Media Guidance Access Using Shared Digital Rights
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current media systems require each household user to have the necessary digital rights to access media content, even if other users present have those rights, leading to unnecessary subscriptions when friends or family gather to watch content.
Innovation Solution
A media guidance application identifies all users present and retrieves their digital rights, comparing them to the required rights for the selected content, and uses the appropriate rights to access the content, allowing users to share subscriptions seamlessly.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If a single user account is used to access media content, then the system is simple to operate, but other users present cannot access content they have rights to
Solution Approach 1:
The media guidance application is designed to serve multiple user accounts through a single interface. It automatically detects which users are present and retrieves their digital rights, allowing the system to adapt its behavior based on the group of users without requiring separate devices or complex authentication processes for each user.
Solution Approach 2:
The system automatically identifies users present at the device, retrieves their digital rights information, and determines appropriate access permissions without requiring manual intervention from each user. The application self-manages the complexity of multi-user authentication and rights management.
2Reliability
If each user subscribes to services independently, then each user has full access to content they are entitled to, but redundant subscriptions increase costs
Solution Approach 1:
The system combines the digital rights of multiple users and merges them into a unified access permission set. By pooling the rights from all present users, the system determines a single set of permissions that allows access to content that any of the users are entitled to view, eliminating the need for separate subscriptions.
Solution Approach 2:
A single subscription or access permission can serve multiple users simultaneously. The system is designed to make one content asset accessible to multiple user accounts that have the appropriate digital rights, making the subscription system multi-functional rather than requiring dedicated subscriptions for each user.
3Device complexity
If the system checks only the logged-in user's rights, then the access control process is simple, but it prevents users without subscriptions from accessing content they should be able to view
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by automatically retrieving and storing digital rights information for multiple users in advance. When content access is requested, the system has already gathered the necessary rights data from all present users, allowing for quick determination of access permissions without complex real-time checks.
Solution Approach 2:
The system continuously monitors which users are present at the device and uses this feedback to dynamically adjust access permissions. By gathering feedback on user presence and cross-referencing it with digital rights information, the system determines appropriate access levels without requiring complex manual configuration.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods are disclosed herein for enabling multiple users' digital rights to be applied as needed to access media while those users are present to consume media. In particular, a media guidance application may receive a selection of a media asset and determine that the user equipment device does not allow access to the media asset. In response, the media guidance application may identify all the users consuming content from that user equipment device and retrieve digital rights for each user. The media guidance application may compare the digital rights of each user with digital rights required to access the media asset. The media guidance application may, based on the comparison, identify a set of digital rights (e.g., for another user present) that enable access to the media asset, and use those digital rights to access the media asset for consumption.