Importance

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Abstract

An information distribution system that allows a customer to retrieve desired information from an information supplier over a communications network and be billed for the retrieved information on the customer's telephone bill. The billing feature may be implemented using existing telephone company premium-rate billing services that allow the telephone company to bill the customer for the call with the telephone company transferring a portion of the payment to the information supplier. A customer desiring to retrieve information is presented with a list of available information items. Upon a customer's selection of a desired information item, a data file is accessed that contains the telephone number of the appropriate information supplier and a retrieval code that identifies the selected information item. The customer's computing system transmits a request to the information supplier for the selected information, identified by its retrieval code. The information supplier will then access the data file which contains the desired information item and then download the requested information item to the customer's computing system. The customer will be billed for the downloaded information on their telephone bill, with a portion of the payment being transferred by the telephone company to the information supplier.

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First Claim