Patent ID: 7974399

Claim:
A telephony system for providing a presence-enhanced whisper feature that enables a user to simultaneously engage in disparate telephonic communication sessions, said telephony system comprising: a presence system maintaining presence information indicating the user is involved in a first telephonic communication session, wherein said presence system is operable to receive updated presence information indicating a request for the user to engage in a second telephonic communication session has been received, the presence system further operable to transmit an instruction to enable the whisper feature of the user upon determining that the user is currently engaged in the first telephonic communication session when the request for the user to engage in the second telephonic communication session is received; a user telephonic device associated with the user that is engaged in the first telephonic communication session and the second telephonic communication session; and a switch within a housing of said user telephonic device, said switch being in communication with the presence system to receive the instruction and enable the whisper feature by isolating audible input of the user from the first telephonic communication session while providing audible output from each of the first telephonic communication session and the second telephonic communication session to the user.