Patent ID: 7478432

Claim:
A contents control method for controlling a process on a receiving side which is applied to contents comprising a plurality of blocks transmitted from a transmitting side apparatus to the receiving side apparatus, comprising the steps of: adding control needed/unneeded information indicative of need/non-need for control of the content to an area of one or more blocks of the content, and if and only if the control needed/unneeded information indicates “need for control” a step of adding first control information to said one or more blocks of the content at the transmitting side apparatus is performed, wherein said one or more blocks of the content is not equal to the whole content, and wherein said first control information is a watermark that specifies conditions for permitting processes to be applied to said one or more blocks of the content; receiving and storing in a first location of the receiving side apparatus said content including the first control information added to said one or more blocks of the content transmitted from the transmitting side apparatus; and receiving by the receiving side apparatus a process designation corresponding to the content transmitted from the transmitting side apparatus to the receiving side apparatus, wherein second control information is stored in a second location of the receiving side apparatus, which receives the content transmitted from the transmitting side apparatus, wherein said second control information specifies condition for which applying processes to the content is permitted, and wherein the conditions specified by the second control information includes at least one type of information selected from a group consisting of user information of the user about to use the contents, location information of the receiving apparatus, area information of the receiving apparatus, and time information; and if and only if a condition specified by the second control information satisfies a condition corresponding to the process designation specified by the first control information, applying a process corresponding to the process designation to the received said one or more blocks of the content.