Patent ID: 8230469

Claim:
A method for distributing a consumer video, comprising: (a) receiving a pick-up ticket for the consumer video by an online video portal from a consumer, the pick-up ticket having been sent to the consumer by an online video merchant from whom the consumer ordered the consumer video, the pick-up ticket comprising a merchant identity of the online video merchant and a product identity of the consumer video; (b) connecting to the online video merchant by the online video portal using the merchant identity in the pick-up ticket; (c) providing the product identity in the pick-up ticket to the online video merchant by the online video portal; (d) storing the consumer video associated with the product identity by the online video portal in a consumer datastore at the online video portal; and (e) distributing the stored consumer video by the online video portal to a television set of the consumer over a dedicated television channel, wherein the online video portal comprises a video receiver and a video server, wherein the distributing (e) comprises: (e1) sending a distribution ready indication by the video receiver to the video server; (e2) storing the distribution ready indication with the stored consumer video; (e3) establishing a communication session between the video server and the television set over a television network and receiving by the video server over the communication session a service request from the television set for the stored consumer video; (e4) obtaining a consumer identity by the video server from the television set; (e5) locating by the video server the consumer datastore based on the consumer identity; (e6) retrieving the stored consumer video from the consumer datastore by the video server; (e7) determining by the video server that the stored consumer video is ready to be distributed any time; and (e8) distributing by the video server the stored consumer video to the television set over the dedicated television channel.