Patent ID: 7430753

Claim:
A resource sharing group having a plurality of members, each member being adapted to communicate with at least one other member, the resource sharing group comprising: at least one local transmission medium for interconnecting the members of the resource sharing group; a local video device for transmitting a resource request to a control member; the control member for, upon receiving the resource request, determining whether a resource is available from a member of the resource sharing group, and for transmitting a response to the local video device, the response indicating whether the resource is available; the local video device comprising a processor communicating with local memory that stores an electronic programming guide application and an electronic programming guide; the control member determining when the local memory associated with the control member lacks capacity to download additional time of the electronic programming guide, the control member communicating with another device to transmit a resource request to the another device to download the additional time of the electronic programming guide to storage in the another device; the processor processing for display monitoring data that indicates remaining storage space in the storage of the another device; the processor querying the another device to determine what programming is being viewed; and the processor processing controls included in the electronic programming guide application that enable access to the storage of the another device to interact with the electronic programming guide stored on the another device through the local video device to schedule a programming event at the local video device.