Patent ID: 8621535

Claim:
A control apparatus for accepting a request for transmission of content from a content transmission apparatus to the control apparatus, for passing on the request to the content transmission apparatus for transmitting the content to the control apparatus over a communication network allowing a transmission quality to be reserved, and for issuing a request to a content accounting server to carry out a content accounting process according to the title of and content quality of the requested content, wherein the control apparatus: receives a specified title of a content and a specified payment amount for the content, calculates an optimum content quality of the content as well as an optimum transmission quality which are in a range determined for the specified payment amount based on a transmission-band reservation cost per unit transmission rate, a transmission-band reservation rate, a content cost per unit transmission rate, and a content transmission rate, and transmits a request based on the specified title and the optimum content quality to the content transmission apparatus as the request for transmission of the content from the content transmission apparatus to the control apparatus; makes a reservation for the calculated transmission quality of a transmission line between the content transmission apparatus and the control apparatus in conjunction with a transmission-quality reservation server, which is connected to the communication network, based on the calculated transmission quality; and issues a request to a transmission-quality accounting server to carry out an accounting process for the reserved transmission quality.