Patent ID: 7328175

Claim:
A transaction brokerage method for brokering a transaction between an information transmitting terminal and a plurality of information receiving terminals connected through a transaction brokerage apparatus, the method comprising: registering, at the transaction brokerage apparatus, the plurality of the information receiving terminals, and a position information and individual information of each of the plurality of the information receiving terminals; receiving a transaction request transmitted from the information transmitting terminal at the transaction brokerage apparatus, the transaction request including expiration time of the transaction request; selecting, at the transaction brokerage apparatus, one or more of the information receiving terminals registered which are within a predetermined range from the information transmitting terminal based on the registered position information as one or more recipients of the transaction request, and transmitting the transaction request to the selected one or more information receiving terminals from the transaction brokerage apparatus; receiving transaction acceptances from the selected information receiving terminals at the transaction brokerage apparatus; considering, at the transaction brokerage apparatus, one or more of the transaction acceptances which have been received within the expiration time included in the transaction request as valid transaction acceptances, and transmitting only the valid transaction acceptances from the transaction brokerage apparatus to the information transmitting terminal; receiving, at the transaction brokerage apparatus, at least a transaction possible indication from the information transmitting terminal; transmitting the received transaction possible indication from the transaction brokerage apparatus to the information receiving terminal indicated by the transaction possible indication; and transmitting registered individual information of the information receiving terminal indicated by the transaction possible indication from the transaction brokerage apparatus to the information terminal; wherein the transaction request includes an upper limit of the number of information receiving terminals, and wherein the transaction request is transmitted to a number of the information receiving terminals, the number being less than or equal to the upper limit included in the transaction request.