System for downloading digital content published in a media channel

• US 20070100787A1
• Filed: 11/02/2005
• Published: 05/03/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 11/02/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Creative Technology Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Creative Technology Ltd.
• Inventors: Choo, Guan, Lim, Seh
• Granted Patent: US 7,793,206 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/70 of video data
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/765 intermediate
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/06 specially adapted for file transfer, e.g. file transfer protocol [FTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/266 Channel or content management, e.g. generation and management of keys and entitlement messages in a conditional access system, merging a VOD unicast channel into a multicast channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4113 PC
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4126 The peripheral being portable, e.g. PDAs or mobile phones
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/41407 embedded in a portable device, e.g. video client on a mobile phone, PDA, laptop constructional details of equipment or arrangements specially adapted for portable computer application G06F1/1626; arrangements specially adapted for mobile receivers in broadcast systems H04H20/57
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/440236 by media transcoding, e.g. video is transformed into a slideshow of still pictures, audio is converted into text
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/440263 by altering the spatial resolution, e.g. for displaying on a connected PDA
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6582 Data stored in the client, e.g. viewing habits, hardware capabilities, credit card number arrangements where receivers interact with the broadcast H04H20/38

Abstract

A system (10) for downloading digital content (5) to a video-enabled portable media player (20), the digital content (5) being published in a media channel (30) by a content creator, the system (10) comprising: a data receiver module (11) to receive the digital content (5) from the media channel (30) via a communication medium; a conversion module (12) to convert the received digital content to at least one video file (40) of a predetermined video format; and a download module (13) to copy the at least one video file (40) to the portable media player (20); wherein the video file (40) ensures the digital content is consumed in the same order that the digital content (5) is published in the media channel (30) by the content creator.

Claims

16-1. The system according to claim 1, wherein if the digital content is a video file that is in a video format not natively supported by the portable media player, the conversion module transcodes the video file into a video format natively supported by the portable media player.

17-2. The system according to claim 1, wherein the filename of the video file is in the form of:

[YYMMDDHHMM]-[CHANNEL NAME]-[FILENAME].AVI

19. A method for downloading digital content to a video-enabled portable media player, the digital content being published in a media channel by a content creator, the method comprising:

receiving the digital content from the media channel via a communication medium;

converting the received digital content to at least one video file of a predetermined video format; and

copying the at least one video file to the portable media player;

wherein the video file ensures the digital content is consumed in the same order that the digital content is published in the media channel by the content creator.

20. The method according to claim 19, further comprising detecting video formats compatible with the portable media player.

21. The method according to claim 19, further comprising selecting the predetermined video format according to suitability for the portable media player.

22. A system for downloading digital content to a video-enabled portable media player, the digital content being published in a media channel by a content creator, the system comprising:

a user interface to be displayed to the user in response to a user action, the user interface enabling digital content to be selectively downloaded directly to the portable media player; and

a download module to receive the selected digital content from the media channel via a communication medium and to transmit the selected digital content to the portable media player without making a local copy.

23. The system according to claim 22, wherein the download module receives the selected digital content in a memory buffer temporarily storing data relating to the digital content before the digital content is saved to the portable media player.

25. The system according to claim 22, wherein the user action is any one from the group consisting of clicking a link or button to download digital content.

26. The system according to claim 22, wherein the user interface comprises a plurality of columns including:

title of the digital content, file size of the digital content, release date of the digital content and brief description of the digital content;

a checkbox associated with each digital content to indicate whether the digital content is to be downloaded; and

a portable media player selection field to indicate the type of the portable media player.

27. The system according to claim 26, wherein the plurality of columns further includes name of the media channel, author of the digital content, artwork, URL of the digital content and language of the digital content.

28. The system according to claim 22, wherein the system is in the form of an OCX/Active X plug in for a web browser application.

29. The system according to claim 22, wherein the download module maintains the digital rights of the content creator of the digital content.

30. The system according to claim 22, wherein the user interface further comprises a download location input field to indicate the storage location for a local copy of the digital content.