Authenticating licenses for legally-protectable content based on license profiles and content identifiers

Abstract

The disclosed technology can mitigate the risk of infringing a content owner's rights in legally-protectable content by operating as a trusted, third-party license authority between content owners and content users to ensure that a license governing at least some aspects of the protectable content is authentic and thus validly represents the restrictions imposed by content owners pertaining to the use, distribution, modification, combination, interaction, and/or other manipulation of such content. An identifier representative of the protectable content together with a profile of the license (which may include attributes that specify particular restrictions, uses, and interactions pertaining to the protectable content) can serve as a basis for determining the authenticity of the license associated with the protectable content. The protectable content can correspond to one or more multimedia presentations, video segments, audio segments, textual representations, works of art, visual representations, technological know-how, business know-how, contract rights, and/or software elements.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 - 27 . (canceled) 
     
     
         28 . A method of aggregating one or more licenses associated with aggregate content, the method comprising:
 searching, by a license evaluation system, a first constituent content element of an aggregate content for an embedded license indicator;   using, by the license evaluation system, the embedded license indicator to identify one or more licenses applicable to the first constituent content element;   determining, by the license evaluation system, a first subset of license attributes associated with the one or more licenses applicable to the first constituent content element;   determining, by the license evaluation system, a second subset of license attributes associated with the one or more licenses applicable to one or more additional constituent content elements of the aggregate content;   analyzing, by the license evaluation system, the first subset of license attributes and the second subset of license attributes;   forming, by the license evaluation system, based on the analyzing, an aggregated license profile for the aggregate content; and   generating, by the license evaluation system, a license for the aggregate content from the aggregated license profile.   
     
     
         29 . The method of  claim 28 , wherein the embedded license indicator is one of embedded copyright information, embedded license information, embedded ownership information, and embedded version information. 
     
     
         30 . The method of  claim 28 , wherein the embedded license indicator is a character string particular to the searching. 
     
     
         31 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein the character string is a segment of software code. 
     
     
         32 . The method of  claim 28 , comprising:
 submitting, by the license evaluation system, to a license authority device, a registration request message including at least a content ID, the aggregate license profile, and an owner ID; and   receiving, by the license evaluation system, from the license authority device, a license identifier based on the content ID, the license profile, the owner ID, and an algorithm type used in forming the content ID.   
     
     
         33 . (canceled) 
     
     
         34 . The method of  claim 28 , comprising:
 generating, by the license evaluation system, an alternative license for the aggregate content from the aggregated license profile, based on an environment-contingent attribute from one of the first subset of license attributes and the second subset of license attributes.   
     
     
         35 . The method of  claim 34 , wherein the environment-contingent attribute is contingent on an operational or deployment environment for the aggregate content. 
     
     
         36 . The method of  claim 34 , wherein the environment-contingent attribute is for a fee that is contingent on use of the aggregate content for research and development purposes. 
     
     
         37 - 40 . (canceled) 
     
     
         41 . The method of  claim 28 , wherein at least one attribute is assigned a use value representing a permissible degree of distribution of an associated constituent content element. 
     
     
         42 . The method of  claim 41 , wherein the assigned use value corresponds to at least one of an acquisition, a personal use, a research use, an organizational use, a limited distribution, and an unlimited distribution of at least one aspect of the protectable content. 
     
     
         43 . (canceled) 
     
     
         44 . (canceled) 
     
     
         45 . The method of  claim 28 , wherein at least one constituent content element of the aggregate content is a software element compliant with an open source definition. 
     
     
         46 . (canceled) 
     
     
         47 . The method of  claim 28 , comprising authenticating the identified one or more licenses applicable to the first constituent content element. 
     
     
         48 . (canceled) 
     
     
         49 . (canceled) 
     
     
         50 . A system for aggregating one or more licenses associated with aggregate content, the system comprising:
 one or more processors; and   memory storing computer executable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations to:
 search a first constituent content element of an aggregate content for an embedded license indicator; 
 identify, using the embedded license indicator, one or more licenses applicable to the first constituent content element; 
 determine a first subset of license attributes associated with the one or more licenses applicable to the first constituent content element; 
 determine a second subset of license attributes associated with the one or more licenses applicable to one or more additional constituent content elements of the aggregate content; 
 analyze the first subset of license attributes and the second subset of license attributes; 
 form, based on the analyzing, an aggregated license profile for the aggregate content; and 
 generate a license for the aggregate content from the aggregated license profile. 
   
     
     
         51 . The system of  claim 50 , wherein the embedded license indicator is one of embedded copyright information, embedded license information, embedded ownership information, and embedded version information. 
     
     
         52 . The system of  claim 50 , wherein the embedded license indicator is a character string particular to the searching. 
     
     
         53 . The system of  claim 52 , wherein the character string is a segment of software code. 
     
     
         54 . The system of  claim 50 , wherein the computer executable instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, further cause the one or more processors to perform operations to:
 submit a registration request message to a license authority device, the registration request message including at least a content ID, the aggregate license profile, and an owner ID; and   receive, from the license authority device, a license identifier based on the content ID, the license profile, the owner ID, and an algorithm type used in forming the content ID.   
     
     
         55 . The system of  claim 50 , wherein the computer executable instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, further cause the one or more processors to perform operations to:
 generate an alternative license for the aggregate content from the aggregated license profile, based on an environment-contingent attribute from one of the first subset of license attributes and the second subset of license attributes.   
     
     
         56 . The system of  claim 55 , wherein the environment-contingent attribute is contingent on an operational or deployment environment for the aggregate content. 
     
     
         57 . The system of  claim 50 , wherein at least one attribute is assigned a use value representing a permissible degree of distribution of an associated constituent content element 
     
     
         58 . The system of  claim 57 , wherein the assigned use value corresponds to at least one of an acquisition, a personal use, a research use, an organizational use, a limited distribution, and an unlimited distribution of at least one aspect of the protectable content. 
     
     
         59 . The system of  claim 50 , wherein at least one constituent content element of the aggregate content is a software element compliant with an open source definition.