Patent ID: 9609261
Date: 2017-03-28
CPC Classifications: G06F,G09G,H04N

Claim:
1. A control apparatus comprising: a command acquiring unit configured to acquire selection commands of pieces of content transmitted from a plurality of controllers or users, in which each controller or user has a respective controller authority value associated therewith; a display processing unit to control a size of each of a plurality of display areas on a display device each having different content simultaneously displayed thereon based on overall authority values; and an authority calculating unit to calculate an overall authority value for each display area having respective content displayed thereon based on a number of controllers or users which selected the respective content and the respective controller authority value or values associated therewith, for use by the display processing unit, in which when multiple controllers or users select a same content and at least two of the multiple controllers or users each have a different controller authority value, the authority calculating unit is configured to calculate a respective overall authority value for the respective display area by adding together the respective controller authority value for each controller or user which selected the same content, such that when both a first controller having a controller authority value of 2 and a second controller having a controller authority value of 1 select the same content the calculated overall authority value for the respective display area would be 3, and in which the display processing unit is configured to control the size of each of the plurality of display areas based on the overall authority values so that respective display areas having the same overall authority values have same size display areas regardless of whether a number of controllers or users of each of the respective display areas is the same, such that a first display area obtained when 3 controllers or users select a same first content each having a respective controller authority value of 1 for a respective overall authority value of 3 is the same size as a second display area obtained when 1 controller or user selects a second content which has a respective controller authority value of 3 for a respective overall authority value of 3.