Patent ID: 8280226

Claim:
A method for facilitating multi-angle viewing and recording of a selected program on a video recorder, the method comprising: a processor of the video recorder transmitting a request for viewer data to a service provider; the processor receiving the viewer data, wherein the viewer data contains information about a plurality of alternate views of a selected program; the processor determining from the information received in the viewer data whether a currently selected program view is displaying a leading view corresponding to a current point in time within the selected program, wherein (a) the leading view is a most popular view for viewers among the plurality of alternate views of the selected program available at various points in time during a display of the selected program and (b) each of the various points in time during the display of the selected program can have a different corresponding leading view; and in response to determining that the currently selected program view is not the leading view, the processor determining whether the video recorder is configured for automatic changing to the leading view; in response to the processor determining that the video recorder is configured for automatic changing to the leading view, the processor autonomously switching to the leading view of the selected program; and after the autonomously switching, the processor dynamically changing between program views of the selected program so that the leading view of the selected program at each of the various points in time is always the program view being displayed by the video recorder after the autonomously switching, wherein over a duration of the selected program, content from several different, alternate program views of the selected program can be displayed, and the program view provided at each particular point in time of displaying the selected program is the leading view of the selected program at that particular point in time.