US 11,863,819 B2
Content consumption monitoring
Hailun Huang, Burlington (CA); Haki Sharifi, Mississauga (CA); Chris Snyder, Toronto (CA); Olena Chernukhina, Toronto (CA); Peter Santos, Woodbridge (CA); and Theodore Tse, Toronto (CA)
Assigned to BCE Inc., Verdun (CA)
Filed by BCE Inc., Verdun (CA)
Filed on Feb. 12, 2021, as Appl. No. 17/174,808.
Application 17/174,808 is a division of application No. 14/752,317, filed on Jun. 26, 2015, abandoned.
Claims priority of provisional application 62/018,045, filed on Jun. 27, 2014.
Prior Publication US 2021/0176525 A1, Jun. 10, 2021
Int. Cl. H04N 21/442 (2011.01); H04N 21/2543 (2011.01)
CPC H04N 21/44204 (2013.01) [H04N 21/2543 (2013.01)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method for monitoring consumption of media content comprising:
receiving a playback request at a content consumption monitoring system from a content consumption device;
processing the playback request at the content consumption monitoring system;
authorizing playback of the media content on the content consumption device based on one or more of: the media content being requested, a customer account, a location of the content consumption device, and an access network used by the content consumption device to access the media content;
receiving a content consumption notification message at the content consumption monitoring system, the content consumption notification message including a unique subscriber identifier (ID) identifying the customer account, an access network identifier identifying the access network, a media content playback event identifier indicative of initiating playback of the media content at the content consumption device, a start time, and media content information;
receiving a further content consumption notification message at the content consumption monitoring system, the further content consumption notification message including the unique subscriber identifier (ID) identifying the customer account, the access network identifier identifying the access network, a media content playback event identifier indicative of stopping playback of the media content at the content consumption device, a stop time, and the media content information;
storing the content consumption notification message and the further content consumption notification message in association with the customer account; and
determining a charge for the customer account based on subscription information and by determining an amount of time that the media content is played back over the access network,
wherein the content consumption notification message and further content consumption notification message are received for each content consumption device used by the unique subscriber identifier to access the media content, and for each access network used by each content consumption device to access the media content, and
wherein the charge for the customer account is based on the amount of time that the media content is played back over each access network for each content consumption device.