JP7532920B2 - Related information distribution device, program, content distribution system and content output terminal - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to a related information distribution device, a program, a content distribution system, and a content output terminal.

Conventionally, with the spread of SNS (Social Networking Service), there has been an increase in services that allow viewers to post comments on television programs. Furthermore, comments posted by viewers are displayed so that they can be viewed, for example, by using a portion of the screen while the television program is being broadcast.

As a technology for providing such a service, for example, an information processing device is disclosed that includes: a video information acquisition unit that acquires video information of video content from an external device; a video display unit that displays the video of the video content on a specified display device according to the acquired video information; a comment acquisition unit that acquires viewers' comments on the video content from an external posting site where comments that describe viewers' occasional impressions of the video content are posted in real time while the video content is being viewed; and a comment display unit that displays the comments acquired by the comment acquisition unit in a specified comment display area on the display device displaying the video of the video content, wherein if a comment acquired by the comment acquisition unit is longer than a specified number of characters, the comment display unit starts displaying the next comment in the middle of displaying the comment" (for example, Patent Document 1).

JP 2016-149780 A

When using the technology described in Patent Document 1 above, in order to obtain viewer comments on video content from an external posting site, for example, comments with a specific tag attached are obtained. Therefore, if a specific tag is added to a comment that is not related to the content of the video content, that comment is also obtained. In addition, viewers are required to add a specific tag when posting a comment.

The present invention aims to provide a related information distribution device, program, content distribution system, and content output terminal that provide information highly related to the content being distributed.

The present invention solves the above problems by the following solving means.
A first invention is a related information distribution device comprising: an important word acquisition means for acquiring important words related to the content of a content from image information and audio information of the content to be transmitted to a display device for each predetermined time range; a related information acquisition means for acquiring word-related information related to the important words acquired by the important word acquisition means from an information storage device that stores various types of information; and a related information transmission means for transmitting the word-related information acquired by the related information acquisition means to the display device.
A second invention is a related information distribution device according to the first invention, further comprising a word extraction means for extracting a plurality of words related to the content for each specified time range based on at least one of the speech content obtained by analyzing the audio information and the target image obtained by analyzing the image information, and an importance calculation means for calculating the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means, wherein the important word acquisition means acquires the words with high importance calculated by the importance calculation means as the important words.
A third invention is a related information distribution device according to the second invention, wherein the importance calculation means calculates the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means based on the frequency of appearance and speech volume, and/or appearance time of each word.
A fourth invention is a related information distribution device according to the second invention, wherein, when the target image obtained by analyzing the image information shows a person, the importance calculation means calculates the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means based on emotional information of the person when each word appears.
A fifth invention is a related information distribution device according to any one of the second to fourth inventions, further comprising an individual information storage unit in which individual information including words indicating interests of a user viewing the content is registered, and the importance calculation means further calculates the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means based on the individual information stored in the individual information storage unit.
A sixth invention is a related information distribution device according to any one of the first to fifth inventions, wherein the related information acquisition means acquires the word-related information when sequentially transmitting the content to the display device, and the related information transmission means transmits the acquired word-related information to the display device in response to the related information acquisition means acquiring the word-related information.
A seventh invention is a related information distribution device which is any of the first to sixth inventions, and which includes a classification designation receiving means for receiving a classification designation regarding the various types of information, and the related information acquisition means acquires the word-related information from information of a specified classification among the various types of information stored in the information storage device based on the classification designation received by the classification designation receiving means.
An eighth aspect of the present invention is a program for causing a computer to function as any one of the related information distribution devices according to the first to seventh aspects of the present invention.
A ninth invention is a content distribution system including a related information distribution device of any of the first to seventh inventions and the display device, wherein the display device is equipped with a content display control means for sequentially displaying the received word-related information in an information display area and playing back and displaying the received content in a content display area.
A tenth invention is a content output terminal comprising: a content receiving means for receiving one of the contents specified by a user from a content server storing a plurality of contents; a key word acquisition means for acquiring key words related to the content from image information and audio information of the content received by the content receiving means for each predetermined time range; a related information acquisition means for acquiring word-related information related to the key words acquired by the key word acquisition means from an information storage device storing various types of information; and an information output means for outputting the word-related information acquired by the related information acquisition means together with the content received by the content receiving means.

The present invention provides a related information distribution device, program, content distribution system, and content output terminal that provide information highly related to the content being distributed.

1 is a diagram showing an overall configuration of a content distribution system according to a first embodiment. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing functional blocks of a content distribution server according to the first embodiment. 5 is a flowchart showing a content distribution process of the content distribution server according to the first embodiment. 5 is a flowchart showing a key word acquisition process of the content distribution server according to the first embodiment. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a specific example for explaining a content distribution process in the content distribution server according to the first embodiment. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a specific example for explaining a content distribution process in the content distribution server according to the first embodiment. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a display example on the receiving device according to the first embodiment. FIG. 11 is a diagram showing the overall configuration of a content distribution system according to a second embodiment and functional blocks of a content distribution server. 13 is a flowchart showing a content distribution process of a content distribution server according to the second embodiment. FIG. 11 is a diagram showing a display example on a receiving device according to the second embodiment. FIG. 13 is a diagram showing the overall configuration of a content distribution system according to a third embodiment and functional blocks of a content distribution server. FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating an example of an individual information storage unit of a content distribution server according to the third embodiment. 13 is a flowchart showing a key word acquisition process of the content distribution server according to the third embodiment. FIG. 13 is a diagram showing a display example on a terminal according to the third embodiment.

Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. Note that this is merely an example, and the technical scope of the present invention is not limited to this example.
First Embodiment
<Overall configuration of content distribution system 100>
FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the overall configuration of a content distribution system 100 according to the first embodiment.
In the content distribution system 100, a content distribution server 1 (related information distribution device) distributes content, which is a television broadcast program, to a receiving device 6 (display device). In addition, in the content distribution system 100, the content distribution server 1 transmits information that is highly related to the content distributed to the receiving device 6. In this way, the content distribution system 100 is a system that causes the receiving device 6 to display information related to the content together with the content.
The content distribution system 100 shown in FIG. 1 includes a content distribution server 1, an information server 4 (information storage device), and a plurality of receiving devices 6, which are connected to each other via a communication network N.

<Content distribution server 1>
FIG. 2 is a diagram showing functional blocks of the content distribution server 1 according to the first embodiment.
As shown in FIG. 2, the content distribution server 1 includes a control unit 10, a storage unit 20, and a communication interface unit 29.
The control unit 10 is a central processing unit (CPU) that controls the entire content distribution server 1. The control unit 10 appropriately reads and executes an operating system (OS) and various application programs stored in the storage unit 20, thereby cooperating with the above-mentioned hardware to execute various functions.
The control unit 10 includes a word extraction unit 11 (word extraction means), an importance calculation unit 12 (importance calculation means), an important word acquisition unit 13 (important word acquisition means), a related information acquisition unit 15 (related information acquisition means), a content distribution unit 16, and a related information transmission unit 17 (related information transmission means).

The word extraction unit 11 is a control unit that extracts multiple words related to the content for each predetermined time range. Here, the predetermined time range refers to a range such as 10 seconds or 30 seconds, for example. In addition, the time ranges may overlap, such as the 10 seconds from 0 to 10 seconds and the 10 seconds from 5 to 15 seconds. The predetermined time range includes multiple frames that make up the content, and in subsequent processing, the multiple frames included in the predetermined time range may be referred to as section frames.

The word extraction unit 11 acquires words related to the content, for example, from the speech content obtained by analyzing the audio information of the content. More specifically, the word extraction unit 11 may, for example, convert the speech content obtained by analyzing the audio information into text, and then analyze the text using morphological analysis to extract words. Note that the word extraction unit 11 may also analyze the text using semantic analysis by natural language processing, for example, other than morphological analysis, to extract words. When semantic analysis is used, important words that are being discussed can be extracted from the context of the sentences acquired as the speech content.

The word extraction unit 11 also acquires words related to the content from, for example, a target image obtained by analyzing image information of the content. More specifically, the word extraction unit 11 may acquire an image similar to the target image using, for example, an image storage device (not shown) that stores associations between images and their names, and acquire the name associated with the acquired image as a word indicating the target image. Note that the word extraction unit 11 may apply the target image to a learning model (not shown) that has been trained by deep learning to acquire words indicating the target image.

The importance calculation unit 12 is a control unit that calculates the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction unit 11. Here, the importance of a word is an index that indicates whether or not the word is highly relevant to the content. If the importance of a word is high, the word is considered to be highly relevant to the content.

The importance calculation unit 12 calculates the importance of each word based on, for example, the frequency of occurrence of each word and the volume of speech of the voice obtained from the audio information of the content, and calculates the importance of each word based on the appearance time of the target image obtained from the image information of the content.
In addition, when the target image obtained by analyzing the image information shows a person, the importance calculation unit 12 may calculate the importance of each word based on emotional information such as the person's facial expression and tone of voice when each word appears.

The important word acquisition unit 13 is a control unit that acquires words with high importance calculated by the importance calculation unit 12 as important words. For example, the important word acquisition unit 13 may set words whose importance is equal to or greater than a threshold as important words. The important word acquisition unit 13 may acquire multiple important words for each specified time range, but may not acquire important words if there are no words whose importance is equal to or greater than the threshold.

The related information acquisition unit 15 is a control unit that acquires word-related information related to the important words acquired by the important word acquisition unit 13 from the information server 4 described later. Here, the word-related information refers to, for example, an explanation of the important word, a comment containing the important word, or other messages, but is not limited to this.

The content delivery unit 16 is a control unit that delivers the content to be processed to the receiving device 6. The content delivery unit 16 may deliver the content to the receiving device 6 before the processing by the word extraction unit 11 is performed, or may deliver the content to the receiving device 6 simultaneously with the processing by the word extraction unit 11 or after the processing by the word extraction unit 11 is performed.
The related information transmitting unit 17 is a control unit that transmits the word-related information acquired by the related information acquiring unit 15 to the receiving device 6 .
Each of these functions will be described in detail later.

The storage unit 20 is a storage device such as a hard disk or a semiconductor memory device for storing programs, data, etc. required for the operation of the content distribution server 1 .
The storage unit 20 includes a program storage unit 21 and a content storage unit 22 .
The program storage unit 21 is a storage area that stores various programs for functioning as the content distribution server 1. The program storage unit 21 stores a related information acquisition program 21a. The related information acquisition program 21a is a program for executing each function of the control unit 10 described above.

The content storage unit 22 is a storage area that stores content to be distributed to the receiving device 6. Here, content refers to content that includes displayable video (images) and, if necessary, audio, and that changes over time. The content consists of multiple frames (still images). The content may be, for example, live distribution in which the video captured by a camera is itself distributed, and may be unrecorded content used as a so-called live broadcast, or a movie or drama that has been produced and stored in advance. Note that content to be distributed live is stored in the content storage unit 22 after it has been captured.

The communication interface unit 29 is an interface for communicating with the information server 4 and the receiving device 6.

<Information Server 4>
1 is a server having an information DB 41 (database) that stores various types of information. The information DB 41 of the information server 4 stores various types of information as character information. The character information may be associated with a URL (Uniform Resource Locator).
The information server 4 is not limited to one server, and may be composed of a plurality of servers. The information server 4 includes, in addition to the information DB 41, a control unit, a storage unit, a communication interface unit, and the like, which are not shown in the figure.

<Receiving device 6>
The receiving device 6 is a terminal such as a television that includes a means for receiving content and word-related information, a content display control means for playing and displaying the content and word-related information on a display 61 (display screen), and a means for outputting the content as audio. The receiving device 6 can also be configured as, for example, a personal computer (PC) or a tablet terminal. In addition to the display 61, the receiving device 6 includes a control unit, a storage unit, a communication interface unit, an audio output unit such as a speaker, and an operation unit such as a remote control, all of which are not shown.

In addition, a computer refers to an information processing device equipped with a control unit, a storage device, etc., and the content distribution server 1, the information server 4 and the receiving device 6 are all information processing devices equipped with a control unit, a storage device, etc., and are included in the concept of a computer.
The communication network N is a network between the content distribution server 1, the information server 4, and the receiving device 6, and is a communication network such as the Internet.

<Processing Description>
Next, the processing of the content distribution system 100 will be specifically described.
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a content distribution process of the content distribution server 1 according to the first embodiment.
FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a key word acquisition process of the content distribution server 1 according to the first embodiment.
As a premise of this process, the content distribution server 1 distributes data including contents unilaterally from the content distribution server 1 to the receiving device 6, like the distribution of a television broadcast program.

3, in step S (hereinafter simply referred to as "S") 11, the control unit 10 (content distribution unit 16) distributes the content to the receiving device 6. Here, it is assumed that the control unit 10 distributes the content live. When distributing content that has been stored in advance in the content storage unit 22, the control unit 10 extracts the relevant content from the content storage unit 22 and distributes it.
In S<b>12 , the control unit 10 acquires, from the content, section frames consisting of a plurality of frames that constitute the content within a predetermined time range to be transmitted to the receiving device 6 .
In S13, the control unit 10 performs an important word acquisition process.

Here, the important word acquisition process will be described with reference to FIG.
In S21 of Fig. 4, the control unit 10 (word extraction unit 11) analyzes the voice information included in the acquired section frame to acquire the speech content. The control unit 10 then extracts words from the acquired speech content. The control unit 10 may use any method as a method for converting the speech content into text and extracting words, and may use, for example, the above-mentioned morphological analysis or semantic analysis.
In S22, the control unit 10 (word extraction unit 11) analyzes the image information included in the acquired section frames to acquire the target image. Then, the control unit 10 acquires the words that indicate the target image. In this case, the control unit 10 may analyze the image information for all frames included in the section frames, but may also analyze only a portion of the frames that are thinned out at a predetermined interval, for example, to improve processing efficiency.

In S23, the control unit 10 (importance calculation unit 12) calculates the importance of each word acquired in the processes of S21 and S22.
When each word is extracted from the speech content, the importance of each word is calculated based on, for example, the frequency of occurrence of the word or the speech volume at which the word is spoken. When a word appears multiple times or when the speech volume of the word is high, the control unit 10 calculates the importance of the word to be high.
Furthermore, when each word is obtained from image information, the importance of each word is calculated based on, for example, the appearance time of the target image. The control unit 10 calculates the importance of each word to be higher in proportion to the length of the appearance time of the target image.
Furthermore, when a word obtained from the speech content matches a word indicating the target image, the control unit 10 may calculate the importance of that word as being high.

In S24, the control unit 10 (important word acquisition unit 13) acquires, as important words, words whose importance is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold based on the importance calculated in the process of S23. Thereafter, the control unit 10 shifts the process to S14 in FIG. 3.

In S14 of FIG. 3, the control unit 10 (related information acquisition unit 15) transmits the acquired important words as keywords to the information server 4, and acquires word-related information related to the important words from the information server 4.
In S<b>15 , the control unit 10 (related information transmission unit 17 ) sets the acquired word-related information into a predetermined format and transmits it to the receiving device 6 .
In this way, the control unit (content display control means) of the receiving device 6 receives the word-related information and outputs the word-related information to the display 61 together with the content.

In S16, the control unit 10 determines whether or not to end the playback of the content by, for example, obtaining information that the content has ended or that an operation has been performed from the receiving device 6 to end the playback of the content. If the playback of the content is to end (S16: YES), the control unit 10 ends this process. If the playback of the content is not to end (S16: NO), the control unit 10 moves the process to S11, obtains the section frames that make up the content for a specified time range following the time range used in the previous process, and repeats the subsequent processes.

<Specific examples>
Next, a specific example will be described.
5 and 6 are diagrams showing a specific example for explaining the content distribution process in the content distribution server 1 according to the first embodiment.
FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an example of a display on the receiving device 6 according to the first embodiment.
5 shows a frame of a certain content 70. The content 70 shown in this example is an information program that provides various information to viewers, and three people, Person A to Person C, appear in the program.
FIG. 6 shows an acquired information table 75 relating to various information acquired from section frames of the content 70 including the frame shown in FIG. 5, and important word information 77 obtained from the acquired information table 75.

5 and 6, a certain section frame (including a frame with a timestamp of 00:12:33) of the content 70 shows a situation in which person C in Fig. 5 is explaining about "tapioca" and person A is surprised. Also, the next section frame (including a frame with a timestamp of 00:12:45) shows a close-up image of person A, who is further explaining about "tapioca."
In the acquired information table 75 of FIG. 6, the time indicated by the time stamp, the image information, the audio information, and the speech content are associated with each other.
The image information includes target images of persons A to C obtained by analyzing image information within the section frames, and, if the target images are of persons, facial expressions (emotion information) obtained from the target images.
The voice information includes the speech volume and tone of voice (emotion information) obtained from the voice information.
The speech contents include speech contents obtained from the voice information.

The important word information 77 shown in FIG. 6 includes each word acquired from the acquired information table 75 by the processes of S21 and S22 in FIG. 4, and a score indicating the importance of each word calculated by the process of S23 in FIG. 4. In other words, the important word information 77 shown in FIG. 6 indicates each word based on the speech content and its score. The important word information 77 also indicates the word that is the name of the target image (e.g., tapioca) acquired from the image information, and its score. Note that if at least one of the persons A to C shown in FIG. 5 is a celebrity, the important word information 77 includes the celebrity's name as an important word.

Each important word score of the important word information 77 shown in FIG. 6 is calculated by, for example, multiplying the frequency of occurrence of the word in a predetermined time range by the average surprised facial expression rate and the average surprised tone of voice rate. According to this method of calculating the important word score, the important word score is calculated according to the change in facial expression, by calculating the score of the word (including those obtained from the speech content and the target image) when there is a change in the person's facial expression. Then, this method of calculating the important word score may be partially modified to, for example, increase the important word score when there is a change to a smile. In addition, the important word score may be increased in the case of a conversation between multiple people, by increasing the score of the word included in the conversation that is exciting. An exciting conversation tends to be one in which multiple people are speaking, the voices are loud, and important words tend to appear more frequently. Therefore, the important word score of a word that satisfies such conditions may be increased.

Then, the control unit 10 of the content distribution server 1 acquires, as important words, words whose scores, which indicate importance, are equal to or greater than a threshold value through the process of S24 in FIG. 4. Here, the threshold value may be a predetermined numerical value, or may be the highest score among the acquired important words. The control unit 10 of the content distribution server 1 then transmits the important words as keywords to the information server 4, thereby acquiring word-related information from the information server 4 and transmitting it to the receiving device 6 (S14 and S15 in FIG. 3).

FIG. 7 shows an example of content displayed in a content display area 80 of the display 61 of the receiving device 6, and word-related information 81 and 82 displayed in the information display area.
The word-related information 81 and 82 are both acquired from the information server 4 using the important word "tapioca" as a keyword.
In this way, the content distribution server 1 transmits the word-related information 81 and 82 related to the content to the receiving device 6 together with the content, and the receiving device 6 outputs the content and the word-related information 81 and 82. This allows the user to view information related to the content while enjoying the content, which may provide useful information to the user.

In the case of live broadcasts in which content captured by a camera is distributed as is, the content distribution server 1 transmits the word-related information after processing to obtain information related to the content. Therefore, the transmission of the word-related information is slightly delayed from the distribution of the content, and there is a slight time lag between the display of the two. However, the content distribution server 1 can display information related to the content on the display 61 without a long delay after the content at that location is distributed.

After displaying the word-related information 81 and 82 in the information display area, the receiving device 6 may, when a predetermined timing has elapsed, hide the word-related information 81 and 82. Furthermore, after displaying the word-related information 81 and 82, when the receiving device 6 receives the next word-related information, the receiving device 6 may change the information display area from the word-related information 81 and 82 to the next word-related information.
7, the information display area is located at the bottom of the screen, but may be located in another position. Furthermore, the receiving device 6 may scroll the word-related information itself in the information display area from bottom to top or from left to right.

Thus, according to the first embodiment, the content distribution system 100 has the following advantages.
(1) The content distribution server 1 transmits content and word-related information related to the content to the receiving device 6. Thus, the receiving device 6 can display the word-related information that is highly related to the content together with the content.
(2) The content distribution server 1 acquires important words related to the content from the audio information and image information of the content, acquires word-related information related to the acquired important words from the information server 4, and transmits the word-related information to the receiving device 6. Thus, the word-related information can be made highly relevant to the content.

(3) The content distribution server 1 extracts a plurality of content-related words for each predetermined time range based on at least one of the speech content obtained by analyzing the voice information and the target image obtained by analyzing the image information, calculates the importance of each extracted word, and obtains the words with high importance as important words. Thus, the important words can be the words with high importance among the words related to the content, and it is possible to obtain words related to the content.
(4) The content distribution server 1 calculates the importance of each word based on the frequency of occurrence of the word in speech obtained from the audio information, the speech volume, and the appearance time of a target image corresponding to the word obtained from the image information. Therefore, it is possible to increase the importance of words that occur frequently in speech, words included in speech with a loud volume, and words that indicate a target image that is displayed for a long time.

(5) The content distribution server 1 repeats the process of acquiring important words from the section frames of the content, acquiring word-related information, and transmitting it to the receiving device 6 while the content is being output. Therefore, new information related to the content can always be transmitted to the receiving device 6.

Second Embodiment
The second embodiment will be described by taking an example in which an operation is performed by an operation unit of a receiving device. In the following description, parts that perform the same functions as those in the first embodiment described above are denoted by the same reference numerals or the same reference numerals at the end, and duplicated descriptions will be omitted as appropriate.
FIG. 8 is a diagram showing the overall configuration of a content distribution system 200 according to the second embodiment and functional blocks of a content distribution server 201.
The content distribution system 200 includes a content distribution server 201 , an information server 4 , and a plurality of receiving devices 6 .

<Content distribution server 201>
The content distribution server 201 includes a control unit 210 , a storage unit 220 , and a communication interface unit 29 .
The control unit 210 includes a word extraction unit 11, an importance calculation unit 12, an important word acquisition unit 13, a category designation receiving unit 214 (category designation receiving means), a related information acquisition unit 215, a content distribution unit 16, and a related information transmission unit 17.

The category designation receiving unit 214 receives category designations related to various types of information. The category designation refers to designating the source from which various types of information are obtained, such as SNS, articles on the Internet (hereinafter also referred to as online articles), etc.
The related information acquiring unit 215 acquires word related information from the information of the specified category stored in the information server 4 based on the category designation accepted by the category designation accepting unit 214 .
For example, when an SNS is specified in the classification specification, the related information acquisition unit 215 acquires messages such as posted comments that contain important words as word-related information. In this case, the related information acquisition unit 215 acquires messages based on hashtags (tag information) that are used as identifiers in the SNS and have the symbol "#" added to the tag.
Furthermore, for example, when an online article is specified in the classification specification, the related information acquisition unit 215 acquires, as word-related information, online articles that include important words and exclude messages such as comments. In this case, the related information acquisition unit 215 acquires articles excluding hash tags.

The storage unit 220 includes a program storage unit 221 and a content storage unit 22 .
The program storage unit 221 stores a related information acquisition program 221 a which is a program for executing each function of the control unit 210 described above.

<Processing Description>
Next, the processing of the content distribution system 200 will be described.
FIG. 9 is a flowchart showing a content distribution process of the content distribution server 201 according to the second embodiment.
FIG. 10 is a diagram showing an example of a display on the receiving device 6 according to the second embodiment.
The processes from S211 to S213 in FIG. 9 are similar to the processes from S11 to S13 in the first embodiment (FIG. 3).
In S214, the control unit 210 transmits a key word display screen (information display area) including the acquired key words to the receiving device 6.
In this way, the control unit of the receiving device 6 receives the important word display screen and outputs it to the display 61 .

FIG. 10 is an example of an output on the display 61 in which a key word display screen 292 is displayed together with the content 270 displayed in the content display area.
The important word display screen 292 includes an important word area 293 and search buttons 294a and 294b. The important word area 293 outputs the important words acquired in the process of S213 in Fig. 9 in a downward order, and the search buttons 294a and 294b are arranged next to each other on the right of each important word. The search button 294a targets online articles excluding SNS, and the search button 294b targets only SNS information.
The reason why the search buttons 294a and 294b are provided separately is to meet the needs of both users who want to extract messages such as tweets and users who want to extract ordinary information other than tweets.
When the user selects the search button 294 a or 294 b by operating a remote control, the control unit of the receiving device 6 transmits a signal corresponding to the selection operation to the content distribution server 201 .

In S215 of FIG. 9, the control unit 210 (classification designation receiving unit 214) determines whether a selection operation corresponding to the classification designation has been received. If a selection operation corresponding to the classification designation has been received (S215: YES), the control unit 210 moves the process to S216. On the other hand, if a selection operation for the classification designation has not been received (S215: NO), the control unit 210 moves the process to S217. Note that if a selection operation has not been received by a predetermined time (e.g., the same time as the time range of the section frame) after the process of S214, the control unit 210 determines that a selection operation for the classification designation has not been received and moves the process to S218; until then, the control unit 210 may remain in the process of S215.

In S216, the control unit 210 (related information acquisition unit 215) transmits the category designation and key words corresponding to the selection operation to the information server 4, and acquires word-related information based on the category designation related to the key words from the information server 4.
The processes of S217 and S218 are similar to the processes of S15 and S16 in the first embodiment (FIG. 3).

As described above, according to the second embodiment, the content distribution system 200 has the following advantages.
The content distribution server 201 transmits a key word display screen 292 including key words and category designations to the receiving device 6, and receives the category designation selected by the user. The content distribution server 201 then acquires word-related information related to the key words from the information server 4 based on the category information corresponding to the received category designation, and transmits the word-related information to the receiving device 6.
Therefore, since the word-related information is obtained from information of a category specified by the user, it is possible to provide information that meets the needs of the user.

Third Embodiment
The second embodiment is a case where content is distributed to a terminal such as a tablet by video distribution using a streaming technology such as YouTube (registered trademark). In addition, an example will be described in which the user's interests are registered in advance or as appropriate, and word-related information is output with priority given to the user's interests.
FIG. 11 is a diagram showing the overall configuration of a content distribution system 300 according to the third embodiment and functional blocks of a content distribution server 301.
FIG. 12 is a diagram showing an example of the individual information storage unit 323 of the content distribution server 301 according to the third embodiment.
The content distribution system 300 shown in FIG. 11 includes a content distribution server 301, an information server 4, and a terminal 306 (display device).

<Content distribution server 301>
The content distribution server 301 includes a control unit 310 , a storage unit 320 , and a communication interface unit 29 .
The control unit 310 includes a word extraction unit 11 , an importance calculation unit 312 , a key word acquisition unit 13 , a related information acquisition unit 15 , a content delivery unit 16 , and a related information transmission unit 17 .

The importance calculation unit 312 is a control unit that calculates the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction unit 11. The importance calculation unit 312 calculates the importance of each word based on individual information including words indicating the interests of each user stored in the individual information storage unit 323 described later. As an example, if the word for which the importance is to be calculated matches a word of interest, which is a word indicating an interest, the importance calculation unit 312 calculates the importance as high, and conversely, if the word matches an excluded word, which is a word that is not an interest and is not to be displayed, the importance calculation unit 312 calculates the importance as low. Note that the importance calculation unit 312 may also calculate the importance of the word for which the importance is to be calculated as high even if it does not match a word of interest but is similar.

The storage unit 320 includes a program storage unit 321 , a content storage unit 22 , and an individual information storage unit 323 .
The program storage unit 321 stores a related information acquisition program 321 a which is a program for executing each function of the control unit 310 described above.

The individual information storage unit 323 is a storage area for storing individual information indicating the interests of each user. The individual information storage unit 323 shown in FIG. 12 stores, for example, words of interest and, if necessary, words to be excluded, in association with a terminal ID (IDentification) for identifying the terminal 306. The words of interest are, for example, words indicating the user's hobbies, the names of favorite entertainers, and words indicating favorite foods and sports. The words to be excluded are, for example, names of entertainers that the user dislikes, and words indicating foods that the user dislikes.
In the example shown in FIG. 12, in the individual information storage unit 323, when the terminal ID is "r0123", a favorite food such as "fish dishes" and a place name such as "Ueno" are registered as words of interest, and a disliked food such as "okonomiyaki" is registered as a word to be excluded.
The individual information to be stored in the individual information storage unit 323 may be acquired in advance from each user and stored therein. In addition, while using the content distribution system 300, the individual information to be stored in the individual information storage unit 323 may be added and updated as needed.

<Terminal 306>
The terminal 306 is, for example, a tablet, and includes a means for receiving content and word-related information, a content display control means for playing and displaying the content and word-related information on a touch panel display 361 (display screen), and a means for outputting the content as audio. The terminal 306 may also be, for example, a PC or a smartphone. In addition to the touch panel display 361, the terminal 306 includes a control unit, a storage unit, a communication interface unit, an audio output unit such as a speaker, and the like, all of which are not shown.
It should be noted that a computer refers to an information processing device equipped with a control unit, a storage device, etc., and the terminal 306 is an information processing device equipped with a control unit, a storage device, etc., and is included in the concept of a computer.

<Processing Description>
Next, the processing of the content distribution system 300 will be described.
FIG. 13 is a flowchart showing a key word acquisition process of the content distribution server 301 according to the third embodiment.
Here, the content distribution process of the content distribution server 301 according to the third embodiment is the same as that of the first embodiment (FIG. 3). However, when the process of the content distribution server 301 starts, the control unit of the terminal 306 transmits a content distribution request specifying the content to the content distribution server 301 together with the terminal ID. As a result, in the process corresponding to S11 in FIG. 3, the control unit 310 (content distribution unit 16) of the content distribution server 301 distributes the specified content to the terminal 306.

Next, the process corresponding to S13 in FIG. 3 will be described with reference to FIG.
Steps S321 and S322 in FIG. 13 are similar to the steps S21 and S22 in the first embodiment (FIG. 4).
In S323, the control unit 310 (importance calculation unit 312) calculates the importance of each word acquired in the processes of S321 and S322 using the individual information in the individual information storage unit 323. If the word for which the importance is to be calculated matches a word of interest in the individual information storage unit 323, the control unit 310 calculates the importance to be high. On the other hand, if the word for which the importance is to be calculated matches a word to be excluded in the individual information storage unit 323, the control unit 310 calculates the importance to be low.
The process of S324 is similar to the process of S24 in the first embodiment (FIG. 4).

<Specific examples>
FIG. 14 is a diagram showing an example of a display on the terminal 306 according to the third embodiment.
Fig. 14 shows a distribution screen 330 having a content display area 331 and an information display area 332. The content display area 331 displays the content specified by the user. The content shown in this example is information disseminated by the characters posting their own videos. In the example shown in Fig. 14, a frame 331a containing the content specified by the user is displayed.
Furthermore, information related to the content designated by the user is displayed in the information display area 332. Word-related information 333a to 333d is output in the information display area 332.

The control unit 310 (word extraction unit 11) extracts a plurality of words from the audio information and image information in the section frames including the frame 331a (see S321 and S322 in FIG. 13).
Then, the control unit 310 (importance calculation unit 312, key word acquisition unit 13) refers to the individual information storage unit 323, calculates the importance of each word, and acquires the key words (see S323 and S324 in FIG. 13).
As an example, the control unit 310 (importance calculation unit 312) calculates the importance of each word based on the appearance frequency and speech volume of each word and the appearance time of the target image. When an image of a man and a fish such as frame 331a is included in a predetermined time range, the control unit 310 calculates the importance of the man's name (if the man is a celebrity) and the fish as the target image to be high.
Furthermore, when the terminal ID of the terminal 306 is "r0123", "Ueno" is registered as a word of interest.
Therefore, the control unit 310 (related information acquisition unit 15) acquires word-related information including "tai" and "ueno", such as word-related information 333b.

As described above, according to the third embodiment, the content distribution system 300 has the following advantages.
By registering words that interest the user as individual information, the content distribution server 301 increases the importance of the registered individual information and extracts important words. Therefore, the content distribution server 301 transmits information that takes into account the individual information as information related to the content to the terminal 306. As a result, the word-related information displayed on the terminal 306 can be made more likely to include information that interests the user.
By providing a URL to the word-related information, if the user is interested in the information, the user can obtain more in-depth information.

Although the embodiments of the present invention have been described above, the present invention is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiments. Furthermore, the effects described in the embodiments are merely a list of the most favorable effects resulting from the present invention, and the effects of the present invention are not limited to those described in the embodiments. Note that the above-mentioned embodiments and the modified forms described below can be used in appropriate combinations, but detailed explanations will be omitted.

(Modifications)
(1) In the first and second embodiments, the delivery of content not stored in the content storage unit has been described, but the same process can also be performed on content stored in the content storage unit. For content stored in the content storage unit, a key word acquisition process may be performed in advance, and key word information may be stored in the storage unit. Then, word-related information related to key words may be acquired each time content is delivered to the receiving device.
This reduces the processing load on the content delivery server, and also ensures that the latest information is always obtained from the information server when obtaining word-related information, making it possible to provide fresh information.

(2) Although examples have been shown and described for the method of outputting word-related information in each embodiment, the above examples are merely examples. For example, the display/non-display of word-related information may be switched by a user operation. The output position is also arbitrary, and the information may be displayed on the content, or a screen separate from the content may be prepared. Furthermore, the output method is also arbitrary, and the information may be switched to new word-related information at predetermined intervals as time passes, or may be output in a flowing manner like a subtitle. Furthermore, the word-related information may be output in chronological order with a scroll bar, so that the user can check the word-related information later by operating the scroll bar.

(3) In each embodiment, the word-related information is output as is, but this is not limiting. As in the third embodiment, a URL specifying a page of word-related information may be linked to the heading of that page, and the user may select the link to open the page of word-related information specified by the URL.

(4) In each embodiment, the specified time range has been described as a predetermined time range, but is not limited to this. Any time range may be used instead of a predetermined time range. For example, the end of a conversation or a change in scene may be automatically detected, and the time range may be set to the detected point. In this way, the range from which the word extraction unit extracts words can be the range of the conversation.

(5) In each embodiment, an example has been described in which word-related information is acquired by a content distribution server and transmitted to a receiving device (or terminal), but this is not limited thereto. The terminal (content output terminal) may include a content receiving means for receiving content, an important word acquiring means for acquiring important words related to the content from image information and audio information of the received content for each predetermined time range, a related information acquiring means for acquiring word-related information related to the acquired important words from an information server, and an information output means for outputting the acquired word-related information together with the content received by the content receiving means.

(6) In the second embodiment, an example has been described in which the user is allowed to select between SNS and online articles, but this is not limiting. Since there are various types of SNS, they may be further subdivided according to type. In addition, multiple categories may be made selectable by the user, such as an ON/OFF button.

(7) In the third embodiment, an example was described in which the individual information storage unit stores words of interest and words to be excluded. The words of interest and words to be excluded are registered in advance and/or at an appropriate timing, but this is not limited to this. The terminal may have a function for acquiring location information, and may transmit the acquired location information of the terminal to the content distribution server when requesting content distribution, for example. Words related to an area identified from the location information may be included as words of interest. In this way, word-related information related to the location of the terminal can be output, which may provide information of interest to the user.

(8) In the third embodiment, the importance of an important word is calculated using the individual information storage unit when the important word is acquired, but the present invention is not limited to this. When acquiring related information, word-related information including the important word and the word of interest stored in the individual information storage unit may be acquired.
(9) In the third embodiment, the terminal is identified using the terminal ID, but the present invention is not limited to this. For example, a user ID for identifying a user may be used. In this case, the individual information storage unit may also store individual information using the user ID as key information. In addition, the terminal ID and the user ID may be used in combination.

1, 201, 301 Content distribution server 4 Information server 6 Receiving device 10, 210, 310 Control unit 11 Word extraction unit 12, 312 Importance calculation unit 13 Important word acquisition unit 15, 215 Related information acquisition unit 16 Content distribution unit 17 Related information transmission unit 20, 220, 320 Storage unit 21a, 221a, 321a Related information acquisition program 22 Content storage unit 41 Information DB
61 Display 81, 82, 333a to 333d Word-related information 100, 200, 300 Content distribution system 214 Classification designation receiving section 292 Important word display screen 306 Terminal 323 Individual information storage section 332 Information display area 361 Touch panel display N Communication network

Claims (7)

a word extracting means for extracting a plurality of words related to the content for each predetermined time range based on a target image obtained by analyzing image information of the content to be transmitted to the display device;
an importance calculation means for calculating, when the target image obtained by analyzing the image information shows a person, the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means based on emotional information of the person when each word appears;
an important word acquiring means for acquiring the words with high importance calculated by the importance calculating means as important words related to the content for each of the predetermined time ranges;
related information acquisition means for acquiring word related information related to the important words acquired by the important word acquisition means from an information storage device storing various types of information;
a related information transmitting means for transmitting the word-related information acquired by the related information acquiring means to the display device;
A related information distribution device comprising: 2. The related information distribution device according to claim 1 ,
an individual information storage unit in which individual information including words indicating interests of a user browsing the content is registered;
The importance calculation means further calculates the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means based on the individual information stored in the individual information storage unit. 3. The related information distribution device according to claim 1,
the related information acquiring means acquires the word-related information when sequentially transmitting the contents to the display device;
The related information transmitting means transmits the acquired word-related information to the display device in response to the related information acquiring means acquiring the word-related information. 4. The related information distribution device according to claim 1,
A classification designation receiving means is provided for receiving a classification designation regarding the various types of information,
The related information acquisition means acquires the word-related information from information of a specified category among the various information stored in the information storage device based on the category designation accepted by the category designation accepting means. A program for causing a computer to function as the related information distribution device according to any one of claims 1 to 4 . A related information distribution device according to any one of claims 1 to 4 ,
The display device;
A content distribution system comprising:
The display device comprises a content display control means for sequentially displaying the received word-related information in an information display area, and reproducing and displaying the received content in a content display area. a content receiving means for receiving one of the contents designated by a user from a content server storing a plurality of contents;
a word extracting means for extracting a plurality of words related to the content for each predetermined time range based on a target image obtained by analyzing image information of the content received by the content receiving means;
an importance calculation means for calculating, when the target image obtained by analyzing the image information shows a person, the importance of each word extracted by the word extraction means based on emotional information of the person when each word appears;
an important word acquiring means for acquiring the words with high importance calculated by the importance calculating means as important words related to the content for each of the predetermined time ranges;
related information acquisition means for acquiring word related information related to the important words acquired by the important word acquisition means from an information storage device storing various types of information;
an information output means for outputting the word-related information acquired by the related information acquisition means together with the content received by the content receiving means;
A content output terminal comprising:

Images