Patent ID: 8464298

Claim:
A method to operate a video resource daisy-chain access system, comprising: requesting from a coordinator access instructions for a client to receive a broadcast stream from a broadcast source; connecting to the broadcast source, or connecting to a re-broadcasting client already receiving the broadcast stream, as instructed by the coordinator; playing back on the client the received broadcast stream; requesting from a coordinator access instructions for a client to receive a broadcast stream from a broadcast source; connecting to the broadcast source, or connecting to a re-broadcasting client already receiving the broadcast stream, as instructed by the coordinator; playing back on the client the received broadcast stream; periodically sending one or more probes by the coordinator to one or more clients to calculate a round trip time; receiving a playback time stamp from the one or more clients, and adding half of the round trip time to the time stamp and storing the time stamp in a time stamp store; incrementing each stored time stamp at a periodic interval; periodically selecting the most delayed time stamp among all the stored time stamps; and adding half of the round trip time of the one or more clients to the most delayed time stamp and sending the resulting time stamp to the one or more clients.