Patent ID: 7548962

Claim:
A system for selecting an ad insertion system from at least two ad insertion systems for receiving broadcast transmissions and inserted advertisements, the system comprising: a gateway device having at least one processor, said gateway device selects an ad insertion system from said at least two ad insertion systems in accordance with a client profile and at least one network factor associated with ad insertion system communication performance, wherein said client profile is a demographic profile associated with a client; and said gateway device receives information relating to said at least one network factor from at least one ad insertion system from said at least two ad insertion systems, wherein said at least one network factor is at least one of: responsiveness of a streaming media broadcast encoded at different playback speeds, responsiveness of said streaming media broadcast encoded at different bit rates, and delay in buffering said steaming media broadcast, wherein said gateway device ascertains that said client supports casting services that transfer data packets over a communications network, said casting services comprising at least one of: IP multicasting, IP multicasting proxy, and IP unicasting, and wherein said gateway device determines said selected ad insertion system in accordance with said casting services supported by said client.