Patent ID: 7467097

Claim:
A business management method comprising the steps of: obtaining information about earnings and expenses based on expenses incurred by content providers supplying users with recording devices compatible with contents offered by the providers, on content subscription fees paid by said users for receiving said contents, and on earnings derived from services and/or advertisements included in said contents; determining said services and/or advertisements to be provided to said users based on said users viewing history data; controlling fees to be paid for said services and/or said advertisements in accordance with said information about said earnings and expenses thus obtained; judging whether a share of the earnings can be paid back; initiating a process to decide on items applicable to pay back when that pay back is judged possible; managing the number of recording devices compatible with said contents provided by said content providers to said users; and determining fees to be paid for said services and/or said advertisements included in said contents in accordance with the managed number of recording devices.