MULTI-MEDIA CONTENT AT A DIGITAL DOWNLOAD KIOSK

• US 20120066089A1
• Filed: 09/14/2010
• Published: 03/15/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 09/14/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NCR Voyix Corporation
• Original Assignee: NCR Corporation
• Inventors: Henderson, James
• Granted Patent: US 10,296,726 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/26.25
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/10 Protecting distributed programs or content, e.g. vending or licensing of copyrighted material protection in video systems or pay television H04N7/16 ; Digital rights management [DRM]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0607 Regulated

Abstract

A digital download kiosk network is described. The network comprises: an authorization database including a digital rights management facility; a first digital download kiosk coupled to the authorization database to receive digital rights management data; and a second digital download kiosk coupled to the authorization database to receive digital rights management data, and coupled to the first digital download kiosk in a peer-to-peer manner to share multi-media content therebetween.

Claims

1. A digital download kiosk network comprising:

an authorization database including a digital rights management facility;

a first digital download kiosk coupled to the authorization database to receive digital rights management data; and

a second digital download kiosk coupled to the authorization database to receive digital rights management data, and coupled to the first digital download kiosk in a peer-to-peer manner to share multi-media content therebetween.

2. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 1, wherein each of the first and second digital download kiosks includes a catalogue listing multi-media content available at any digital download kiosk in the digital download kiosk network.

3. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 1, wherein the authorization database is located remotely from the first and second digital download kiosks.

4. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 1, wherein the first digital download kiosk is coupled to the authorization database by a permanent connection and the second digital download kiosk is coupled to the authorization database by a dial-up connection.

5. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 4, wherein the first digital download kiosk is configured to receive all new multi-media content and deletes old multi-media content to make sufficient space for the new multi-media content.

6. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 4, wherein the first digital download kiosk is configured to receive all new multi-media content and transfers some old multi-media content to the second digital download kiosk to make space for the new multi-media content.

7. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 1, wherein the first and second digital download kiosks are mutually coupled using a high speed short range communications system.

8. A digital download kiosk network according to claim 1, wherein the first digital download kiosk includes a content management application operable to allocate different multi-media packages to different digital download kiosks.

9. A method of providing multi-media content in playable form to a customer, the method comprising:

receiving at a first digital download kiosk information from a second digital download kiosk about the multi-media content stored on the second digital download kiosk;

providing information to a customer at the first digital download kiosk about multi-media content stored on either of the first or second digital download kiosks;

receiving a request from the customer to download multi-media content stored on the second digital download kiosk;

retrieving the requested multi-media content from the second digital download kiosk;

retrieving digital rights management data from a remote authorization database;

applying the digital rights management data to the retrieved multi-media content to create playable multi-media content; and

copying the playable multi-media content to a portable storage device provided by the customer.

10. A method according to claim 9, wherein the step of receiving at a first digital download kiosk information from a second digital download kiosk about the multi-media content stored on the second digital download kiosk is implemented using 60 GHz transmission technology.

11. A method according to claim 9, wherein the step of providing information to a customer at the first digital download kiosk about multi-media content stored on either of the first or second digital download kiosks is implemented so that the location of the multi-media content is hidden from the customer.

12. A method according to claim 9, wherein the step of retrieving the requested multi-media content from the second digital download kiosk is implemented in a peer-to-peer manner using an IP network.

13. A method according to claim 9, wherein the method includes the step of receiving and authenticating payment from the customer prior to the step of retrieving digital rights management data from a remote authorization database.

14. A method according to claim 9, wherein the method comprises the further steps of:

accessing the remote authorization database to retrieve new multi-media content;

implementing a distribution criterion to transfer some multi-media content from the first digital download kiosk to the second digital download kiosk to ensure that the first digital download kiosk has sufficient storage space to receive the new multi-media content; and

downloading the new multi-media content to the first digital download kiosk.

15. A method according to claim 14, wherein the distribution criterion consists of one or more of:

locating all multi-media content of the same genre on the same digital download kiosk, locating all new releases on the same multi-media kiosk;

locating all multi-media content having the same characters on the same digital download kiosk;

distributing the most popular multi-media content across all of the digital download kiosks; and

locating all multi-media content from the same source on the same digital download kiosk.