Patent attributes
A mutual recognition process is performed in step S1. When it is determined in step S2 that a request for sending a list of musical pieces has been received, the list of musical pieces is sent in step S3. When a request for sending audio data has been received in step S4, a transfer-rate measurement process is executed in step S5. When it is determined according to the transfer rate in step S6 that the audio can be transmitted, the corresponding compressed audio data is extracted in step S7, the compressed audio data is decoded to generate linear PCM data suited to the transfer rate in step S8, and transmitted in step S9. When the audio data cannot be transmitted, an error message is transmitted in step S10. The present invention can be applied, for example, to a server for distributing audio data and an audio player terminal for reproducing the distributed audio data.