TELECONFERENCE SUPPORT SYSTEM

• US 20100324946A1
• Filed: 06/16/2010
• Published: 12/23/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/22/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Original Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Inventors: Araki, Tadashi, Kasuya, Yuuji, OHMURA, Keiji, Hashimoto, Takako
• Granted Patent: US 9,031,855 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/5
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/02 Reservations, e.g. for tickets, services or events
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1818 Conference organisation arrangements, e.g. handling schedules, setting up parameters needed by nodes to attend a conference, booking network resources, notifying involved parties
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/18 Comparators
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/387 using subscriber identification cards
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/56 Arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities video conference systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42203 sound input device, e.g. microphone
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4223 Cameras H04N23/00 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4788 communicating with other users, e.g. chatting arrangements for providing for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms, to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1813; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/15 Conference systems

Abstract

A teleconference support system, establishing a teleconference among conference rooms, includes teleconference apparatuses, and a connection server including a conference venue information storage, a conference start judgment unit, and a teleconference apparatus connection unit. Each teleconference apparatus, disposed in each conference room, is provided with an image taking unit, a sound taking unit, a display unit, and an audio output unit. The connection server connects the teleconference apparatuses to transmit and receive information among the conference rooms. Each teleconference apparatus includes a person identification information acquisition unit to obtain person identification information identifying individual. The conference venue information storage stores conference information including person identification information of expected teleconference participant. The conference start judgment unit determines whether each teleconference satisfies a conference start condition using the person identification information. The teleconference apparatus connection unit connects teleconference apparatuses when the teleconference is determined to satisfy the conference start condition.

Claims

1. A teleconference support system used for establishing a teleconference among a plurality of conference rooms, comprising:

a plurality of teleconference apparatuses, each of which is disposed in each of the conference rooms and provided with an image taking unit to take visual information in each of the conference room, a sound taking unit to take audio and sound information in each of the conference room, a display unit, and an audio output unit; and

a connection server to selectively connect two or more of the teleconference apparatuses so that visual information, taken by the image taking unit, and audio information, taken by the sound taking unit, provided for a first teleconference apparatus in a first teleconference room, are respectively output to the display unit and the audio output unit provided for a second teleconference apparatus disposed in a second teleconference room,

each of the teleconference apparatus including a person identification information acquisition unit to obtain person identification information identifying each individual present in each of the conference rooms,

the connection server including;

a conference venue information storage to store conference information including person identification information of expected participant assigned to each conference room for each of teleconferences to be held;

a conference start judgment unit to determine whether each to-be-held teleconference satisfies a conference start condition based on a comparison of the person identification information included in the conference information and the person identification information obtained by the person identification information acquisition unit from each conference room; and

a teleconference apparatus connection unit to connect teleconference apparatuses used for the teleconference when the teleconference is determined to satisfy the conference start condition.

2. The teleconference system according to claim 1, wherein the person identification information acquisition unit obtains biometrics information of each individual present in each conference room as the person identification information.

3. The teleconference system according to claim 2, wherein the person identification information acquisition unit obtains the person identification information from feature values of face information extracted from a face image of each individual present in each conference room, the face image being taken by the image taking unit.

4. The teleconference system according to claim 2, wherein the person identification information acquisition unit obtains the person identification information from feature values of voiceprint extracted from audio information of each individual present in each conference room, the audio information being taken by the sound taking unit.

5. The teleconference system according to claim 1, wherein the conference start judgment unit checks whether person identification information obtained by the person identification information acquisition unit from each conference room satisfies conditions for participation set for each conference room in advance for a teleconference, and the conference start judgment unit determines whether a conference start condition for teleconference is satisfied based on results of checking the conditions for participation for each conference room.

6. The teleconference system according to claim 5, wherein the conference start judgment unit determines that the conference room satisfies the conditions for participation when all person identification information included in the conference information matches the person identification information obtained by the person identification information acquisition unit from the conference room.

7. The teleconference system according to claim 5, wherein the conference start judgment unit determines that the conference room satisfies the conditions for participation when at least one person'"'"'s identification information included in the conference information matches any person identification information obtained by the person identification information acquisition unit from the conference room.

8. The teleconference system according to claim 5, wherein the conference start judgment unit determines that the conference room satisfies the conditions for participation when a given expected proportion of person identification information included in the conference information matches the person identification information obtained by the person identification information acquisition unit from the conference room.

9. The teleconference system according to claim 6, wherein the conference information includes priority level information set for each of person identification information, the priority level information indicating an importance level of each expected participant, and the conference start judgment unit determines whether the participant condition is satisfied when person identification information having higher priority level included in the conference information is matched to the person identification information obtained by the person identification information acquisition unit for the conference room.

10. The teleconference system according to claim 5, wherein when a conference start time of the teleconference has come and there is a conference room that does not satisfy conditions for participation among teleconference-reserved conference rooms, the conference start judgment unit searches for other conference room that satisfies the conditions for participation.

11. The teleconference system according to claim 1, wherein the connection server further includes:

a conference history information storage unit to store conference history information including information of participants participated in past teleconferences, the conference history information being stored for each one of the past teleconference; and

a degree of relatedness computing unit to compute a degree of relatedness between the participants based on the conference history information,

wherein the conference start judgment unit estimates that conference rooms are connectable for a teleconference based on person identification information of individuals entering conference rooms not scheduled for a teleconference and the degree of relatedness between participants computed by the degree of relatedness computing unit.

12. The teleconference system according to claim 1, wherein the person identification information acquisition unit obtains the person identification information of each individual present in each conference room from an identification storing device provided for each individual.

13. A method of supporting a communication connection among conference rooms used for a teleconference, the method comprising the steps of:

determining whether there is a conference room reserved for a given teleconference but not satisfying conditions for participation when the given teleconference is to start;

searching for other conference rooms satisfying the conditions for participation when it is determined that the reserved conference room does not satisfy the conditions for participation,

detecting another conference room that satisfies the conditions for participation; and

changing the teleconference venue from the conference room that does not satisfy conditions for participation to the conference room detected at the detecting step that does satisfy the conditions for participation.

14. A method of estimating utility of establishing a teleconference between individuals entering different conference rooms not previously reserved for teleconferencing, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving person identification information of the individuals entering the conference rooms not reserved for teleconference;

computing a degree of relatedness between the individuals;

determining degree of relatedness between one individual entering one conference room and another individual or individuals entering another conference room based on the results of computing the degree of relatedness;

determining whether the one conference room and the other conference room not reserved for a teleconference satisfy a conference start condition once the degree of relatedness is determined; and

establishing a session between teleconference apparatuses disposed in each of the conference rooms when it is determined that the one conference room and other conference room satisfy the conference start condition.