Patent ID: 8477921

Claim:
A computer implemented method to manage participation in a teleconference, the computer implemented method comprising: generating a hierarchical graph of terms, wherein the hierarchical graph comprises a main topic and a plurality of subtopics, wherein the main topic is directly related to a topic of a teleconference, and wherein each of the plurality of subtopics are separated from the main topic by one or more degrees of separation on the hierarchical graph; in response to determining that a particular subtopic is more than a predetermined degree of separation from the main topic, deeming said particular subtopic as being unrelated to the topic of the teleconference; a processor monitoring teleconference inputs from participants of a teleconference for use of an unrelated term, wherein the unrelated term is a term that has been deemed related to the particular subtopic and thus unrelated to the topic of the teleconference; determining that an errant participant is using the unrelated term in at least one of the teleconference inputs; and managing participation in the teleconference by generating an alert to prompt the errant participant to limit future teleconference inputs to the topic of the teleconference.