user sets the executional environment.

26. The information distribution system as defined in claim 25, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider, and a corresponding content server can be charged a fee when a user displays the background picture.

21. The information distribution system as defined in 20, wherein the distribution server includes an accounting means which can execute an accounting processing to a content server or a content provider and a client or a user.