Patent ID: 8289362

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: first and second video displays to display images of remote participants to a telepresence conference; first and second loudspeakers respectively associated with the first and second video displays; first and second audio mixers each of which is coupled to receive audio sources input from the remote participants, each of the first and second audio mixers being operable to apply a gain coefficient to each audio source, the first and second audio mixers being operable to produce first and second mixed audio outputs to the first and second loudspeakers, respectively; and one or more processors to implement a finite state machine (FSM) comprising first, second, and third states that control the gain coefficient applied to each audio source by each of the first and second audio mixers, in the first state, which corresponds to a substantial silence or a background noise only, audio being suppressed or mixed as non-directional in the first and second mixed audio outputs; in the second state, which corresponds to a loud, undisplayed participant, audio being mixed as non-directional in the first and second mixed audio outputs; and in the third state, which corresponds to a loud, displayed participant, audio being mixed as directional with respect to either the first or second mixed audio outputs, depending on whether the first or second video displays an image of the loud, displayed participant.