A controller determines whether an optical disk has been formatted (S1), formats the optical disk by recording a lead-in area in the recording area of the optical disc if the optical disk has not yet been formatted (S2), records content data in a contents area of the optical disk, and at the same time stores data that may be used as index information separately from the content data being recorded (S3). When a recording stop command is issued, the index information is generated (S6), a file system is recorded so that the content data and the index information can be recognized by other apparatuses, an anchor point is recorded, a temporary lead-out area is recorded, and the process is ended.