SYSTEM FOR AUDIO-VISUAL MEDIA USER CUSTOMIZATION

摘要

The invention provides a technique for integrating a plurality of media streams (100), including a main program and a stream of customized information at a terminal so that a user (155) gets a single playback. Prior to streaming a main program to a user (155), the main program is embedded with placeholders (116). These placeholders (116) include a definition of a location for insertion of customized media content and a pointer to another server. As the user (155) receives the main program and embedded placeholders (116), these pointers get directed from the user's terminal to streaming server, which responds by identifying appropriate media and streaming the media to the user's terminal. Software on the user's terminal (also known as a "player") integrates the various data streams and synchronizes them to a main program. The user's terminal may receive many media streams from different streaming servers and integrate each stream into a single playback.