Providing content interruptions

1. A system comprising:

a receiver to receive content and an advertisement;

a cache, coupled to said receiver, to store said content and said advertisement;

an interface, in said receiver, to receive an updated advertisement and updating instructions, said updating instructions to enable the receiver to replace the stored advertisement with the updated advertisement;

wherein said receiver is to detect a starting point of said advertisement and to create a marker and insert it into the content to indicate said starting point, and to store said advertisement from the content to a memory storage location separate from the content, and to create and store a first pointer to the memory location;

said interface to detect a user-initiated pause in viewing of content, to retrieve the updated advertisement from storage, and to provide a user interface that enables the user to view the retrieved updated advertisement for as long as the viewing of the content remains paused; and

the receiver configured to overlay the retrieved updated advertisement with material descriptive of upcoming content in the received content.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein said receiver is adapted to enable storage of the updated advertisement in a location other than the location of said stored advertisement that the updated advertisement is to replace, and to create and store a second pointer to said other location.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein said receiver is to receive additional content together with another advertisement, said receiver to determine whether the another advertisement was previously stored.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein said receiver is to store said received advertisement only if the received advertisement was not previously stored.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein said cache stores the marker and a second pointer information in a file other than an associated content file, the marker identifying a location in the content to insert the updated advertisement, the second pointer identifying a stored location of the updated advertisement in the cache, and the receiver uses the marker and second pointer information prior to the display of content from that content file.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein said receiver is to maintain a list of stored advertisements and to compare information about a newly received advertisement to information on said list of stored advertisements to determine whether said newly received advertisement was previously stored.

7. The system of claim 6 wherein said receiver is to upload said list of stored advertisements, to a remote server, along with pointers to said stored advertisements.

8. The system of claim 1 wherein said receiver is to receive information about when to update said stored advertisement and automatically update said stored advertisement in accordance with said information.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein said receiver periodically, automatically updates advertisements.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein said system is a set-top box.

11. The system of claim 1 wherein said system stores a plurality of advertisements, and said user interface enables the user to select, from a subset of said plurality, one or more advertisements for viewing so long as the content remains paused.