JP2007053566A - Device and method for content reception, and system for content distribution - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide audience rating information for a terminal having provided view history information. <P>SOLUTION: A terminal 1 receives a television broadcast by a television reception part 2 and displays a selected television program on a display 3. A CPU 7 periodically uploads view history information for specifying a program being viewed at present to an audience rating measuring server 11 through a network interface 6 and a network 20. In response to a request generated by the terminal 1, audience rating information is downloaded from the audience rating measuring server 11 to the terminal 1. The audience rating information is program information specifying the program currently at the top audience rating. When a program is switched to a CM, the display 3 is automatically switched to the channel of the program at the top audience rating according to the audience rating information. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a content receiving apparatus, a content receiving method, and a content distribution system that can be applied to television broadcasting, Internet television, and the like.

  With respect to a television broadcast program, the audience rating is known as an estimated value indicating the percentage of viewers in the area who watched a certain television program. The audience rating is measured based on data obtained from equipment connected to a television receiver installed in a monitor household. There are demands for an instantaneous audience rating obtained every minute, an average audience rating that is an average value of the instantaneous audience rating, and the like.

  As an audience rating measurement method, as described in Patent Document 1 below, a portable terminal having a remote control function of a television receiver is used, and operation history information on the operation of the television receiver by the portable terminal is portable. It has been proposed that a terminal transmits a viewing history management server and the server obtains a viewing rate.

JP-A-2005-79609

  In a conventional audience rating calculation system, a viewing history from a monitor viewer is uploaded to an audience rating measurement server and the audience rating is measured, and a service related to the audience rating is provided to the monitor viewer who provides the viewing history. It was normal not to be done.

  Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a content receiving apparatus, a content receiving method, and a content distribution system capable of providing information related to a program having a high current audience rating to a viewer who has provided viewing history information such as viewing history It is to provide.

In order to solve the above-described problem, the present invention transmits viewing history information specifying first content that is selectively viewed among a plurality of distributed contents to an audience rating measurement server. Communication means for receiving from the audience rating measurement server audience rating information specifying a second content that has acquired a relatively high audience rating and is viewable;
Display means for displaying received audience rating information;
And a display control unit that controls display of audience rating information on the display unit.

The present invention transmits viewing history information for identifying first content that is selectively viewed among a plurality of distributed contents to an audience rating measurement server,
Currently receiving audience rating information from the audience rating measurement server for identifying the second content that has been acquired a relatively high audience rating and can be viewed;
This is a content receiving method for displaying received audience rating information.

The present invention provides a content distribution device that distributes content to a content receiving device;
An audience rating measurement server that receives viewing history information specifying the first content viewed in the content receiving apparatus from the content receiving apparatus and measures the current audience rating from the collected viewing history information;
Communication that transmits viewing history information to the audience rating measurement server and receives audience rating information that identifies a second content that is currently acquiring a relatively high audience rating and can be viewed from the audience rating measurement server. A content delivery system comprising: means; display means for displaying received audience rating information; and a display control means for controlling display of audience rating information on the display means.

  In the present invention, preferably, the display means is controlled such that a program with a high audience rating is automatically displayed on the display means when a preset scene is broadcast, such as when a commercial is broadcast.

  According to the present invention, instead of providing viewing history information, it is possible to know a program having a high audience rating among receivable programs. For example, it is possible to notify a viewer who is turning on the television receiver without having the purpose of viewing a specific program, the program that many viewers are currently viewing.

  Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows an entire content distribution system according to an embodiment. The system includes a terminal 1 as a content receiving device, an audience rating measurement server 11, and a network 20 such as the Internet connecting the terminal 1 and the server 11. Note that content means general information such as text, still images, moving images, and music that can be viewed. Since one embodiment is an example of watching a television program, the content is a distributed program.

  The terminal 1 includes, for example, a television receiving unit 2 that receives a television broadcast, a display 3 that reproduces a television program selected in the received television broadcast, and an operation unit 4 that includes a remote control light receiving unit. A memory 5 such as an SDRAM, a network interface 6 as a communication unit, and a CPU 7 as a control unit for controlling the overall operation and processing of the terminal 1. These components of the terminal 1 are connected by a bus 8. Although not shown, a speaker for audio reproduction is provided integrally or separately with the display 3. The terminal 1 is not limited to a stationary configuration at home, but may be a configuration of a mobile receiver such as a PDA, a mobile phone, or an in-vehicle device.

In the terminal 1, the CPU 7 controls the television receiving unit 2 in accordance with a user operation on the operation unit 4, thereby turning on / off the power, selecting a desired television channel, and a program of the selected television channel. Are received and decoded, the decoded program is displayed on the display 3, and the audio is reproduced. As will be described later, the CPU 7 controls a display operation for displaying the received audience rating information on the display 3. CPU 7
Shows the viewing history information for specifying the currently viewed program, for example, viewing channel information, viewing start time and viewing end time to the audience rating measurement server 11 via the network interface 6 and the network 20. Upload regularly. The program viewed from the channel information and time is specified. For example, when viewing history information is transmitted at a short time interval such as an interval of 5 seconds, only the channel number being viewed may be transmitted.

  In response to a request generated in the terminal 1, audience rating information is downloaded from the audience rating measurement server 11 to the terminal 1 via the network 20 and the network interface 6. The request is generated periodically, for example. A request may be generated in response to a user operation. The downloaded audience rating information is stored in the memory 5. The audience rating information is updated to the latest one every time it is downloaded. This audience rating information is program information that identifies a program with a high audience rating, for example, a program with the highest audience rating. Of course, since there is a delay time until the audience rating measurement server 11 collects viewing history information, measures the audience rating, and transmits the measured audience rating information to the terminal, the current audience rating is the latest It means audience rating.

  The audience rating measurement server 11 includes a network interface 12 that connects the network 20 and the server, a hard disk 13 that stores a database that stores monitor information, program information, and the like, a memory 14 such as an SDRAM, The CPU 15 is configured as a control unit that controls the overall operation and processing of the server 11. These components of the server 11 are connected by a bus 16.

  The audience rating measurement server 11 processes the viewing history information uploaded from a large number of terminals and calculates the audience rating. A conventional method can be used as the audience rating calculation method. For example, the viewing start time, the viewing end time, and the viewing channel are uploaded to the audience rating measurement server 11 every predetermined time from a predetermined terminal to which a user ID for identification is assigned. The server 11 collects viewing history information from the received terminal, calculates an instantaneous audience rating for each program, for example, an audience rating every 5 seconds, and further calculates an average audience rating for each program.

  The calculated audience rating information is stored in the memory 14. Upon receiving a request from the terminal 1, the audience rating measurement server 11 reads the instantaneous audience rating in the audience rating information stored in the memory 14 and determines a program having the highest instantaneous audience rating. Information relating to this program is transmitted as audience rating information to the terminal 1 that issued the request via the network interface 12 and the network 20.

  In the audience rating measurement method in the audience rating measurement server 11, in digital broadcasting, for example, digital terrestrial broadcasting, a broadcasting station is specified by defining an area identification code in addition to the channel number of the UHF channel. Therefore, in the viewing history information uploaded from the terminal 1 to the server 11 and the viewing rate information downloaded from the server 11 to the terminal 1, not only the channel number but also the area identification code is specified in order to specify the broadcasting station. It is required to be included. In addition, the audience rating can be calculated for each region, for example, for each prefecture based on the region identification code. In addition, you may make it calculate the audience rating for every area using the registration information of user ID.

The downloaded audience rating information is presented to the user at the content receiving terminal 1. A specific example of the presentation method will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 2A is an example in which the audience rating information downloaded from the audience rating measurement server 11 is text data, and the data is displayed on the display 3. Currently, the program name of the program with the highest audience rating and the channel number of the broadcasting station providing the program are displayed. Not only the program with the highest audience rating but also the program name and channel number with the highest audience rating such as the second and third rankings may be displayed.

  FIG. 2B shows an example in which the screen of program A that is currently viewed is automatically switched to the screen of program B that currently has the highest audience rating. When the program A is watched, it is detected that a preset scene such as a commercial (for example, abbreviated as CM) is broadcast, and the program B is automatically switched to a state of reception. As a method for detecting CM, an existing method such as a method using an audio signal or a method for analyzing an image can be used. In addition to the CM, it is also possible to detect a game pause period in a sports broadcast program and automatically switch the reception channel to a channel with a high audience rating.

  FIG. 2C shows an example in which a child screen is displayed on the display screen of the currently viewed program A, and the program B with the highest audience rating is currently displayed on the child screen. The timing for presenting the child screen is, for example, when a CM is detected. The programs A and B may be displayed as split screens that display not only the child screen but also two screens of the same size on the left and right. In the case of FIG. 2C, it is necessary to provide two receiving units, for example, a tuner so that two cases A and B can be received simultaneously.

  FIG. 3 shows an exemplary configuration of the television receiver 2 in the terminal 1. Broadcast waves received by the antenna 21 are supplied to the tuner 22. The tuner 22 selects a target carrier wave from the received broadcast wave, performs demodulation processing, and restores a transport stream (hereinafter referred to as TS as appropriate). Further, error correction processing is performed in units of TS packets.

  When the TS is scrambled (multiplexed), the descrambler 23 performs descrambling processing for releasing descrambling as necessary for a packet having a specific PID (packet ID) existing in the TS. .

  The demultiplexer 24 performs demultiplexing (separation) processing on the descrambled TS, separates contents such as video, audio, and data, and also performs SI (Service Information), PSI (Program Specific Information), and the like. Separate program information. In the processing in the demultiplexer 14, the TS is converted to a PES (Packetized Elementary Stream) or ES (Elementary Stream) before being converted to a TS.

  The decoder 25 performs a decoding process on the video PES and the audio PES, and converts the video and audio into a digital signal. The video signal processing unit 26 processes the decoded digital video signal and outputs it to the bus 8. The audio signal processing unit 27 processes the decoded digital audio signal and outputs it to the bus 8. Although not shown, in an example (see FIG. 2A) in which the text of audience rating information is displayed in the video of the received program (see FIG. 2A), an OSD (On Screen Display) control unit that superimposes the text on the video is provided.

  The CPU 7 controls each unit via the bus 8. The memory 5 includes a ROM (Reed Only Memory) in which a control program is stored and a RAM (Random Access Memory) used as a work area when executing the program, for example. Information corresponding to the operation is supplied from the operation unit 4 to the CPU 7. The operation unit 4 may be configured with buttons, a rotary dial, or the like, or may be configured as a touch panel that is operated by touching a monitor. Further, a remote control device may be used.

  The broadcast station information storage unit 28 stores information regarding broadcast stations. The broadcast station information storage unit 28 is configured by a nonvolatile memory such as a hard disk. The broadcasting station information storage unit 28 stores information on channel arrangement of digital terrestrial broadcasting.

  That is, the broadcast station information storage unit 28 stores a channel assigned to the broadcast station and a region identification which is region information indicating a place where the broadcast station broadcasts. The area identification is information including either wide area information or narrow area information. The wide area information is a region including a plurality of prefectures such as the Kanto region, the Chukyo region, and the Kinki region, and the narrow region information is information indicating a region narrower than the wide area, such as Tokyo, Aichi, and Kyoto prefectures. . Thus, a broadcasting station is specified by the channel number and the area identification.

  FIG. 3 is an example of the television receiver 2, and other configurations are possible. For example, when two programs are displayed at the same time by a sub-screen or a split screen, it is necessary to provide two systems of receiving and decoding means including separate tuners.

The present invention can also be applied to, for example, Internet television (also referred to as broadband broadcasting) distributed via the Internet. The measurement of the audience rating on the Internet television can be performed in the same manner as the measurement of the audience rating on the television broadcast described above. For example, a predetermined measurement software is installed in a personal computer to which a user ID is assigned, and access history information including a user ID, a URL (Uniform Resource Locator), and a time is transmitted to the measurement server. Count the number of accesses and calculate the ranking according to the number of accesses. Information relating to the website with the highest number of accesses is transmitted to the personal computer that provided the history information as audience rating information.

  The operation of the above-described embodiment of the present invention will be described. FIG. 4 shows processing performed by the control of the CPU 7 of the terminal 1, that is, processing when the terminal 1 transmits viewing history information to the audience rating measurement server 11. Starting from step S1 where the power of the terminal 1 is turned on, it is determined in step S2 whether or not an operation for turning off the power has been performed. If an OFF operation is performed, the power is turned OFF in step S3.

  If it is determined in step S2 that the power OFF operation is not performed, it is determined in step S4 whether a predetermined time has elapsed. If it is determined that a predetermined time, for example, 5 seconds has elapsed, in step S5, channel information specifying the program being viewed is sent to the audience rating measurement server 11. Here, since viewing history information is sent to the server every short time, channel information is used as viewing history information.

  FIG. 5 shows processing performed by the CPU 15 of the audience rating measurement server 11. When the service is started in step S11, it is determined in step S12 whether or not viewing history information from the terminal has been received. If received, the received viewing history information is stored in the viewing database (hard disk 13) in step S16.

  If it is determined in step S12 that viewing history information is not received, it is determined in step S13 whether or not there is a request for viewing rate information from the terminal (that is, information on the current viewing rate rank). If it is determined that there is a request for audience rating information, the audience rating information is transmitted to a terminal requesting audience rating information in step S17.

  If it is determined in step S13 that there is no request for audience rating information, it is determined in step S14 whether a predetermined time has elapsed. If it is determined that the predetermined time has not elapsed, the process returns to step S12 (determination of whether viewing history information has been received from the terminal).

  If it is determined that the predetermined time has elapsed, the viewing history information from the previous calculation stored in the database is totaled in step S15, and the rank is calculated. The calculation result is stored in the memory 14 and the hard disk 13. Then, the process returns to step S12. A predetermined time is set to a short time such as 5 seconds, and an instantaneous audience rating is calculated.

  FIG. 6 shows processing for realizing an example of display control as shown in FIG. 2B described above. In step S21, the power is turned on. In step S22, it is determined whether or not the power is turned off. If it is determined that the power is turned off, the power is turned off in step S23.

  If it is determined in step S22 that the power-off operation is not performed, it is determined in step S24 whether or not the program of the channel being viewed has become a CM. If it is determined that the CM has been reached, the receiving broadcast station automatically selects the first channel of the audience rating in step S25 based on the audience rating information received in advance from the audience rating measurement server 11 and stored in the memory. Can be switched automatically. Accordingly, the screen of the program that was being viewed is automatically switched to the screen of the program with the highest audience rating.

  After switching the screen in step S25, or if no CM is detected in step S24, it is determined in step S26 whether a predetermined time has elapsed. The predetermined time is a time interval at which the terminal 1 transmits a request for downloading audience rating information to the audience rating measurement server 11. By setting a short time, the latest audience rating information can be obtained.

  If it is determined in step S26 that the predetermined time has not elapsed, the process returns to step S22 (determination of presence / absence of power-off operation). If it is determined that the predetermined time has elapsed, the audience rating information is acquired from the audience rating measurement server 11 in step S27, and the stored audience rating information is updated to the latest one. Then, the process returns to step S22.

  When the reception channel is automatically switched to the first channel of the audience rating, it is detected whether or not there is any subsequent operation on the operation unit of the user, and when no operation is performed, a predetermined value corresponding to the airing time of the CM When it is detected that the time elapses, it may be possible to return to the state of viewing the program of the original channel. That is, the program with the highest audience rating is viewed for almost the CM period. This process is also applicable to other display control processes to be described later.

  FIG. 7 shows processing for realizing another example of display control. In step S31, the power is turned on. In step S32, it is determined whether or not the power is turned off. If it is determined that the power is turned off, the power is turned off in step S33.

  If it is determined in step S32 that the power OFF operation is not performed, it is determined in step S34 whether or not the program of the channel being viewed has become a CM. If it is determined that the commercial has been reached, a transmission request for audience rating information is transmitted to the audience rating measurement server 11 in step S35, and audience rating information is acquired from the audience rating measurement server 11 and stored. Information is updated.

  Based on the acquired latest audience rating information, in step S36, the reception channel is automatically switched to the first channel of the audience rating. Accordingly, the screen of the program that was being viewed is automatically switched to the screen of the program with the highest audience rating.

  While the process of FIG. 6 periodically transmits a request for transmission of audience rating information to the audience rating measurement server 11, the process of FIG. 7 receives audience rating information when a program is switched to CM. In this example, the reception channel is switched based on the latest received audience rating information. In addition to the CM, it is also possible to detect a game pause period in a sports broadcast program and automatically switch the reception channel to a channel with a high audience rating. Examples of the game pause period include a half time of a soccer game, a period between rounds of martial arts such as boxing, a period of change of inning of a baseball game, and the like.

  FIG. 8 shows processing for realizing still another example of display control. In the process of FIG. 8, audience rating information is periodically received, and the program being viewed is automatically switched to the program with the highest audience rating according to a request generated by a user operation. In step S41, the power is turned on. In step S42, it is determined whether or not a power-off operation has been performed. If it is determined that the power-off operation has been performed, the power is turned off in step S43.

  If it is determined in step S42 that the power OFF operation is not performed, it is determined in step S44 whether or not there is a request for switching to the channel with the highest audience rating. If it is determined that there is a request, the reception channel is automatically switched to the first channel of the audience rating in step S45 based on the audience rating information acquired and stored in advance. Accordingly, the screen of the program that was being viewed is automatically switched to the screen of the program with the highest audience rating.

  After the screen is switched in step S45 or when it is determined in step S44 that there is no request, it is determined in step S46 whether or not a predetermined time has elapsed. The predetermined time is a time interval at which the terminal 1 transmits a request for downloading audience rating information to the audience rating measurement server 11. By setting a short time, the latest audience rating information can be obtained.

  If it is determined in step S46 that the predetermined time has not elapsed, the process returns to step S42 (determining whether or not the power is turned off). If it is determined that the predetermined time has elapsed, the audience rating information is acquired from the audience rating measurement server 11 in step S47, and the stored audience rating information is updated to the latest one. Then, the process returns to step S42.

  Similar to the processing of FIG. 7, when it is detected in step S44 that a request for switching to the channel with the highest audience rating has occurred, a transmission request for audience rating information is transmitted to the audience rating measurement server 11. Then, the audience rating information may be acquired from the audience rating measurement server 11 and the stored audience rating information may be updated to the latest one.

  If the program of the channel currently being viewed is the program with the highest rating, the program may be switched to the program with the next highest rating or displayed simultaneously as an exception process.

  The present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments of the present invention, and various modifications and applications are possible without departing from the spirit of the present invention. For example, a terminal having a recording function may be used.

1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of a content distribution system according to the present invention. FIG. It is a basic diagram which shows the example of the display control in a terminal. It is a block diagram of an example of the television receiving part which a terminal has. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of the process which a terminal sends out viewing history information in one Embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of the process which an audience rating measurement server measures viewing history information, and provides to a terminal in one Embodiment of this invention. 7 is a flowchart showing a flow of processing for switching a reception channel to a channel with a high audience rating when the terminal periodically receives audience rating information and switches to CM in an embodiment of the present invention. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of a process which receives audience rating information when a terminal switches to CM in one Embodiment of this invention, and switches a receiving channel to a channel with a high audience rating. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of the process which switches a receiving channel to a channel with the highest audience rating according to the request | requirement of a terminal in one Embodiment of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Terminal as a content receiver 2 ... Television receiver 3 ... Display 6 ... Network interface 7 ... CPU
11 ... Audience rating measurement server 12 ... Network interface 15 ... CPU
20 ... Internet

Claims (6)

Viewing history information that identifies first content selectively viewed among the plurality of distributed contents is transmitted to the audience rating measurement server, and currently has a relatively high audience rating; and Communication means for receiving, from the audience rating measurement server, audience rating information that identifies second content that can be viewed;
Display means for displaying the received audience rating information;
A content receiving apparatus comprising: display control means for controlling display of the audience rating information on the display means. In claim 1,
The content receiving apparatus that controls the display means so that the display control means displays the audience rating information when a preset scene is broadcast. In claim 1,
The content receiving apparatus that controls the display unit so that the display control unit displays the second content specified by the audience rating information instead of the first content being viewed. In claim 1,
The content receiving apparatus that controls the display means so that the display control means displays the second content specified by the audience rating information simultaneously with the first content being viewed. Transmitting viewing history information for identifying the first content selectively viewed among the plurality of distributed contents to the audience rating measurement server;
Currently receiving audience rating information specifying the second content that has been acquired a relatively high audience rating and can be viewed from the audience rating measurement server,
A content receiving method for displaying the received audience rating information. A content distribution device for distributing content to a content receiving device;
An audience rating measurement server for receiving viewing history information specifying the first content viewed in the content receiving device from the content receiving device and measuring a current audience rating from the collected viewing history information;
The viewing history information is transmitted from the audience rating measurement server to the audience rating measurement server, and the audience rating information specifying the second content that is currently acquiring a relatively high audience rating and can be viewed is sent from the audience rating measurement server. A content distribution system comprising: a communication means for receiving; a display means for displaying the received audience rating information; and a display control means for controlling display of the audience rating information on the display means.

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