Implicit floor control in a packet-based real-time media session

A method and system for implicitly controlling the floor during a packet-based real-time media conference. A participating station implicitly requests the floor by simply beginning to send media to the conference server. If no other participant currently holds the floor, the server grants the floor to the first station from which the server receives an incoming media stream. Further, in a half-duplex conference, if a participating station receives an incoming media stream when it is sending an outgoing media stream, the station treats the incoming media stream as an implicit floor denial and responsively alerts a user that the floor is denied.