Patent ID: 8150916

Claim:
A method for transmitting audio content comprising: designating, with a controller device, a plurality of audio playing apparatuses as recipients of the audio content to be transmitted by an information transmission apparatus; concurrently transmitting over a wired local area network, from the information transmission apparatus to the plurality of audio playing apparatuses designated in the act of designating, at least one packet comprising: identification information for at least one of the plurality of audio playing apparatuses indicating a recipient of the packet; at least a portion of the audio content; and control information requiring the playing of the audio content by the at least one of the plurality of audio playing apparatuses such that the at least one of the plurality of audio playing apparatuses is instructed to play the audio content concurrently with receiving the audio content; if a rejection message is received from a particular audio playing apparatus of the plurality of audio playing apparatuses, the rejection message identifying that the at least one packet has been rejected by the particular audio playing apparatus, performing a play suspension process to refrain from transmitting further packets to the particular audio playing apparatus; for each audio playing apparatus of the plurality of audio playing apparatuses from which no rejection message was received, transmitting at least one further packet comprising the identification information, at least another portion of the audio content, and the control information; and notifying each of the plurality of audio playing apparatuses to which the transmission of the audio content is completed of an end of transmission of the audio content.