JP2002015193A - Content reservation / advance purchase method - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] [PROBLEMS] To download content that has been pre-purchased or pre-purchased on a street terminal via a computer network without inputting a reservation number or the like. SOLUTION: The contents are sold by downloading the contents stored in a server to a storage medium mounted on a street terminal. Make a content purchase reservation or advance purchase from the client or street terminal to the server, issue a content reservation / advance purchase information code from the server, which is information on the purchase reservation or advance purchase, and issue the content reservation / advance purchase issued by the server. The information code is received by the client or the street terminal and stored in the storage medium. When the storage medium is mounted on the street terminal, the content corresponding to the read content reservation / prior purchase information code is downloaded to the storage medium.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a pre-purchase method, and more particularly to a content reservation / pre-purchase method that enables seamless cooperation between purchase of content at a street terminal and purchase reservation or pre-purchase by a client via a computer network.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, by installing a street terminal (kiosk terminal) in a convenience store or the like, reservations for game software purchases, reservations for concerts and airplane tickets, application for cable broadcasting, etc. Providing services has been done. For example, there is a multimedia terminal "Loppi" provided by Lawson of convenience store, etc., which notifies the center of reservation information input via the terminal, and provides an application ticket with a reservation number printed on the terminal. Issued, the customer takes this application ticket to the cash register and pays for payment.

On the other hand, recently, such a street terminal is used not only for reservation sales of tickets and the like but also for music distribution and the like. For example, a music vending machine “Music Pod” of Vysynch is installed in a record shop in Tokyo. Have been. The music pod temporarily stores the music data distributed from the communication satellite in the hard disk of the terminal, and downloads the music data to the MD (mini-disc) at about 8 times speed by selecting the music and inserting coins. Such a street terminal makes it possible to sell a large amount of music data (hereinafter, referred to as content) which cannot be sold in conventional homes due to communication speed problems.

[0004] Further, such content purchase reservation or pre-purchase is made via the Internet via a terminal such as a personal computer at home (hereinafter referred to as a client).
It is also under consideration to do so. That is, after making a purchase reservation, etc., the client notifies the client of the reservation number or purchase number via the Internet, the user memorizes or writes down these numbers, goes to a convenience store, and mounts the storage medium on the street terminal. The content can be downloaded by manually entering these numbers afterwards.

[0005]

However, it is troublesome and troublesome to memorize such a reservation number and input it manually to a street terminal. The reservation number and purchase number have a strong meaning as a management number used by the content sales company, and are used as information identifiers used for confirming the reservation or purchase status of the content sales company and inquiring, but are easy to remember. Not something. The present invention has been made to solve such a problem, and when downloading a pre-purchased or pre-purchased content via a computer network at a street terminal, downloading without manually inputting a reservation number or the like. The purpose is to provide a content reservation / advance purchase method that can be performed.

[0006]

In order to achieve such an object, a content reservation / advance purchase method according to the present invention provides a method for transferring content comprising electronic data stored in a server on a computer network to a street terminal. In a method of selling desired content to a user by downloading the content to an attached storage medium, a purchase reservation or advance purchase of the content is performed from a client or a street terminal connected to the computer network to the server. Issue a content reservation / pre-purchase information code, which is information on the purchase reservation or pre-purchase, from the server, and receive the content reservation / pre-purchase information code issued by the server at the client or the street terminal. Storing in the storage medium, the storage medium Wherein when mounted on the street terminal reads the content book advance purchase information code from the storage medium, downloads the content corresponding to the read content and book advance purchase information code in the storage medium.

The present embodiment includes the following configuration as another aspect. That is, the content providing terminal further includes (a) a storage device for storing the content distributed from the server, and (b)
When the storage medium is mounted on the content providing terminal, the content reservation / advance purchase information code is read from the storage medium, and the content corresponding to the read content reservation / advance purchase information code is stored in the storage medium. Download from the device to the storage medium. When downloading the content to the storage medium, information related to the content is stored in the storage medium together with the content. Further, the information related to the content is a URL (Uniform Resource) of a homepage that discloses information related to the content.
Locator). Further, the server issues points according to the type of content purchase reservation or advance purchase from the server, totals the points for each user, and provides the content in exchange for the totalized points.

[0008] With this configuration, the present invention provides:
Since the information about the purchase reservation or the advance purchase is stored in the storage medium, the user does not need to memorize or write down these codes as in the related art. Therefore, at a later date, the content which has been pre-purchased or pre-purchased can be transferred to the storage medium only by a simple operation at a content providing terminal (for example, a street terminal installed inside a facility such as a convenience store or outdoors such as a road), Content can be purchased more easily than before.

[0009]

Next, one embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram showing one embodiment of the present invention. This system comprises a computer network 1 and a WWW server 2
, A database server 3, a street terminal 4, a client 5, and a large-capacity and removable storage medium 6. One or more WWW servers 2, a database server 3, and a street terminal 4 are connected to the computer network 1, respectively. In general, the servers 2 and 3 and the street terminal 4 are connected by a relatively high-speed computer network 1, but the communication line connecting the client 5 and the computer network 1 is different from the computer network 1. May be a low-speed line.

The street terminal 4 has a street terminal environment management table 4a.
, A point management program 4b, a related information program 4c, a content purchase program 4d, a content purchase page 4e, and a content reservation page 4f. The client 5 includes a CRT 5a, a WWW browser 5b, and a storage medium interface 5c, and the storage medium 6 can be mounted on the storage medium interface 5c. The WWW server 2 is composed of a workstation server or the like, and is a screen for accepting a reservation for purchase of a content (hereinafter, a content reservation page 2).
c), one or more content reservation / advance purchase information creation programs 2b, and one or more content guidance programs 2
a. The content distribution system 7 is a system that includes a storage device (HDD or the like) storing various types of content and provides the content to the street terminal 4.

The database server 3 is constituted by a workstation server or the like in the same manner as described above, and includes a content management table 3d shown in FIG. 3, a reservation / advance purchase management table 3a shown in FIG. 4, and a point management table 3c shown in FIG. , And a guidance management table 3b shown in FIG. Note that the WWW server 2 and the database server 3 may be configured by one server. Content reservation / advance purchase information creation program 2b
Processes one or a plurality of reserved contents or pre-purchased contents transmitted from the client 5 in the server, and accumulates the resulting contents reservation / pre-purchase information code in the storage medium 6 connected to the client 5. I do.

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing a content reservation / advance purchase information code. The content reservation / pre-purchase information code generated on the server side is a code in which information on content purchase reservation or pre-purchase is described. The information value of the code changes depending on whether the purchase reservation information, the advance purchase information, or the payment has already been completed. That is, if the payment has already been completed,
It will have a value equal to the price of the content.

The format of the code is mainly composed of four parts: (1) a reservation basic part, (2) a reservation extension part, (3) a user identification part, and (4) a content identification part. It consists of a part. (1) The basic reservation section is a section in which the contents of a request for purchase reservation are recorded. For example, a reservation date and time, a reservation expiration date, a reservation method, a street terminal identification ID, a reservation number, a total number of bytes, and the like are recorded. is there. (2) The reservation extension section means that the content reservation information
This is a portion in which information for providing expandability is recorded, and a group of identifiers for identifying an extension of a reservation term, presence or absence of settlement, a purchase number, a progress status, and the like. Due to the change in the recording state of the reservation extension unit, the content reservation / advance purchase information code changes from the state of the reservation ticket (state where payment has not yet been made) to the state of ticket ticket (state where payment has been made). . The progress is a record of the progress up to the purchase, and is used to identify repurchase and retransfer of the content. (3), (4) The user identification section and the content identification section are sections in which identifiers for identifying users and contents are recorded, for example, user identification IDs, content identification IDs, and content key identification IDs. Is recorded.

As described above, the content reservation / advance purchase information code in FIG. 2 has a record-like configuration, and one or a plurality of content IDs can be recorded in the content identification unit. The content reservation / advance purchase information varies in the encryption level and the encryption range depending on the recorded contents of the reservation extension unit. For example, when the content reservation / advance purchase information code is equal to the reservation ticket status, it is necessary to encrypt the reservation basic unit including the reservation number and the user identification unit including the user identification ID. If it is equal to the ticket voucher status, a method of encrypting the entire content reservation / advance purchase information code or storing it in a protected area of a storage medium can be considered. The protected area is a storage area that cannot be accessed by general users.

The content guidance program is for processing one or more pieces of information transmitted from the client with a guidance management table in the server, and as a result, guiding the client connected to the computer network. Content reservation / purchase information creation program,
The content guidance program is created using, for example, a CGI program (Common Gateway Interface program), a Perl script (Perl Script), an active server page script (Active Server Page Script), a Java script (Java Script), or the like. You.

The content management table shown in FIG. 3 has an ID for identifying the content, a content key identification ID for identifying the content, a price, whether or not to redeem the points, a redemption point, information related to the content, and the like. The presence / absence of redemption is an identifier that specifies whether or not to exchange content according to the number of points (reward points). For example, as shown in FIG. 3, the content “01000001” can be purchased by paying “200” yen, or can be purchased in exchange for “100” points. The related information (for example, xxx.yyy.zzz) is information indicating the location of data uniquely identifiable from another server via a computer network, and is, for example, a U of a homepage that provides information related to content.
RL (Uniform Resource Locator) is used. When the storage medium 6 is mounted on the client 5 in order to reproduce the content, the related information is read out by the client 5, and information based on the related information is displayed on the WWW browser 5b. Therefore, by using the advertisement information as the related information, it is possible to encourage the user to further promote the sale of another content.

The reservation / advance purchase management table of FIG. 4 records information equivalent to the content reservation / advance purchase information code (FIG. 2) generated by the content reservation / advance purchase information creation program, and is described above. Four parts are described. The content reservation / advance purchase information code stored in the storage medium 6 is collated with the contents of the reservation / advance purchase management table to provide a service to the user. The point management table in FIG. 5 includes an ID for identifying a user, an ID for identifying a street terminal, an expiration date of points, a point accumulation, and the like. The guidance management table in FIG. 6 includes an ID for recognizing a user, content related information, the date and time when the content was purchased, the number of times of guidance, and the like. The number of times of guidance indicates the number of times that the user is guided to the related information of the content, and is used as an index for identifying information that has not guided the user to the related information.

The street terminal 4 is a terminal device provided with an interface function (reader / writer, etc.) for reading / writing data from / to the storage medium 6, and a screen (hereinafter, referred to as a screen) for accepting a content purchase reservation. A content reservation page 4f) and a screen for accepting content purchase (hereinafter, content purchase page 4f)
e), a content purchase program 4d, a point management program 4b, a related information program 4c, and a street terminal environment management table 4a.

The content purchase program 4d collects the content reservation / advance purchase information code stored in the storage medium 6 from the storage medium 6, checks the collected information content and the like, and checks the reserved or pre-purchased content. Is purchased or transferred to a storage medium. The related information program 4c extracts related information of the purchased content from the content management table 3d, associates the extracted related information with an ID for identifying the user, and reflects the extracted information on the guidance management table 3b. .

The point management program 4b is a program for changing the points given to the user according to the type of the reservation method, and is intended to improve the user's willingness to purchase. The content purchase program 4d, the related information program 4c, and the point management program 4b
Is, for example, a CGI program (Common Gateway Interfa
ce program), Perl Script,
Active Server Page Script
ver Page Script), Java Script (Java Scrip
t) etc.

FIG. 7 shows a street terminal environment management table. The street terminal environment management table is a table in which basic information in environment setting values of the street terminal is described, and for example, a point ratio linked with a point management program is set in advance. By referring to the street terminal environment management table, the point value at the time of purchase reservation can be changed. The point ratio mentioned here is a ratio for changing the points calculated by the type of the purchase reservation method or the like with respect to the points calculated from the price or the like, and is set for each street terminal.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described. In the present embodiment, it is assumed that there is an environment in which an ID for identifying a user and an ID for identifying a street terminal exist on the WWW server, but an anonymous purchase reservation from a street terminal or an anonymous purchase from a client is made. Reservations are also possible.
However, in the case of an anonymous person, it is limited only to purchase of content. Each user may store an ID for identifying the user, for example, but it is better to store the ID in a protection area in a storage medium having a protection storage area. When exchanging personal information such as a user identification ID between a server and a client on a computer network,
It is preferable to perform encrypted communication such as SL (Secure Sockets Layer).

FIG. 8 is an example showing the flow of processing in which a user makes a reservation for purchase of a content using a client. The user causes the WWW browser 5b (FIG. 1) of the client 5b (FIG. 1) to display the owner page or the anonymous page of the user identification ID (step 10).
1), select items necessary for purchase reservation or advance purchase of these pages or contents, and transmit them to the WWW server 2 (step 102). At this time, as the necessary items, for example, a content to be purchased or pre-purchased, a street terminal used when actually purchasing the content, and the like are selected (steps 103 and 104). The selected information is transmitted to the WWW server 2, and a payment process is performed at that time (step 105). When purchasing content using points, step 105 is skipped.

The content reservation / advance purchase information creation program 2b on the server generates and encrypts the content reservation / advance purchase information code described in FIG. 2 based on the information sent from the client 5 (step 10).
6, 107), and transfers and stores the data to the storage medium 6 connected to the client 5 (step 108). The client 5 is notified of the purchase reservation or the pre-purchased content (step 109). Thereafter, upon completion of a series of flows, purchase reservation or advance purchase of the selected content is completed. However, if the purchase reservation or the pre-purchased content is not distributed to the street terminal (step 110), a request for a distribution request is made to the content distribution system 7 (step 111). Distribute content to In addition,
As a payment method related to the advance purchase processing described here, a general payment method can be used, and for example, a credit payment may be used.

FIG. 9 is an example showing the flow of a process in which a user who has made a content purchase reservation or pre-purchase inserts a storage medium into a street terminal and purchases or transfers pre-reserved content or pre-purchased content. .
First, the storage medium 6 is inserted into the street terminal 4 (step 2).
01). The content purchase program 4d is stored in the storage medium 6
After the acquisition and decryption of the information of the reservation section in the content reservation / advance purchase information code stored in the storage section and the information recorded in the reservation extension section are performed, authentication is performed (steps 202, 203, and 204). , And purchase the purchase reservation content. That is, when an authentication error occurs, the content reservation / advance purchase information code in the storage medium 6 is deleted (step 205), and a screen for suspending all processing and invalidating the reservation is displayed on the street terminal 4 (step 206). , 207).

On the other hand, if no authentication error has occurred, it is determined whether or not the user ID is possessed (step 208). (Step 209).
If not, it is determined whether or not the payment has already been made (step 210). If not, the name of the reserved content is displayed on the WWW browser 5b of the client 5 as a purchase inquiry screen (step 2).
11). In the street terminal 4, a purchase process is performed by the user, that is, the content is sold to the user (step 212), and the sold content is stored in the storage medium 6.
Is transferred to and stored (step 213).

Thereafter, the related information program 4c is started (step 214), and the record of the purchased content is deleted from the reservation pre-purchase management table 3a (step 21).
5). It is determined whether there is an unpurchased content reservation / advance purchase information code (step 216), and if it exists, the corrected content reservation / advance purchase information code is transferred to the storage medium 6 and stored (step 217). ).
If it does not exist, the point management program 4b is started (step 218), and the completion of purchase of the reserved content is notified to the street terminal 4 (step 21).
9). Note that a general settlement method can be used as the settlement method related to the purchase processing described here, and for example, cash settlement or credit settlement may be used. In addition,
When purchasing the contents using points, steps 210, 211 and 212 are skipped. Also,
The processing of points is performed by subtracting the number of points in step 218.

FIG. 10 is an example showing the flow of processing for transferring the relevant information of the purchased content to the storage medium. First, it is determined whether or not the user ID is anonymous information (step 301). If the user is anonymous, terminate without performing any of the following steps.
D and information related to the content are retrieved and acquired from the content management table (step 302), data associated with the user identification ID is created and reflected in the guidance management table 3b (step 303), and is stored on the storage medium 5. Also transfers and accumulates information accompanying the content guidance (step 304). In addition,
As the related information, for example, a URL of a homepage that provides information related to the content may be used.

FIG. 11 is an example showing the flow of a process for giving points based on the type of reservation method. This procedure calculates points from the price at the street terminal 4, obtains a point ratio from the street terminal environment management table 4a in the street terminal 4, obtains a valid point value from the point calculated from the price and the point ratio, This is reflected in the point management table 4a. First, it is determined whether or not the user ID is anonymous information (step 401). If the user is anonymous, the process is terminated without executing any of the following procedures. If the user is not anonymous, a determination is made based on the type in the content reservation / prior purchase information code (step 402). That is, if the reservation is made from the client 5 connected to the computer network 1, it is determined whether the reservation is made from the street terminal 4, and further, either the reservation or the advance purchase is determined, and then the street terminal environment management is performed. The point ratio is extracted from Table 4a (Steps 403 to 408). Next, points are calculated from the purchased price (step 409), and effective points are calculated by multiplying the calculated points by the point ratio (step 410). Next, the calculated points are stored in the point management table 3c of the database server 3 connected to the computer network 1 (step 411).

Next, a procedure for the user to access the server using the client 5 and to introduce the number of points accumulated so far will be described. FIG. 12 is an example showing a flow of a process for inquiring about points given to a user. In this method, information is transmitted from the client 5 to the server using the user identification ID and the like, and the server retrieves and calculates points from the user identification ID and the point management table 3c, and transmits the points to the client 5. .

First, a user connects to the WWW server 2 using a WWW browser, and displays a point introduction page on the client 5 (step 501). When the user manually inputs the user identification ID, the user further inputs a password, and the input information is stored in the WWW server 2.
(Steps 502 and 503). Storage medium 6
Is mounted on the client, the user ID stored in the storage medium 6 is read by the client 5 and transmitted to the WWW server 2. The password is manually entered by the user. The WWW server 2 having received the user identification ID and the password performs authentication based on the information (step 505),
If the authentication has failed, it is determined that the access is unauthorized, and the subsequent processing is interrupted (step 506). If the authentication is successful, the points in the point management table 3c are transmitted to the client 5 based on the user ID (step 507). The received points are displayed on the WWW browser 5b of the client 5 (step 508).

FIG. 13 is an example showing a flow of a process related to information guidance from the purchase reserved content to the information providing server. This is information associated with content guidance, for example, U
RL or the like is read from the storage medium 6 connected to the client 5, and automatically connected to the database server 3 on the computer network 1,
Is linked to the appropriate information providing server in cooperation with the guide management table 3b held by the user.

First, when the user attaches the storage medium 5 to the client 5 in order to reproduce content such as music data, the WWW browser 5b is automatically started and a specific server ( Here, access is made to the WWW server 2) and the user identification ID is set to WW.
Send to W server 2. The WWW server 2 searches the guide management table 3b based on the received user identification ID, checks the purchase date and the number of accesses of the user, and checks whether there is information (related information) to guide the user. It is determined whether or not it is (step 602). If there is, the guide page is transmitted to the client (step 605), and the homepage provided by the information providing server is displayed on the WWW browser 5b. If there is no information to be guided in step 602, the related information in the storage medium 6 is deleted, and the subsequent processing is stopped (step 604).

[0034]

As described above, according to the present invention, if the content to be purchased is reserved in advance via the computer network, the content can be purchased without performing the same operation again at the street terminal. Also, by adding related information of the content when the content is downloaded to the storage medium, promotion (sales promotion) of the new content can be expected. That is, when a storage medium is mounted on a client in order to play back content, a home page based on related information is displayed, so that new content can be introduced to a user. As a storage medium used by the user, any of an SD memory card, a flash memory, an MD (mini disk), and the like may be used. In addition, a mobile phone or the like can be used in addition to the removable storage medium.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram showing one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram showing a content reservation / advance purchase information code.

FIG. 3 is a table showing a configuration of a content management table.

FIG. 4 is a table showing a configuration of a reservation / purchase management table.

FIG. 5 is a table showing a configuration of a point management table.

FIG. 6 is a table showing a configuration of a guidance management table.

FIG. 7 is a table showing a configuration of a street terminal environment management table.

FIG. 8 is a sequence diagram illustrating a flow of a content purchase reservation process.

FIG. 9 is a sequence diagram showing a flow of a content purchase process.

FIG. 10 is a flowchart showing a flow of a process for preparing related information guidance.

FIG. 11 is a flowchart illustrating a flow of a point management process.

FIG. 12 is a sequence diagram illustrating a flow of a point inquiry process.

FIG. 13 is a sequence diagram showing a flow of a related information guiding process.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... computer network, 2 ... WWW server, 2
a: Content guidance program, 2b: Content reservation / advance purchase information creation program, 2c: Content reservation page, 3: Database server, 3a: Reservation / advance purchase management table, 3b: Guidance management table, 3c: Point management table,
3d: Content management table, 4: Street terminal, 4a: Street terminal environment management table, 4b: Point management program, 4c ...
Related information program, 4d: Content purchase program, 4e: Content purchase page, 4f: Content reservation page, 5: Client, 5a: CRT, 5b: W
WW browser, 5c ... storage medium interface, 6
... storage medium, 7 ... content distribution system.

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continuing on the front page (72) Inventor Maki Asano 1-6-6 Uchisaiwaicho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo NTT Communications Corporation (72) Inventor Akira Yamamoto One Uchisaiwaicho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo F-term (reference) of NTT Communications Corporation NTT DATA Corporation 5B049 AA01 BB11 CC05 CC08 DD00 DD01 EE00 FF07 GG02 GG04 GG07

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A method of selling desired contents to a user by downloading contents composed of electronic data stored in a server on a computer network to a storage medium mounted on a contents providing terminal, A content purchase reservation or pre-purchase is performed from the client or the content providing terminal connected to the computer network to the server, and a content reservation / pre-purchase information code, which is information on the purchase reservation or pre-purchase, is transmitted from the server. Issue, the content reservation / advance purchase information code issued by the server is received by the client or the content providing terminal and stored in the storage medium, and when the storage medium is attached to the content providing terminal, From storage media Reading the serial content book advance purchase information code, content and book Advance Purchase wherein downloading the content in accordance with the retrieved content book advance purchase information code in the storage medium. 2. The content providing terminal according to claim 1, wherein the content providing terminal further comprises: (a) a storage device for storing content distributed from the server; and (b) the storage medium is mounted on the content providing terminal. Reading the content reservation / advance purchase information code from the storage medium, and downloading the content corresponding to the read content reservation / advance purchase information code from the storage device to the storage medium. A featured content reservation and advance purchase method. 3. The content reservation / advance purchase method according to claim 1, wherein, when the content is downloaded to the storage medium, information related to the content is stored together with the content in the storage medium. Content pre-purchase method characterized by being stored in 4. The content reservation / advance purchase method according to claim 3, wherein the information related to the content is a URL (Unif) of a homepage which discloses information related to the content.
orm Resource Locator). 5. A content reservation / advance purchase method according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the server issues points according to the type of content purchase reservation or advance purchase, and the points are issued to each user. A content reservation / advance purchase method, which comprises totaling and providing content in exchange for the totaled points.