Content management device and method

Abstract

To provide a content management apparatus and a program capable of flexibly managing story-based content according to situations.SOLUTION: In a content management system, an input unit 130 inputs, for each progress unit of story-based content, for example, for each scene, group attributes, namely, start times of triples of appearing entities and relations (predicates), and inputs group information (information of the entire progress unit). A progress unit overall attribute storage unit 110 holds the group information, and a progress unit appearing entity description storage unit 120 holds the group attributes. A search unit 140 searches progress units across one or more works using the group information or the group attributes, and displays the searched progress units.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 1

Description

[Technical Field]

[0001] The present invention relates to a technique for managing video content such as animation, movies, dramas, and documentaries, and content with a story such as still image content such as comics and novels. [Background technology]

[0002] For content with a storyline, there has been a demand for the ability to search for scenes from a work based on the situation (location, season, characters / objects, relationships between characters, etc.) during the creation of the work, or after completion and distribution. For example, it is desirable to be able to identify the same scene in different media of the same work (for example, between anime and comics), or to rediscover content by identifying scenes from the perspective of characters based on changes in their relationships or emotions. It is also desirable to be able to identify specific scenes from the same work or other works and use them as reference for creating new works.

[0003] In content with a storyline, when managing information as the story progresses, such as the characters, objects (mecha, vehicles, props, mob characters, etc.) that appear in each scene, and the setting, the items to be managed change as the story progresses, such as the progression of scenes in the work or episodes (episode N of a drama or anime program), making it difficult to strictly define the table structure in advance. Furthermore, the items to be managed often differ for each work or even between creators, and managing the details that appear in such content requires frequent additions and changes to the table structure, which increases the time and cost of operation.

[0004] It is desirable to be able to flexibly manage story-based content according to the situation.

[0005] In addition, a patent document related to this invention discloses a technology for converting audio information of a scene into text and acquiring its attributes (Patent Document 1). Also, another patent document discloses a technology for managing program attribute data, scenes appearing in a program, people appearing in a program, companies appearing in a program or sponsoring companies of a program, sounds played in a program, and text-based attribute data included in program data for each program (Patent Document 2). [Prior art documents] [Patent documents]

[0006] [Patent Document 1] Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2018-169697 [Patent Document 2] Japanese Patent Publication No. 2020-156001 Summary of the Invention [Problem to be solved by the invention]

[0007] It is desirable to be able to flexibly manage story-based content according to the situation.

[0008] It should be noted that the present invention should not be understood as being limited by the above-mentioned problems, and the contents thereof are defined in the claims and will be described in detail below using examples. [Means for solving the problem]

[0009] Here, before describing the invention in detail, a supplementary explanation will be given regarding the claims.

[0010] According to one aspect of the present invention, in order to achieve the above-mentioned object, a content management device that manages information about content with a story in progress units that make up the content is provided with: a progress unit entity appearing description storage means that stores, for each progress unit, an entity appearing description that describes, in a graph structure, information about entities appearing in the progress unit; a progress unit overall attribute storage means that stores progress unit overall attributes that describe the overall attributes of the progress unit; an input means that inputs the entity appearing description and the progress unit overall attribute to the progress unit entity appearing description storage means and the progress unit overall attribute storage means; and a search means that searches for progress units based on the entity appearing description or the progress unit overall attribute.

[0011] Here, the appearance entity refers to a character, an object, etc. described in a graph structure. Hereinafter, the characters and objects (mecha, vehicles, props, mob characters, etc.) may be collectively referred to as an appearance object.

[0012] With this configuration, the overall attributes of the progress unit are described, and information about the entities appearing in the progress unit is described in a graph structure, making it possible to manage content without omissions and according to the situation.

[0013] A progress unit is a cut or scene of a work that continues for a certain period of time or more and constitutes part of the work.

[0014] Also, in this configuration, the graph structure may describe the relationships between the appearing entities and the attributes of the appearing entities.

[0015] In this configuration, the relationships between the appearing entities and the attributes of the appearing entities may include descriptions of the origin times of the relationships and the attributes.

[0016] Furthermore, in this configuration, the content management device may further be provided with a characteristic description phrase determination means for extracting the entity description of the entity appearing in the progress unit or the overall progress unit attribute from the progress unit entity appearing description storage means or the progress unit overall attribute storage means, determining one corresponding characteristic description phrase from a plurality of characteristic description phrases (also called affective themes) prepared in advance for displaying the entire progress unit alone, and assigning it as one of the overall attributes of the progress unit.

[0017] The characteristic description phrases are prepared in advance to describe the content or theme of the progress unit, and are hereinafter also referred to as affective themes. From the group of characteristic description phrases, those suitable for the progress unit are selected and registered as part of the overall attributes of the progress unit.

[0018] In this configuration, the overall attributes of the progress unit may include start and end point information of the progress unit, and meta information of the progress unit.

[0019] In addition, in this configuration, the content management device may further be provided with a progress unit synthesis means for generating, for a single progress unit formed by combining a plurality of progress units, overall attributes of the single progress unit formed by combining a plurality of progress units and information about the entities appearing in each of the plurality of progress units from the overall attributes of each of the plurality of progress units and information about the entities appearing in each of the plurality of progress units.

[0020] In this configuration, the search means may search for a corresponding progress unit based on the characteristic description phrase.

[0021] In this configuration, the entity description may be described using a resource description framework.

[0022] This invention can be realized not only as an apparatus or system, but also as a method. It goes without saying that a part of such an invention can be configured as software. Furthermore, software products (computer programs) used to cause a computer to execute such software are naturally included within the technical scope of this invention.

[0023] The above and other aspects of the present invention are set forth in the claims and will be described in detail below using examples and the like. [Effects of the Invention]

[0024] According to this invention, content with a storyline can be flexibly managed according to the situation. [Brief explanation of the drawings]

[0025] [Figure 1] 1 is a block diagram schematically illustrating an example of the configuration of a content management system 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention. [Figure 2] 1 is a block diagram illustrating an example of computer resources of a content management system 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention. [Figure 3] 1 is a diagram illustrating a network implementation of a content management system 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention. [Figure 4A] FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining the input of information about appearing entities. [Figure 4B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating the input of information about appearing entities. [Figure 5] FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining the input of the overall attribute of the progress unit; [Figure 6A] 10 is a flowchart illustrating an example of the operation of a search process in an embodiment of the present invention. [Figure 6B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of an input screen of a search unit. [Figure 6C] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of an output screen of a search unit. [Figure 7A]10 is a flowchart illustrating an example of an operation for adding an affective theme to an overall attribute of a progress unit in an embodiment of the present invention. [Figure 7B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of an affective theme. [Figure 7C] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of a metaword table for determining metawords included in information on progress units to be matched with constituent metawords of an affective theme. [Figure 8A] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of extraction of person correlation changes in progress units. [Figure 8B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of management of content with a story. [Figure 9] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of management information of progress units. [Figure 10] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating a triple configuration that constitutes a graph structure that describes information about entities that appear in a progress unit. [Figure 11A] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of a graph structure describing information about entities appearing in progress units, including time information. [Figure 11B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating another example of a graph structure describing information about entities appearing in progress units, including time information. [Figure 11C] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating another example of a graph structure describing information about entities appearing in progress units, including time information. [Figure 12] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of reconstructing management information for content with a story. [Figure 13] FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating the structure of an animation work. [Figure 14] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of a product produced in the process of creating an animation work. [Figure 15] 10A and 10B are diagrams illustrating examples of meta information to be added to products in the production process. [Figure 16A] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating management of information about characters in progress units. [Figure 16B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating management of information about characters in progress units. [Figure 16C]FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating management of information about characters in progress units. [Figure 16D] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating management of information about characters in progress units. [Figure 17A] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of RDF description based on the correlation between characters. [Figure 17B] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of RDF description based on the correlation between characters. [Figure 17C] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of RDF description based on the correlation between characters. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0026] An embodiment in which the present invention is applied to a content management system for managing information on anime works will be described below.

[0027] It should be noted that the present invention is not limited to the management of animations, but can be widely applied to any content with a story.

[0028] The content management system of this embodiment manages production information for story-based content, managing information on the interrelationships between characters and other characters and objects (called "appearance objects") depicted in the story, and on the data structure of each appearance object changing as the story progresses. This system manages information for portions of a work (progress units), such as cuts or scenes, that constitute continuous time periods of at least a certain length. For each progress unit (e.g., scene unit), the system manages overall attributes (also called group information) that represent the overall content of the progress unit, and information on the appearance objects (also called group attributes) that appear within the progress unit. The appearance objects are managed using a graph structure. Management using the graph structure may be limited to certain appearance objects, such as characters. The attributes of the entire progress unit may include index information identifying the progress unit, its temporal location within the work, its length, and common information within the progress unit, such as location, season, and weather. Furthermore, higher-level information, such as an "emotional theme" (Figure 9), associated with the story content of the progress unit can be assigned.

[0029] A graph structure is appropriately adopted as a method for managing the objects that appear in a work (Figure 10). Conventional methods include table management and relational databases. In these cases, in order to manage the objects that appear, it is necessary to define management items, such as the characteristics of each element, as columns in advance. However, the objects that appear in each individual progress unit within a work are not constant, but change significantly depending on the flow of the story. For this reason, it is difficult to define management items, such as the characteristics of the objects that appear in each progress unit, in advance. Therefore, the management system of this embodiment uses management based on a graph structure, making it possible to flexibly respond to changes in management items.

[0030] As an example of an object that appears in each progress unit within a work, we will use characters within that progress unit to explain a management method that takes into account the time of change (Figures 11A-11C). The characters' personalities (including information such as age, personality, address, commute, and grade level), emotional changes within that progress unit, and relationships between characters change depending on the experiences of the characters as the story progresses. This information within the progress unit can be extracted by analyzing the meta information and dialogue information attached to the artifacts of the production process. Here, when managing the timing of character appearances, information about their personalities, information about their emotions, and information about relationships using a graph structure, time information about when that information changes is also managed. This time information can be time position information within the entire work, or it can be a relative time relative to the start time of the progress unit information.

[0031] Specifically, methods for managing the time information of each node on a graph structure include, as in the example of management using a graph structure (Figures 11A to 11C), directly superimposing the time information on individual nodes or the ``relationships'' between nodes as ``relationship #time information'' (Figure 11A), assigning unique identification information to individual nodes or edges (``relationships'') between nodes and managing the time information for that identification information in a separate table (Figure 11B), or defining the time information of changes in individual objects as the time information of the objects (Figure 11C), but are not limited to these methods.

[0032] In this embodiment, graph information may be reconstructed (progress units may be combined). Multiple pieces of progress information may be combined into a new, higher-level progress unit. Individual progress unit information may be aggregated to create a new, higher-level progress unit. Information about the group's situation (location, season, etc.), character information (attributes, correlations, etc.), and higher-level conceptual information such as themes expressed in the story within the group may be reconstructed and utilized, taking into account the characteristics and importance of each group's information. The newly reconstructed progress unit may then be managed and searched in the same way as individual progress units. During this reconstruction, character information in the reconstructed progress unit is defined as information about characters who appeared within the relevant multiple progress units, information about relationships between characters, and emotional changes. In other words, with this management method, information within a progress unit is managed as differential information within the group's period. Therefore, for example, when searching for character information in a specific progress unit, depending on the purpose, all of the character information may need to be combined and used from the beginning of the work. If the system is used in a variety of ways, including frequently using accumulated character usage information, the accumulated character information may be managed separately and independently by progress unit.

[0033] In this embodiment, the content appearing in the work, which changes over time, can be flexibly managed in units of progress, and by adding time information about the personalities of the characters appearing, changes in their emotions, and information about the relationships between the characters in a tree structure and adding time information about the points at which the information changes, it becomes easier to obtain information such as the progression of the relationships between the characters in the work, the growth of the protagonist, and changes in their emotions.

[0034] You can also search for scenes from other works with similar situations (location, season, objects that appear, relationships between characters, etc.). This makes it easy to search for scenes with similar situations in other works and use them as reference when creating a new work, for example.

[0035] By defining and managing the themes expressed in scenes of a work as emotional themes, it becomes easier to link them with articles or products that have similar emotional themes.

[0036] By managing information on the relationships and emotional changes of important characters as the story progresses, it is possible to associate content with similar changes. This information can also be used to enjoy content in new ways from the characters' perspectives.

[0037] FIG. 1 shows the content management system 100 of this embodiment as a whole. In this figure, the content management system 100 is configured to include a progress unit overall attribute storage unit 110, a progress unit appearing entity description storage unit 120, an input unit 130, a search unit 140, and an affective theme determination unit 150.

[0038] The content to be managed is, for example, an anime, and as shown in Figure 8A, it is managed in progress units extracted according to the passage of time in the story. It can be seen that there are changes in character correlation within each progress unit. Each progress unit also includes group information (information about the entire progress unit) and group attributes (description of entities appearing in the progress unit). As shown in Figure 9, the group information may include, but is not limited to, the progress unit index, temporal location information, length, common information for the progress unit such as location, season, and weather, story, dialogue, and emotional theme. The group attributes include descriptions of entities appearing in the progress unit. The descriptions of entities appearing in the progress unit describe a graph structure, and are described, for example, by semantic triples consisting of a subject, predicate, and object, as shown in Figure 10. Semantic triples may be described, for example, by RDF (Resource Description Framework), but are not limited to this.

[0039] In FIG. 1, the input unit 130 may input group attributes (entity descriptions appearing in progress units) using, for example, the input interface 130A shown in FIG. 4A, but is not limited to this. The input interface 130A may specify a progress unit using index information and input the triples of the appearing entities and the start time of the relationship (predicate). If the start time is the start point of the progress unit, no time may be specified (empty). The entered entity descriptions appearing may be displayed as shown in FIG. 4B by specifying the index of the progress unit. In this state, desired triples may be specified (shown with dashed lines, for example) and updated. The entity descriptions appearing in progress units may be displayed in the form of graphs shown in FIGS. 15 and 16A to 16D instead of or in addition to the display in FIG. 4B.

[0040] Furthermore, the input unit 130 may use the input interface 130B shown in FIG. 5 to specify the progress unit using the index information and input group information (information on the entire progress unit).

[0041] The search unit 140 can access the progress unit overall attribute storage unit 110 and the progress unit appearing entity description storage unit 120 to search for progress units. Figure 6A6B shows the operational flow of the search unit 140. For example, search conditions are entered using the search interface 140A shown in FIG. 6B (S10). In FIG. 6B, a group item of the group information is specified using a pull-down menu, and a keyword is entered in a keyword entry field. For group attributes, a type of triple component (subject, predicate, object) may be specified using a pull-down menu, and a keyword may be entered in a keyword entry field, but this is not limited to this. The search conditions are converted into a search formula, and progress units that match the search conditions are extracted from the progress unit overall attribute storage unit 110 or the progress unit entity description storage unit 120 (step 11), and are displayed in a search result list 140B shown in FIG. 6C. Search results may include, for example, the title of the anime, an index, the opening part of the story, etc., but are not limited to these. For group information, a group item is specified and a keyword is entered. For group attributes, a keyword may be specified by specifying a triple component (subject, predicate, object), but is not limited to this. The overall information can be searched using, for example, a normal relational database search language (SQL), and the attribute information can be searched using a knowledge-based query language such as SPARQL, but is not limited to these.

[0042] As described, the search results are displayed in a list of progress units (title, index information, and opening part or summary of the story) as shown in Figure 6C, and you can specify an entry in this list to display the overall information (Figure 5) or attribute information (Figure 4B). You can modify the items in the displayed overall information (Figure 5) and attribute information (Figure 4B).

[0043] FIG. 7A illustrates an example of the operation of the affective theme determination unit 150. Affective themes are a plurality of phrases prepared in advance to describe the theme of a piece of content or a progress unit of the content, and are also referred to herein as "characteristic description phrases." An example of affective themes is shown in FIG. 7B, and metawords are assigned to each affective theme. The metawords are determined in advance to identify affective themes from multiple perspectives, and the metawords assigned to each affective theme may be extracted from text expressing the metawords and weighted based on their statistical information.

[0044] In FIG. 7A, first, characteristic words (also called search candidate words) are extracted from the progress unit information, group information, and / or group attribute information, and matching metawords are extracted by looking up the metaword table shown in FIG. 7C (S20). Next, the progress unit metawords are matched with the metawords of each affective theme to calculate a score for each affective theme (S21). The weight of the metawords for each affective theme may be taken into consideration when calculating the score. Based on the scores of each affective theme, one affective theme with a high score is selected and added to the group information (S22). The number of affective themes selected and displayed may be more than one.

[0045] The search unit 140 can extract progress units that include a desired affective theme from one work (content) or from multiple works (contents).

[0046] 2 is a diagram showing a schematic implementation of a content management system 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention, in which the system is implemented on a computer 1000 including a CPU 1001, a main memory 1002, an input / output interface (input / output bus) 1003, an external device 1004, etc. Content management system 100 is constructed by installing an application 1005 on computer 1000.

[0047] 3 illustrates an environment in which a content management system 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention is used. In this figure, a content management server 200 is connected to a communication network 400. A user terminal 300 is connected to this communication network 400. Although only one user terminal 300 is shown, there are usually multiple user terminals 300. A user can use the user terminal 300 to obtain content information from the content management server 200 and view the content information.

[0048] The structure of an anime work will be described below. Fig. 13 shows an example of the structure of an anime work. An anime work is made up of episodes, scenes, cuts, and frames. In this embodiment, the progress unit is a scene or a cut, but this is not limiting. (1) Episode A story unit within a work, a general unit of publication or broadcast that makes up a series such as a TV program, and is made up of a collection of multiple "scenes." (2) Scene A scene / scene represents the same thing, and in words it is like a sentence / paragraph, and is made up of multiple "cuts." (3) Cut "The smallest unit of footage that makes up a film, etc. It's like a word or a phrase in a sentence. It's used to mean "the smallest unit of visual elements that make up a story" or "from when the camera starts to when it stops." (4) Frame Basically, one second is divided into 24 parts, called one frame.

[0049] Next, we will explain an example of the production process for film animation. The production process goes through the following steps: script → storyboard → layout → key drawing → animation → tracing → painting → filming → editing → dubbing → dubbing → completion. Also, cut bags are used during the animation production process [layout → key drawing → animation → tracing → painting → filming].

[0050] The contents of the cut bag are as follows: (1) Time sheet (the person in charge of key animation fills out the key sheet, the person in charge of animation fills out the animation sheet, and the person in charge of production fills in shooting instructions, etc.) (2) Layout (copying is done by the background designer) (3) Original artwork (drawn by the original artist) (4) Video (drawn by the video editor) (5) Cel (traced and painted) (6) BG (background drawn by the art director)

[0051] In addition to the cut number and number of seconds, the cut bag also contains check items for direction, animation director, animation inspection, color specification, and finishing inspection, as well as the number of original drawings, animation, tracing, painting, and special effects frames, their totals, and a shooting column, and the necessary items are filled in after each task is completed.

[0052] In the example of the composition of an animated work shown in Figure 13, an animated video is generally created by displaying 24 still images (frame units) continuously per second. In contrast to this, in the case of filming movies or TV dramas, the unit of recording one scene in one shot is often called a cut, and in the production of animation, a single flow of video within a work is similarly managed as a cut.

[0053] When producing anime, work is often divided into cuts, and the items required for production are generally managed as a set called a "cut bag." On the other hand, a scene is like a paragraph in a novel, and is managed as a unit of story content.

[0054] Until now, this information has been stored and managed as digitized, manually created data, but because it was not managed in a systematic way, it was difficult to perform detailed searches, such as the scene or situation in which a character first appeared, or the specific facial expressions of a character or how a cinematography effect was drawn. If such searches become possible, when creating a new work, it will be possible to search for and refer to similar drawing methods from past works, thereby improving the efficiency of production. It will also allow less experienced anime production staff to improve their production skills by using them as references.

[0055] As an example of animation production on a cut-by-cut basis, the "Story Structure of Momotaro's Momotaro" is shown in Figure 14, using the story of "Momotaro." This was created from animation production information, including the overall work settings such as the script, screenplay, and object settings (character settings, size, clothing, color, etc.), as well as time sheets, layouts, keyframes, animation, cels, GB (background), and cut-by-cut information such as direction, special effects, and filming techniques. Possible methods for extracting information for the story structure table from this information include automatic conversion or manual work by a conversion worker. In Figure 14, the "lines" inserted during dubbing have also been added for reference.

[0056] Figure 14 shows an example of meta-information that can be added to the products of the production process in cut units. This table shows an example of combining cuts 4 and 5 from scene 3 in the story structure of Momotaro. This combining process is performed when you want to manage the story as a meaningful unit within the flow of the work's story. For example, because cut units are managed as a unit of camera direction, they may be short, ranging from a few seconds to several tens of seconds, and may not necessarily be meaningful units within the flow of the story.

[0057] Figure 15 shows the relationship between information management items for cuts in scene 3. Cut 3-4_5 is the result of combining the cut information that was originally managed as cut 3-4 and cut 3-5 in order to manage it in larger cut units. In this diagram, items that can be predefined as information to be managed are managed using normal tables, and the objects that appear are managed as graph information.

[0058] However, production information requires the management of detailed information about each object that appears, and because this information differs depending on the work, and particularly depending on the animation production company, it is difficult to define the configuration of the management table in advance and manage it in a systematic manner, as was done in the past.It is also difficult to search for the timing and transitions in the status of these objects that appear.

[0059] According to the embodiment described here, these problems can be solved by managing part of the cut information as graph information that can handle time information. Figures 16A, 16B, and 16C show examples of the management method of this embodiment for cuts 4, 5, and 6 in scene 1, respectively. Also, Figure 16D shows an example of when cuts 5 and 6 in scene 1 are combined and reconstructed as cut 5_6 in scene 1.

[0060] Figures 17A, 17B, and 17C explain an example of describing group attributes of correlations in RDF format using the example of "Momotaro," where Figure 17A describes the story, Figure 17B shows a graph of the correlations between the characters, and Figure 17C shows an example of the description in RDF format. The correlations between the characters in this embodiment can also be described in RDF format, but are not limited to this.

[0061] This completes the description of the embodiment.

[0062] It should be noted that the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments, and various modifications are possible without departing from the spirit of the present invention. It should also be noted that various features of the embodiments can be used in combination unless such combination is clearly inappropriate or unless such combination is explicitly or implicitly excluded. [Explanation of symbols]

[0063] 100 Content Management Systems 110 Progress unit overall attribute memory section 120 Progress unit appearance entity description memory section 130 Input section 140 Search Department 150 Sensitivity Theme Decision Department

Claims

1. In a content management device for managing information on content with a story, the content is composed of a series of multiple progress units, and two adjacent progress units on the timeline of the story are connected without any gap on the timeline of the story, and the content management device manages information on the content involving the story in the progress units; The content management device a progress unit entity information storage means for storing, for each progress unit, an entity description in which information about entities appearing in the progress unit is described in a graph structure; a progress unit overall attribute storage means for storing progress unit overall attributes describing overall attributes of the progress unit, the progress unit overall attributes including a title of the content, index information of the progress unit, and a story description of the progress unit; an input means for inputting the description of the entities appearing in the progress unit and the overall attributes of the progress unit into the progress unit appearing entity information storage means and the progress unit overall attributes storage means; A search means for searching for a progress unit based on the entity description or the progress unit overall attribute is provided, an entry in the list of search results of the search means includes a story description in units of progress; the graph structure describes the relationships between the entities appearing and the attributes of the entities appearing; A content management device, wherein the relationships between the entities appearing and the attributes of the entities appearing include descriptions of the starting times of the relationships and the attributes.

2. 2. The content management device according to claim 1, further comprising a characteristic description phrase determination means for extracting from the progress unit entity information storage means or the progress unit overall attribute storage means an entity description of an entity appearing in the progress unit or a progress unit overall attribute, determining a corresponding one characteristic description phrase from a plurality of characteristic description phrases prepared in advance to display the entire progress unit alone, and assigning the corresponding one as one of the overall attributes of the progress unit.

3. A content management device as described in claim 1, further comprising a progress unit synthesis means for generating, for a single progress unit formed by combining a plurality of progress units, the overall attributes of each of the plurality of progress units and information regarding the entities appearing in each of the plurality of progress units from the overall attributes of the plurality of progress units and information regarding the entities appearing in each of the plurality of progress units.

4. 3. The content management device according to claim 2, wherein said search means searches for a corresponding progress unit based on said characteristic description phrase.

5. 2. The content management device according to claim 1, wherein the description of the entities appearing in the content management device is described using a resource description framework.

6. A content management method executed by a computer for managing information on content with a story, comprising: The content is composed of a series of multiple progress units, and two adjacent progress units on the timeline of the story are connected without any gap on the timeline of the story, and the content management method manages information on the content accompanying the story in the progress units, The content management method is as follows: a progress unit entity appearing information storage step of storing an entity appearing description, in which information about entities appearing in the progress unit is described in a graph structure, in a progress unit entity appearing information storage means for each progress unit; a progress unit overall attribute storage step of storing progress unit overall attributes describing overall attributes of the progress unit in a progress unit overall attribute storage means, the progress unit overall attributes including a title of the content, index information of the progress unit, and a story description of the progress unit; a search step of searching for a progress unit based on the entity description or the progress unit overall attribute; The entries in the list of search results from the search step include a story description for each progress unit, the graph structure describes the relationships between the entities appearing and the attributes of the entities appearing; A content management method, wherein the relationships between the entities appearing and the attributes of the entities appearing include descriptions of the origin times of the relationships and the attributes.

7. A content management computer program for managing information on content with a story, The content is composed of a series of multiple progress units, and two adjacent progress units on the timeline of the story are connected without any gap on the timeline of the story, and information on the content accompanying the story is managed in the progress units, Computer, a progress unit entity information storage means for storing, for each progress unit, an entity description in which information about entities appearing in the progress unit is described in a graph structure; a progress unit overall attribute storage means for storing progress unit overall attributes describing overall attributes of the progress unit, the progress unit overall attributes including a title of the content, index information of the progress unit, and a story description of the progress unit; an input means for inputting the description of the entities appearing in the progress unit and the overall attributes of the progress unit into the progress unit appearing entity information storage means and the progress unit overall attributes storage means; functioning as a search means for searching for progress units based on the entity description or the progress unit overall attributes; an entry in the list of search results of the search means includes a story description in units of progress; the graph structure describes the relationships between the entities appearing and the attributes of the entities appearing; A computer program for managing content, wherein the relationships between the entities appearing and the attributes of the entities appearing include descriptions of the starting times of the relationships and the attributes.

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