Patent ID: 7836466

Claim:
A method comprising: collecting metadata that is associated with a particular piece of media content, wherein: the metadata comprises content description metadata that describes the particular piece of media content; the metadata does not comprise instance description metadata that indicates when or where the particular piece of media content is available; and the metadata does not comprise the particular piece of media content itself; generating composite metadata based on metadata from a plurality of metadata providers, wherein a first portion of the metadata comprises a first type of metadata and is collected from a first of the plurality of metadata providers and a second portion of metadata comprises a second type of metadata, different from the first type of metadata, and is collected from a second of the plurality of metadata providers; calculating a program score for the particular pieces of media content according to a preference of a user, wherein calculating the program score on a user-by-user basis, wherein the program score is based on a significance file and at least one attribute score of the media content, the attribute score is determined by comparing a preferred attribute value designated in a user preference file with at least one attribute value of a content description file, wherein the preferred attribute value includes at least one preference value which indicates how much a particular user likes or dislikes a particular attribute value in a program, wherein the content description file is associated with the media content, wherein the user preference file is generated using information contained in at least a user viewing log, wherein the user viewing log includes at least a program attribute value, a program time, a list of media content watched by a viewer and media content listed for consumption; optimizing the composite metadata based on a class designation of a client device and a user preference indicated by the client device, wherein the optimizing is configured to exclude metadata which is not useful to the client device because the client device lacks the resources to process and display the metadata and content associated with the metadata, and wherein the class designation comprises: thin client, thick client and custom client, the class designation is indicated by the client or determined based on resources of the client for processing and displaying metadata and content associated with the metadata; organizing the metadata into a content folder that is associated with the particular piece of media content; and responsive to receiving the particular piece of media content, abstracting, by a client device, the particular piece of media content and the metadata of the content folder into an abstracted entity, wherein the abstracted entity is stored in a folder which is exchangeable over a network.