Patent ID: 7853864

Claim:
A device for adaptively converting a modality of multimedia contents, the device comprising: an input for receiving data specifying multimedia contents, metadata of the multimedia contents, and user preference for the modality conversion; and a converter for converting the modality of the input multimedia contents; wherein the input is adapted for receiving a multimedia contents item which comprises a unit expressible in any one of different modalities, the unit being the whole of the multimedia contents item or being a portion of the multimedia contents item, wherein the user preference for the modality conversion comprises a qualitative preference and a quantitative preference, wherein the qualitative preference indicates a sequence of modalities according to the user preference for the modalities, and the quantitative preference indicates a relative quantitative importance of at least two of the modalities to the user; wherein the converter is for expressing the unit in a modality in which the unit is to be transmitted to the user, the converter using at least the qualitative preference in determining the modality in which the unit is to be transmitted; wherein the converter comprises: means for predicting an overlapped contents model using the input multimedia contents and input metadata of the contents, the overlapped contents model specifying, for each said modality and an associated range of resource values, a contents value curve which specifies, for the associated modality, a relationship between (i) a resource value in the associated range of resource values and (ii) a content value, wherein at least two of the contents value curves intersect inside one of the ranges; means for modifying the overlapped contents model using the user preference for the modality conversion; and means for determining a resource restriction and expressing the multimedia contents according to the resource restriction in a form corresponding to a maximum contents value of the modified overlapped contents model.