The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 25, 2003
Filed:
Aug. 30, 2000
Satoshi Otsuka, Kanagawa, JP;
Kazuyuki Marukawa, Kanagawa, JP;
Sony Corporation, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
An information providing apparatus includes a housing section for housing recording media including a plural kinds of recording media, which have at least any one of plural kinds of contents information recorded in advance. A content detector is also included for detecting a kind of content information required by a user. An ejecting portion ejects the kind of recording media in which the content information of the kind detected by the content detector is recorded. A remaining recording medium detector detects, for each kind of recording media, whether or not the remaining number of the kind of recording media housed in the housing section is less than or equal to a minimum threshold value. A replenishing device replenishes the recording media of the kind detected by the remaining recording medium detector to be less than or equal to the minimum threshold value.