Display hierarchy of participants during phone call
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A method of enhancing a conference call, comprising:
- (a) connecting first and second telecommunication devices to create a live conference call, the first and second telecommunication devices being associated, respectively, with first and second participants;
(b) determining characteristics of each of the first and second participants;
(c) creating a hierarchal structure of the first and second participants based upon their respective determined characteristics, wherein the first participant has a first hierarchical ranking and the second participant a second hierarchical ranking, and wherein the hierarchical structure indicates the relative values of the first and second hierarchical rankings; and
(d) during the live conference call, providing the hierarchical structure to at least the second participant.
27 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention is directed toward methods and systems for providing advanced features to a telecommunication device. The systems and methods determine a hierarchical relationship of participants of a conference call and when one participant is communicating with another participant, the parties are made aware of their hierarchical relationship relative to each other.
-
Citations
20 Claims
-
1. A method of enhancing a conference call, comprising:
-
(a) connecting first and second telecommunication devices to create a live conference call, the first and second telecommunication devices being associated, respectively, with first and second participants;
(b) determining characteristics of each of the first and second participants;
(c) creating a hierarchal structure of the first and second participants based upon their respective determined characteristics, wherein the first participant has a first hierarchical ranking and the second participant a second hierarchical ranking, and wherein the hierarchical structure indicates the relative values of the first and second hierarchical rankings; and
(d) during the live conference call, providing the hierarchical structure to at least the second participant. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
-
-
9. A communication device, comprising:
-
(a) an interface for sending across and receiving voice data from a communications network;
(b) a memory coupled to the interface operable to store information relating to characteristics of participants of a conference call; and
(c) a contact organizer operable to process the information relating to characteristics of the participants of the conference call such that a hierarchical relationship is created between each of the participants of the conference call based upon the characteristics of each of the participants, the hierarchal structure indicating the relative rankings of each of the conference call participants and wherein the relative rankings are indicated using an indicator other than the titles of the conference call participants. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
-
-
17. A communications network, comprising:
-
(a) network means for connecting first and second telecommunication devices to create a live conference call, the first and second telecommunication devices being associated, respectively, with first and second participants; and
(b) contact organizer means for;
(b1) determining characteristics of each of the first and second participants;
(b2) creating a hierarchal structure of the first and second participants based upon their determined characteristics, wherein the first participant has a first hierarchical ranking and the second participant a second hierarchical ranking, and wherein the hierarchical structure indicates the relative values of the first and second hierarchical rankings; and
(b3) during the live conference call, providing the hierarchical structure to at least the second participant. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20)
-
Specification