METHOD AND PROGRAM FOR DOWNLOADING CONTENT, RECORDING MEDIUM STORING THE DOWNLOADING PROGRAM, CONTENT REPRODUCING PROGRAM, AND RECORDING MEDIUM STORING THE REPRODUCING PROGRAM

摘要

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide efficient quasi-VoD to many users while suppressing the number of channels and the maximum waiting time. ;SOLUTION: In a method of downloading contents, the contents of a program are divided into information groups so that the sizes of the divided information groups may become D×R^(n-1) (R1), scheduled, and broadcast. Then the information group which is the earliest among the information groups broadcast after a downloading request is made from a user is downloaded. When the (k+1)-th information group exists, the reproduction of the (k+1)-th information group being broadcast through the (k+1)-th channel is started immediately after the downloading of the k-th information group is completed. When the (k+1)-th information group does not exist, the k-th information is reproduced.;COPYRIGHT: (C)2003,JPO