Patent ID: 7159029

Claim:
A system for personalized information distribution (PID) of information from an information source server to a plurality of user terminals, wherein the system accommodates a plurality of user terminals each of said terminals requiring a differing communication modality from that required by others of said terminals, the system comprising: an information distribution network communicatively connecting said information source server and said user terminals and for distributing the information, via a PID tree, from said information source server to said user terminals, wherein the PID tree provides the information to every one of said terminals at the communication modality required by each of said terminals; the PID tree having respective PID-paths between said information source server and corresponding ones of the user terminals, each of said PID-paths having at least one active node so as to define a plurality of active nodes across all of said PID-paths; and each of said active nodes having a distribution control means which sets an information distribution process in said each active node in response to local distribution parameters associated with said each active node so as to define the communication modality provided by said each active node over an associated one of said PID-paths in order to satisfy the communication modalities required by all of the terminals, situated downstream of said each active node, communicatively connected to and served through said each active node and said associated PID-path, wherein a distribution control code, originating from either said all user terminals or any other one of the active nodes situated downstream in said PID-tree between said all user terminals and said each active node, is passed upward through the PID-tree to said each active node for use, by said each active node, in managing said local distribution parameters.