Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – Automated electrical financial or business practice or... – Discount or incentive
Reexamination Certificate
1999-02-25
2001-11-27
Trammell, James P. (Department: 2162)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
Automated electrical financial or business practice or...
Discount or incentive
C705S001100, C705S026640, C705S054000, C705S057000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06324518
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic information utilization promotion system designed to, promote further utilization of others' copyrighted electronic information, including manipulations by a computer.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Many apparatuses and methods of managing the amount of software for preventing illegal use of electronic information has been conventionally known. A system which permits the use of software storage media within the range of predetermined provision information is described in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. Hei 6-324858, for example. This system uses e.g., an IC card as a management medium and permits the use of software only when provision information written there is satisfied.
According to the officially publicized system, illegal use of software can be prevented without impairing spatial convenience with which desired software can be executed by using any of remote computers of the same type.
Also, a method of preventing illegal copying is known in electronic publishing. For example, a method of protecting electronically published documents is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,509,074. According to this method, for a user's request for a document to a document server, an authentication server authenticates the user and encrypts the requested document using a user's identification number before sending it to the user, and the user decrypts the sent document for utilization.
Also, an information providing system is described in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. Hei 7-74744. In this system, electronic information is encrypted before being broadcast to an unspecific number of users over communication networks and broadcasting networks, the electronic information and indexes thereof are accumulated in user terminal equipment, only required electronic information is decrypted as requested by the users, and a charge is levied only for the decrypted electronic information.
However, the above-mentioned conventional systems have been problematic in that although right processing for so-called use rights on software use and viewing of electronic documents and images can be performed, the right processing has been too insufficient to further distribute copyrighted electronic information as a new copyrighted material by utilizing (manipulating) it.
By the way, in a present right processing system to perform such right processing for utilization rights, when information to be utilized is obtained through Internet, for example, a charge is generally levied for the utilization right. In this system, a fee is charged even in the case where the information has been utilized (manipulated) with an unsatisfactory result, resulting in discouraging utilization of electronic information.
Such right processing for utilization rights entails a single negotiation with the author of electronic information to be utilized for right processing, bringing about tremendous efforts particularly when a plurality of pieces of electronic information are utilized. This deters further promotion of utilization of electronic information.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned problem, and objects of the present invention are to make it possible to separately perform use right processing for mere viewing and listening of information and utilization right processing for utilization in users' works, and to make it possible to perform only use right processing for information being manipulated, without performing utilization right processing until the manipulated information is released, in order to avoid useless right processing in the process of creation and reduce efforts to negotiate singly with an author for right processing.
To achieve the above-mentioned objects, an electronic information utilization promotion system according to claim
1
comprises:
an information manipulation space management part that manages virtual electronic information manipulation spaces created on a network;
an information manipulation space information accumulation part that accumulates information within the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces;
an information manipulation space control part that presents the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces to users while communicating with the information manipulation space management part over the network and obtains information managed by the information manipulation space management part by users' operations;
an information manipulation part that manipulates information in the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces; and
a right processing part that performs right processing when information is transferred out of the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces.
According to the invention of claim
2
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
1
is characterized in that:
the information manipulation space management part, the information manipulation space information accumulation part, the copyrighted material management part, and the right processing part are included in an information manipulation space server;
the information manipulation space control part and the information manipulation part are included in user terminal equipment; and
the information manipulation space server and the user terminal equipment each include a communication part to perform communications over the network.
According to the invention of claim
3
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
1
includes:
a copyrighted material management part that manages others' copyrighted materials used for reference or manipulation in the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces,
wherein the right processing part references information of the copyrighted material management part to perform right processing when information is transferred out of the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces.
According to the invention of claim
4
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
1
includes:
an information manipulation space access right control part that confirms that a user to gain access to the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces is a legitimate user, before permitting the user the access.
According to the invention of claim
5
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
2
is characterized in that:
the information manipulation space server includes an encryption part that encrypts information managed by the information manipulation space management part when it is transferred to the information manipulation space control part of the user terminal equipment over the network; and
the user terminal equipment includes a decryption part that decrypts information encrypted by the encryption part that is sent from the information manipulation space server.
According to the invention of claim
6
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
5
is characterized in that:
the encryption part uses an encryption method which, during encryption, changes an encryption key for each of the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces.
According to the invention of claim
7
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
1
includes:
a utilization and reference list part that presents a list of others' copyrighted materials in the virtual electronic information manipulation spaces.
According to the invention of claim
8
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
7
is characterized in that:
of the copyrighted materials presented by the utilization and reference list part, those used in manipulated materials are notationally changed in the list so that their locations in the list are identified.
According to the invention of claim
9
, the electronic information utilization promotion system of claim
1
includes:
a utilization trend extraction part that extracts the trend of copyrighte
Katsurabayashi Hiroshi
Ohsawa Takashi
Sasaki Shigehiko
Tamaru Eriko
Fuji 'Xerox Co., Ltd.
Oliff & Berridg,e PLC
Tesfamariam Mussie
Trammell James P.
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