Reception apparatus, reception method, transmission apparatus, and transmission method

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10880608-B2
Application number	US-201916537465-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 9, 2019
Priority date	Feb 17, 2015
Publication date	Dec 29, 2020
Grant date	Dec 29, 2020

Abstract

The present technology relates to a reception apparatus, a reception method, a transmission apparatus, and a transmission method that make it possible to do a promotion for a non-subscriber to a pay broadcast service more flexibly. The reception apparatus receives broadcast content that is provided as a pay broadcast service and transmitted in a scrambled manner, acquires a subscription check application for checking presence of a subscription to the pay broadcast service depending on information indicating presence of the subscription check application, the information being included in control information including information regarding a structure of the broadcast content, and controls an operation of the subscription check application. The present technology is applicable, for example, to a television receiver capable of receiving a digital broadcast signal.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A reception apparatus comprising:
circuitry configured to
receive a broadcast stream including control information and broadcast content provided as a pay broadcast service, the broadcast content being included in a scrambled stream of the broadcast stream and the control information being included in a non-scrambled stream of the broadcast stream;
acquire a subscription check application, based on the control information, for checking presence of a subscription to the pay broadcast service;
control an operation of the subscription check application; and
acquire a promotion application in response to a determination that the subscription to the pay broadcast service is not present.

2. The reception apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein the circuitry is further configured to
acquire a conjunction application in response to a determination that the subscription to the pay broadcast service is present.

3. The reception apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein the circuitry is further configured to
cause a transition from the subscription check application to one of the promotion application and the conjunction application to control an operation of one of the promotion application and the conjunction application.

4. The reception apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein the circuitry is further configured to
execute the conjunction application in conjunction with the broadcast content when a non-subscribing user subscribes to the pay broadcast service via the promotion application.

5. The reception apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein the subscription check application is transmitted in a non-scrambled manner, the promotion application is transmitted in a non-scrambled manner, and the conjunction application is transmitted in a scrambled manner.

6. The reception apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein the subscription check application, the promotion application, and the conjunction application are transmitted as data, and the control information includes application control information for controlling the subscription check application and data transmission information including information regarding data transmission.

7. The reception apparatus according to claim 6 , wherein a single service is provided as the pay broadcast service, and the broadcast content, the control information, the application control information, the data transmission information, the subscription check application, the promotion application, and the conjunction application are transmitted as streams of the pay broadcast service.

8. The reception apparatus according to claim 6 , wherein a plurality of services are provided as the pay broadcast service, the broadcast content, the control information, and the conjunction application are transmitted as streams of the pay broadcast service, and the application control information, the data transmission information, the subscription check application, and the promotion application are transmitted as streams common to other pay broadcast services.

9. The reception apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein in the subscription check application, a function of checking the presence of the subscription to the pay broadcast service is provided by an application programming interface (API).

10. The reception apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein an MPEG media transport (MMT) scheme is employed as a media transport scheme.

11. A reception method of a reception apparatus, the reception method comprising:
receiving a broadcast stream including control information and broadcast content provided as a pay broadcast service, the broadcast content being included in a scrambled stream of the broadcast stream and the control information being included in a non-scrambled stream of the broadcast stream;
acquiring a subscription check application, based on the control information, for checking presence of a subscription to the pay broadcast service;
controlling an operation of the subscription check application; and
acquiring a promotion application in response to a determination that the subscription to the pay broadcast service is not present.

12. An information providing system comprising:
circuitry configured to
generate a broadcast stream including control information and broadcast content provided as a pay broadcast service;
transmit the broadcast stream, the broadcast content being transmitted in a scrambled stream of the broadcast stream and the control information being transmitted in a non-scrambled stream of the broadcast stream;
provide a subscription check application to be acquired by a reception apparatus based on the control information for checking presence of a subscription to the pay broadcast service; and
provide a promotion application to be acquired by the reception apparatus based on a determination that the subscription to the pay broadcast service is not present.

13. The information providing system of claim 12 , wherein the circuitry is further configured to
provide a conjunction application to be acquired by the reception apparatus based on a determination that the subscription to the pay broadcast service is present.

14. The information providing system of claim 13 , wherein the subscription check application transitions to one of the promotion application and the conjunction application to control an operation of one of the promotion application and the conjunction application.

15. The information providing system of claim 13 , wherein the conjunction application is executed by the reception apparatus in conjunction with the broadcast content when a non-subscribing user subscribes to the pay broadcast service via the promotion application.

16. The information providing system of claim 13 , wherein the subscription check application is transmitted in a non-scrambled manner, the promotion application is transmitted in a non-scrambled manner, and the conjunction application is transmitted in a scrambled manner.

17. The information providing system of claim 13 , wherein the subscription check application, the promotion application, and the conjunction application are transmitted as data, and the control information includes application control information for controlling the subscription check application and data transmission information including information regarding data transmission.

18. The information providing system of claim 17 , wherein a single service is provided as the pay broadcast service, and the broadcast content, the control information, the application control information, the data transmission information, the subscription check application, the promotion application, and the conjunction application are transmitted as streams of the pay broadcast service.

19. The information providing system of claim 17 , wherein a plurality of services are provided as the pay broadcast service, the broadcast content, the control information, and the conjunction application are transmitted as streams of the pay broadcast service, and the application control information, the data transmission information, the subscription check application, and the promotion application are transmitted as streams common to other pay broadcast services.

20. The information providing system of claim 12 , wherein in the subscription check application, a function of checking the presence of the subscription to the pay broadcast service is provided by an application programming interface (API).

Assignees

• Sony Corp

Inventors

• Kitazato Naohisa

Classifications

• H04N21/4622

  Retrieving content or additional data from different sources, e.g. from a broadcast channel and the Internet (web site content organization and management for information retrieval from the Internet G06F16/958; transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82; stock exchange data over packet-switching network H04L12/1804; push services including data channel over packet-switching network H04L12/1859) · CPC title

• H04N21/235

  Processing of additional data, e.g. scrambling of additional data or processing content descriptors · CPC title

• H04N21/63

  Control signaling {related to video distribution} between client, server and network components; Network processes for video distribution between server and clients {or between remote clients}, e.g. transmitting basic layer and enhancement layers over different transmission paths, setting up a peer-to-peer communication via Internet between remote STB's; Communication protocols; Addressing (real-time session protocols H04L65/1101; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104) · CPC title

• H04N21/47211 Primary

  for requesting pay-per-view content (payment schemes payment architectures or payment protocols G06Q20/00, G07F) · CPC title

• H04N21/4348

  Demultiplexing of additional data and video streams · CPC title