Patent ID: 8443386

Claim:
An information processing apparatus, comprising: a content information acquisition unit that acquires, from each of a plurality of content management servers, content related information related to content managed by that content management server; a content list generation unit for generating a content list based on the acquired content related information including a list of the content managed by each of the plurality of the content management servers such that the content list does not identify which of the plurality of content management server manages which of the content listed in the content list; a selection unit that receives user selections, from the content list generated based on the content related information, of content to be reproduced and whether the selected content is to reproduced by the information processing apparatus or by an externally connected device connected to the information processing apparatus; an externally connected device control unit that, when the selected content is to be reproduced by the externally connected device, notifies the externally connected device of location information of content data corresponding to the selected content and acquires, from the externally connected device, reproduction state information representing a reproduction state of the selected content when the externally connected device reproduces the selected content; and a content reproduction processing unit that, in response to the externally connected device starting reproduction of the selected content, reproduces thumbnail information containing information about a thumbnail image associated with the content being reproduced by the externally connected device.