Patent ID: 8739234

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, from a plurality of computing devices located at disparate geographic locations, information associated with a presentation of multimedia content, the information comprising data associated with first segments of the multimedia content that are common to each of the plurality of computing devices and second segments of the multimedia content that are not on each of the plurality off computing devices; identifying in the information, via a processor, common synchronization points in the first segments; modifying a timing of a presentation of the multimedia content for one of the plurality of computing devices based on the common synchronization points, to yield synchronized multimedia content; receiving control signal votes from a plurality of viewers, wherein each control signal vote in the control signal votes is associated with a viewer in the plurality of viewers, and wherein each control signal vote has a weight which increases based on an amount of time the viewer associated with the each control signal vote has been in the plurality of viewers; determining a control signal based on democratic principles using the control signal votes to simultaneously control a presentation of the synchronized multimedia content; and communicating the control signal to each of the plurality of computing devices such that a control event occurs in the presentation of the synchronized multimedia content at each of the plurality of computing devices.