Patent ID: 8176199

Claim:
A content delivery system comprising a client and a server, said client requesting deliveries of content from said server which transforms said content into layered-encoded data for transmission to said client over a network: wherein said client includes an input device for inputting a time limit within which said content is to be delivered; a requesting device for requesting a delivery of said content from said server within said time limit; and a communications unit for receiving layered-encoded data constituting said content of which the delivery has been requested by said requesting device and which is transmitted from said server; and wherein said server includes an acquiring device for acquiring said time limit; a priority information generation unit for calculating an amount of change luminance in said content, comparing the calculated amount of change in luminance in said content to a predetermined threshold, and generating priority information based on the comparison, wherein said priority information indicating whether priority is on picture quay or on frame rate; a determining unit for measuring bandwidth applicable to said client and storing the measured bandwidth in the server, and determining a layer up to which said content to be encoded into layer-encoded data and a frame rate at which the layer-encoded data to be transmitted to said client within said time limit, wherein the determining being based on said time limit, on the priority information, on the measured bandwidth and on size information about the layer-encoded data, wherein if said priority information indicates that priority is on picture quality, the determining comprises first determining a highest possible layer to encode said content into the layer-encoded data, then determining highest possible frame rate to transmit the layer-encoded data, wherein if said priority information indicates that priority is on frame rate, the determining comprises first determining a highest possible frame rate to transmit the layer-encoded data, then determining a highest possible layer to encode said content into the layer-encoded data; and a transmitting device for transmitting to said client said layered-encoded data at said frame rate determined by said determining unit.