Patent ID: 7701884

Claim:
A method for audio and video data control for communicating streaming video data over a data network including a plurality of computers operated by users and linked to one another by at least one conference bridge, a plurality of cameras for generating said video data and a plurality of microphones for generating said audio data, the network operating under a protocol that provides reports, the method comprising steps of: receiving video data from each of said plurality of cameras and each of said plurality of microphones, communicating said video and audio data to others of said users and displaying said video data using displays, and playing said audio data using speakers; dynamically measuring data packet loss between said bridge and each of said users for one or more of said audio or video data, said bridge recording information in a memory including a sequence number and a reception time for each data packet it receives from each of said plurality of users, said bridge determining a number of lost packets from each of said plurality of users over a substantially identical time period; dynamically measuring data latency between said users for one or more of said audio or video data; comparing said dynamically measured data packet loss to a loss limit and comparing said dynamically measured data latency to a latency limit; determining a rate of data reception of said receiver if either of said loss limit or said latency limit is exceeded, said rate of data reception determined by: RRU =[( EHSR i −EHSR [i-1] )−( LP i −LP [i-1] )]/( TS [i] −TS [i-1] ) where: RRU=actual data reception rate (e.g., the number of packets per unit time received by said receiver) EHSR i =The most recent packet sequence number received from said report received from said receiver EHSR [i-1] =The previous packet sequence number received from said report received from said receiver LP i =The most recent cumulative number of packets lost from said report received from the receiver LP [i-1] =The previous cumulative number of packets lost from said report received from the receiver TS i =The timestamp of the report containing EHSR i and LP i . TSi i-1 =The timestamp of the report containing EHSR [i-1] and LP [i-1] , and if one or both of said loss limit or said latency limit is exceeded, reducing the rate of data transmission from the sender for one or more of said audio or video data to not exceed said rate of data reception.