Patent ID: 7523071

Claim:
A method for providing on-line rental service for software, the method comprising: assigning a collection of virtual containers to a set of users including one or more users, wherein the collection is selected from a plurality of collections, each with a different quantity of virtual containers, and each virtual container in the collection being configured to identify one or more software products that are rented by users in the set, and the collection identifying a rental package of a predefined quantity of virtual containers at least one of which is configured to identify a plurality of the software products accessible to the set of users, and wherein at least one virtual container in the collection is assigned a virtual container priority level corresponding to a variable software product access level, and wherein at least one virtual container in the collection provides a different rental period duration from at least one other virtual container in the collection, and wherein at least one virtual container in the collection permits selectively removing a software product and adding a new software product before the end of a rental period associated with the at least one virtual container; and authorizing a user in the set to access a software product through a computer network based on whether the software product is identified as a rented software product in one or more virtual containers of the collection assigned to the set of users.