Ever since eBay's acquisition of Skype over two years ago, there has been speculation as to how eBay and Skype should be "integrated" to enhance the auction process. While not the world's most active eBay participant, I have used it several times to acquire items not normally available in Canada and to sell (ironically) a "surplus" Nortel PBX a few years ago. But I have also had the opportunity to attend a couple of eBay Live events and gain some of the flavor of the extent of the Ebay domain and the enthusiasm of its resellers, especially the several hundred thousand who run a full time business through eBay.

During these eBay Live sessions I have noted two key facts:

• There is very little Skype awareness amongst the eBay reseller community.
• When one or two Skype training sessions are available over the three days of eBay Live, they are well attended with an eagerness to learn more about Skype

My primary question has always been, how would one maintain the integrity of the auction process while engaging in real time conversations. It appears there are several stages to the auction process:

• Setting up the individual item's auction information
• Executing the auction, accepting bids and "Buy Now" requests
• Finalizing the payment transaction
• Delivering the item, and
• Exchanging buyer and seller feedback.

The key for the first two stages is to enhance the integrity of the auction itself by ensuring that information exchanged between seller and bidder is available to all potential bidders. Real time one-on-one Skype chat and voice conversations have the potential to violate the integrity sought. Yet, with Skype there are two solutions:

1. Establish a Skype Public Chat that can be joined by any bidder who is on Skype; the reseller can manage who remains on the chat to eliminate "spammers" and others who go off-subject..
2. Establish an ongoing asynchronous voice conversation using Evoca's hosted voice recording and playback services. This allows all (potential) bidders to have an asynchronous, ongoing conversation with the seller incorporating all the additional information disclosed as a result of bidder queries..

For the last three stages, standard Skype conversations (voice, IM chat and video) can be used to provide customer service and support, as appropriate to the individual auction. Should their business be ongoing with sufficient transaction volume, even OnState's ACD Call Center solution can be invoked (at $30 per seat per month - no capital costs) to ensure calls are directed to an appropriate party.

But then there is a bigger challenge beyond simply installing Skype and creating Skype accounts: training eBay Resellers on how they can implement and use Skype to their business's advantage. It is not sufficient simply to make Skype buttons available for eBay Resellers. The Skype ecosystem not only offers basic real time conversation support but also, through its Skype Developer Partners, call recording and conversation archiving as well as collaboration and conferencing tools which may be useful for certain categories of resellers. But they need training to realize the full potential of Skype.

And then there is the missed viral opportunity yet to be fulfilled.

Tags: Skype, eBay, Skype Developer Partners, Skype Public Chat, Evoca, OnState

Posted by Jim Courtney at 06:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

High Quality Video certainly places superior demands on technology resources; in testing yesterday evening with Phone Boy, Dameon Welch, we found superior performance for the user who has those resources.

In previous posts I have talked about doing a setup for High Quality Video and subsequently putting together the requirements, goals and benchmarks for High Quality Video. Working with a 1.6 GHz CoreDuo Laptop, Logitech 9000 webcam with version 11.5 drivers, Skype 3.6 for Windows and a 6Mbps download/800 kbps upload cable Internet connection at my end and a 2.66GHz Core2Duo Desktop, and even faster Internet connection at Dameon's end we did test video calls using both Skype's High Quality Video and SightSpeed 6.0 to determine what constitutes the better user experience. In today's post I will describe our High Quality Video results; tomorrow I will provide a summary comparison with SightSpeed. along with commentary on some other experiences that helped to define what to expect for High Quality Video.

As a preamble to our results, and building on my recent interview with Jonathan Christensen, Skype's GM for Audio and Voice, their High Quality Video is the result of extensive co-operation between Logitech and Skype working together to optimize their codecs and drivers, often at some fairly basic levels to achieve a sustainable high quality video experience. Skype had set initial goals of having a sustainable user experience that could be achieved by a reasonably broad base of Skype users: 640 x 480 @ a sustainable 24-30 fps outcome over an entry level broadband connection (384 kbps). They tested out many webcams on the market to see if there was potential to meet this requirement; nothing worked.

Then Logitech provided a demonstration of a prototype QuickCam Pro 9000 while it was still in development; they had finally found a camera that had the potential to deliver the sustained quality and frame rate in a consistent and reliable way. At that point they launched a co-development effort involving Logitech, On2 and Skype to optimize the codecs along with the capture and rendering software required. They also found it necessary to specifically optimize for real time video conferencing scenarios involving mostly "stationary talking heads" in sustained lighting situations and perhaps people walking into and out of a frame as opposed to the requirements for full motion broadcast video such az YouTube movies. This allowed them to cut back significantly on CPU utilization amongst other modifications.

"The result is that we have certainly arrived at a state-of-the-art situation in terms of coding, capture at the sending side and rendering at the other side", stated Christensen. Amongst other issues Skype and Logitech had to deal with CPU utilization management, low light conditions, image sharpness and intelligent adaptation to varying network conditions (especially at the end points) to deliver a service that could work at a minimum 384 kbps bandwidth. While the released service reduces the wide variability of outcomes seen with other webcam configurations and provides a fairly consistent result, they are still working on issues such as better and more intelligent network utilization but they feel they have the camera, driver and coding issues well under control.

The Complete High Quality Video Experience

Reference: Phone Boy Review

Over the past few days I have tried out the High Quality Video with almost all my Skype calls, even if the other party did not have a webcam. While the sending (capture) end of the call requires relatively new hardware (Dual core processor, Logitech webcams with Carl-Zeiss optics) the receiving end can view High Qualty Video even with higher speed single core processors and have an excellent video viewing experience (based on comments of several viewers).

The real challenge was to find a situation where both parties met the requirements for High Quality Video; yesterday evening "Phone Boy" Dameon Welch (who normally uses a Mac) had finally put together a Windows configuration, using one of the Logitech Carl-Zeiss cameras where we could truly test bi-directional video calling over reliable network conditions. (In another post I'll talk about how testing for High Quality Video is resulting in the exposure of underperforming DSL services.)

Launching a call: once connected the receiving party sees the window on the left in the active call tab of the Skype client; after about 30 seconds High Quality Video has been established. The promotional bar at the top goes away after a minute or so. The white logo in the upper left appears when the frame rate exceeds 24 fps; why this particular number is a question we have put to Skype. Using the "technical call info" we found that, while occasionally the frame rate would drop to, say, 12 - 15 fps, the picture quality did not deteriorate noticeably. Certainly a crisp, sharp picture, moving the head or hand across the viewing range would not result in "shadowing" or other artifacts, even below 24 fps. The "camera" icon on the left in the bottom frame allows you to capture the picture; in the resulting captured image window two mouse clicks trigger a "file transfer" of the captured image back to the other party while the image is also stored in your "My Skype Pictures" folder.

Above is a "Video in Window" image (reduced from 640 x 480 to accommodate the width available in this post). While not having the logo due to insufficient frame rate (~ 15 - 20 fps) it represents the quality of video image we saw. Most importantly we did not see any "shadowing" if he moved his head or put up his hand and raised his five fingers. On the other hand this image is an example of the "intelligent adaptation" inherent to the Skype software at work, where Skype will adjust to both CPU utilization and changing network conditions (jitter, return time, etc.) such as to maintain a high quality picture even when not working above 24 fps.

CPU utilization management is one feature of the new Skype video where the software is monitoring CPU usage such that Skype video does not consume all the CPU resources. In one situation where I found the video "capped" at sending 15 fps, simply turning off my SlingPlayer (which itself was using about 2.5 Mbps of bandwidth via an internal LAN connection to my SlingBox) allowed the frame rate to increase above 24 fps to invoke the High Quality Video logo on a sustainable basis.

Full screen video at 1650 x 1080 gave again a good picture, maybe with a bit of pixelation in going from 640 x 480. In the SightSpeed comparison tomorrow I will comment on the "intense" room light above Dameon's head and how the Skype video adjusts for the saturation such an intense light can create.

Finally an image that demonstrates some of the optics of the camera: close-up of a Pokemon card showing both how the auto-focus feature adjusts and the quality obtained even when an object is only 4 to 6 inches from the camera. And in my image at the lower left I had reduced the room lighting to one 50-watt recessed "under-the-shelf" lamp above my work surface, yet Dameon was able to distinguish the stripes on my shirt. This is the Logitech "Right Light" sensing in operation where it can pick up images in very low lighting situations. (And the High Quality Video logo during this conversation had held at this point for over 15 minutes.)

Clearly Dameon and I agreed that Skype's High Quality Video is a winner and provides, in hardware and software configurations meeting all the requirements, an excellent user video experience. The issues here include:

• Skype's High Quality Video, as a free service, represents one more threat to the personal communications segment of business video conferencing, even at the enterprise level. Business model disruption at work again.
• Having enough Skype users using the Logitech webcam to take advantage of the Carl-Zeiss optics and driver optimization. Dual core processor PC's have now been on the market for eighteen months and become the entry level standard; the new Logitech Carl-Zeiss optics cameras are priced at the same level as their previous generation webcams.
• Ensuring a good quality Internet connection at least meeting the minimum 384 kbps speed but, in subtle ways, High Quality Video works better (for instance ramps up to the desired frame rate faster) on higher speed connections.

Dameon's post; Skype High Quality Video Testing

All in all, I was impressed with the High Quality Video that came from Skype. It's not just marketing hype, it's the real deal. I've seen it for myself and I'm a believer.

Tome Keating and Rich Tehrani have done some testing as well:

As always, Skype has over-delivered on their free offering, providing superior functionality at the bargain basement price of zero dollars. Obviously you will need a new video camera and possibly a new pc to take advantage of the highest quality Skype video yet but these seem like small sacrifices to make when you consider you will not have to pay a recurring service fee to videoconference at far superior resolution.

This new product is certainly a win for the world’s most popular IP communications software company and moreover for users of the popular software/service.

Tomorrow: the SightSpeed comparison, working with Macs, other experiences and a summary.

• High Quality Video: What's the Benchmark?
• To Be Restored: Camera Flexibility for Video Hackers
• Installing a Logitech High Quality Video Camera: The Experience.

Tags: Skype, High Quality Video, Logitech, Skype 3.6, Dameon Welch, Phone Boy, Jonathan Christensen, QuickCam Pro 9000, On2 Technologies, Carl-Zeiss optics

Posted by Jim Courtney at 08:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Ipoque reports today:

VoIP isn't a bandwidth threat:

Voice over IP (VoIP) only accounts for one percent of the Internet traffic, but is used by 30 percent of all users.

While many other VoIM and VoIP products include voice and video talk, apparently Skype (with 95% share) is the one people choose for calling:

Skype is by far the most popular Internet telephony application.

Culture and costs change behavior:

The popularity of instant messaging (IM) varies heavily from region to region. In the Middle East, 60 percent of all Internet users also use IM, in Germany, however, it is only 17 percent.

Do people substitute between IM and mobile texting, depending on availability and cost?

Ipoque makes products that examine and manage network traffic for ISPs and large enterprises. Source for this report:

Three petabytes of anonymous data representing over one million users in Australia, Eastern Europe, Germany, the Middle East and Southern Europe have been analyzed.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 06:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

People Using Skype

The Severson family moves from Florida to Vienna. "If you have been wondering how you can contact us once we make the big trip, we are encouraging everyone to join Skype."

Skype in mountain climbing. As satellite IP connectivity goes (Inmarsat!), so goes Skype. The quest for Broad Peak's first winter ascent, The MountEverest.net team is a "a global bunch operating over different time zones (communicating over Skype.)"

PR disaster is not all Skype’s fault. "Skype gets a misplaced boot to the swingers cos it’s the ‘brand de jour’. However, the saying ‘timing is everything’ seems pretty poignant in this PR nightmare - after all, when would most international callers want to use the no-cost Skype? Surely around the festive holidays"

Recruit Volunteers with Skyped Testimonials. Tutorial courtesy of Macdonald Youth Services of Winnipeg, Canada.

Labs

Skype from call notes with TEO (Tablet Enhancements for Outlook) now lets you . "Have you ever looked frantically for a notepad on your desk while on a call to jot down a phone number or address? Have you ever clicked Start -> Run -> notepad.exe because you had no other place to write something down? ¶ The telephony features in TEO supports Skype out of the box and provides you with a call notes area for incoming and outgoing phone calls. Even better, it links contact information to the call so that when you save your call notes in the Outlook Journal, you have a link to the contact and the time and duration of the call." via Sumocat's tablet blog.

Yubz classic USB handsets work with Skype. via The Cool Hunter.

Stonevoice offers SkyStone, a software Skype gateway to Cisco Unified Communications Manager. Skype someone and pick up your Cisco IP Phone.

ASUS eeePC comes with Skype. $499 Linux ultraportable for the education market. Ready for Skype video calls.

The Wibrain B1 UMPC now selling at Dynamism. "Integrated wifi and Bluetooth make for easy connectivity, and the pop-up camera/mic make for easy 'Skype-ability'" 

Other

Visual history of Skype Executive team. Courtesy of the wayback machine. on Skype-Watch.

Ed Bott says Skype's IE extensions slow browsing on Vista. Disabling them sped his Vista up.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 06:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I read the following Interfax China article by Chen Shasha: China becomes Skype's biggest market with 51 million users, yet to make profit, based on information from Skype partner TOM Online.

China Internet Statistics:

• 162 million users as of June 2007
• 122 million broadband users
• 55 million wireless internet
• 54.9% Internet users are male
• 57.9% are unmarried
• 51.2% are under 25 years old
• The majority of Internet users have at least a college diploma.
• 36.7% are students
• 25.3% are enterprise staff
• 33.9% earn more than 1500 yuan a month
• 53.6% earn more than 1500 yuan a month if student users are left out.

China Internet Cafés in 2005:

• China has 110,000 Internet cafés [Editor: anecdotal evidence suggests this number may be closer to 300k cafes if you include unregistered sites]
• more than 1 million people work in this industry
• 18.5 trillion Yuan per year spent
• 70% Internet café visitors are 18-to-30 years old
• 90% are male
• 65% unmarried
• 54% hold a college degree
• More than 70% of visitors play computer games
• 20% of China's Internet users go to Internet cafés

Like I do usually, let us assume the numbers are correct, this would mean that:

• 20% of the active Worldwide Skypers are from China
• 3.9% of the population of China are Skypers
• 5.4% of the "active" population of China are Skypers (discounting people older than 65 years, and younger than 14 years)
• 34% of Chinese Internet users are Skypers

Bear in mind that the second, third and fourth numbers above are very exaggerated.

As usual, let me correct this statement: they mean "registered user names,"not "registered users", and this isn't equal to "active users".

Reasons are:

• lost password, and therefore inaccessible user name, therefore the need to create a new user name
• testing Skype, and abandoned use of the user name
• spare user names, registered for alternative or future use (i have several!)
• the owner of the user name died (yes, this also happens!)
• the person switched to another VoIP tool
• the person registered a temporary name for a temporary past situation
• spammers also register multiple usernames to "attack" their victims

So, like always, this 51 million "users" statement is marketing exaggeration!

Jean Mercier follows the numbers on Skype Numerology.

Posted by Jean Mercier at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Paul Amery and his Skype Developer Partner team have organized another Skype Developer event to be held in lower Manhattan on Monday, December 10, 4 - 7 p.m.. Hosted by Vapps, Inc., Skype partner vendor of HighSpeedConferencing hosted services, this event will involve getting "your thoughts and feedback. The Skype Developer Program is navigating a clear Roadmap for 2008 with a key focus on sustaining our partnerships and our ecosystem while planning for the coming year."

In attendance, Paul Amery, Director of Skype Developer Program, Antoine Bertout, Partners Relation Manager and several key partners, like our host, Vapps. This is your chance to get behind-the-scenes with some of Skype’s key third party applications and a chance to check out some of the latest Skype partners products, understand the partnership route to market and meet our partners who continue to extend the Skype platform.

Skype Journal will be there to report.

View Larger Map

Posted by Jim Courtney at 09:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Several posts have been written about the changes of London SkypeIn numbers. VoIP Toolkit blogger David Meyer at ZDNet UK has dug further into the issue in "Skype must 'rebuild trust' after number debacle", talking with both Ian Fogg, an analyst with Jupiter Research:

"My advice to Skype would be: if you, as a company, wish to target small businesses or even consumers, you need to respond swiftly to reassure your users that this isn't going to happen again," he said. "Don't offer a different number without some kind of transitionary agreement."

....

"The regulatory position in the UK is not keeping up with where telephony is today," said Fogg. "The bit that's important is not dialing out — it's the contact number or contact address for incoming calls. That's what's quoted [to customers and contacts]."

and Don McQueen, managing director of GCI Telecom, supplier of the affected numbers:

Although he refused to divulge the exact details of the commercial dispute between GCI and Skype, he said that a "nominal fee" for the 0207 numbers had been charged to Skype until recently, when GCI "had to move to a market-rate fee".

"We have offered everyone who has [an affected SkypeIn number] the ability to keep their number with a VoIP service from us at £4 a month," added McQueen, who claimed that just under 10,000 numbers had been affected. "This service [and price] is probably not going to be offered to other people." McQueen said that interested customers should email sales@geonum.co.uk.

Read the full post for more details, including the role of the regulatory authority, Ofcom, in all this.

Aside from the perfectly justified issue this situation creates for Skype business users, what amazes me, on reading UK Telephone Code Confusion in Wikipedia, is that Londoners don't even know which digits are part of the city code and which are part of the local phone number. According to this reference, London's city code is simply "020" and the "7", "8" and "3" are simply the first digit in the local phone number. But I guess that is the confusion created when the "authorities" keep changing city codes every few years. If you can clarify the issue, please use the Comments to this post (and/or modify the Wikipedia item).

Tags: Skype, SkypeIn, David Meyer, VoIP Toolkit, GCI Telecom, Ian Fogg, Jupiter Research, Ofcom

Posted by Jim Courtney at 01:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

Lots of confusion out there: High Quality Video, HD Video, HD Voice, High Definition Audio? What do these terms mean? And what does High Quality Video mean when it comes to Skype Video calling? "Well, my configuration should work", comes from both other vendors and some end users. Did a bit of research to try to find a baseline against which all these claims could be measured.

HD Video generally refers to video with a minimum 1280 x 720 resolution (720p). Common to all High ?? Video descriptions is the transmission of video at 25 - 30 frames per second (fps). "HD VoIP" was the subject of an excellent session at Fall VON and generally refers to audio transmission of voice covering at least 8kHz audio -- primary range of the human ear (sometimes called wide band audio); Intel appears to have taken over the term High Definition Audio to describe some of their audio-related technology.

The aim of this post is to provide some background that allow us to move forward in testing High Quality Video. Without a standard to be achieved we are seeing lots of claims about various webcams and the ability to transmit video. In this post I will set some basic benchmarks to help identify High Quality Video when it happens. In future posts I will cover some of my experiences attempting to have Skype-based conversations using High Quality Video.

My first question to Jonathan Christensen, Skype's GM for Audio and Video, was "What defines High Quality Video?" Summing up his response it's the sustained transmission of 640 x 480 (VGA) video resolution at 24 - 30 fps over a minimum 384 kbps connection. And the key word here is "sustained" as in "carrying on a reasonable length conversation" user experience. According to Christensen, previously one could get bursts of VGA quality but sustaining it was not practical due to non-optimization of all the technology pieces that need to come together.

Skype initially considered a higher resolution involving the 1280 x 720 "true HD" Video spec but soon saw that as unrealistic within today's network conditions and video technology limitations. According to Jonathan, his Skype Audio/Video engineering team did a significant amount of research looking at factors such as webcam technology, codecs, webcam drivers, end user configurations, network conditions (including user end point configurations), image sharpness, CPU utilization, and surrounding light sensitivity in coming up with a video calling product specification. And they had to settle on the type of video content that would be most commonly used: "talking heads" in a home or office desktop environment. (No Discovery Channel panoramic scenery video or high speed action sports such as hockey or football here.)

Basic requirements: many have heard about the Sender (Capture) requirements:

• Intel Dual Core (or CoreDuo) processor
• Logitech QuickCams with Carl-Zeiss optics (9000 Pro, Pro for Notebooks)
• QuickCam software drivers version 11.5
• Skype 3.6
• Internet Connection: (an industry standard minimum requirement for video transmission)

At the Recipient (Rendering) end these requirements are relaxed to:

• Fast processor (but not necessarily Dual Core)
• Skype 3.6
• Internet Connection: minimum 384 kbps upload and download speed

So how do you identify High Quality Video is being captured and transmitted by the sender and received. and rendered by the recipient? Simply put, Skype injects a logo into both the active call window's video indicator and the recipient's video picture, whether within the active call tab, a 640 x 480 Window or full screen. This logo only appears in situations where either the Sender is sending 640 x 480 @ 24-30 fps (above) or the recipient is receiving 640 x 480 @ 24-30 fps (left). Drop below 24 fps and the logo goes away; come back above an it appears. To add to the confusion, the Sender can be sending High Quality Video, yet the recipient does not necessarily see the logo unless certain conditions are met.

A few other notes:

• In my testing I have come across a couple of situations where High Quality Video was being identifiably received under the "Recipient" conditions (for instance an Inspiron 6000 with a single 1.6 GHZ Pentium M processor, shown above, and Phil's 64-bit AMD processor PC, both of which had Skype 3.6 installed).
• Note that the Recipient can launch not only a Chat session from the video within the Active Call window but can also "capture" the picture as a still photo (camera icon).
• If a recipient is using an earlier version of Skype (3.5 or earlier), they may be seeing High Quality Video but there is no indication via the logo. The only way to check is via "displaying the technical call info"¹.
• It can take about 45 to 120 seconds for a High Quality Video connection to be established.. Using Skype's "technical call info" feature¹, you can actually observe the Send fps rate ramp up; High Quality Video identification only occurs above 24 fps (and a 640 x 480 frame size). So there is obviously some initial handshaking/negotiation activity generated on launching a video call.
• It is worthwhile checking your own Internet connection speed and connection conditions^2. I have found using the Visual Ware VoIP Quality and Speed Test provides a relatively good measure (requires Java on your PC). However, other measures may be required on other continents as distance from the measuring server can play a role in the resulting tests. My cable connection appears to be running between 6 and 6.5 Mbps for download and consistently around 800 kbps for upload. QoS is usually above 90% with low jitter (<10 ms) -- more than sufficient for High Quality Video requirements.
• The best SightSpeed can support for "Send" under my network conditions is 320 x 240 @ 30 fps; if my upload speed could be raised to 1.5 Mbps, it could then support 640 x 480 at this frame rate.

But the real challenge is the overall end user configuration including network conditions. And this is where Skype still needs to some testing and more experience to achieve a consistent and sustainable³ High Quality Video user experience. I have attempted Skype High Quality Video calls in several situations with significantly inconsistent results and continue to expand on that experience base.

A second question: In launching High Quality Video as a marketing tool why did Skype let the situation get out of their control in terms of setting user expectations? Can't hit the target when there is no stated target to aim for. It's insufficient to state what the requirements are; independently measurable benchmarks are also required:

• Resolution: 640 x 480 (VGA)
• Transmission rate: 24 -30 fps
• Time of call: 30 minutes meeting these requirements
• Time to reach transmission rate at stated resolution: < 2 minutes

And how does it deal with other considerations?

• Low light environment
• CPU utilization management
• "Intelligently" adaptation to network traffic conditions

Both subjects of upcoming posts.

Update: all the related posts:

• High Quality Video: Definitely a Winner for Skype
• Expanding the High Quality Video Experience and Observations
• To Be Restored: Camera Flexibility for Video Hackers
• Installing a Logitech High Quality Video Camera: The Experience.

¹ Tools | Options | Advanced | Connection --> "Display technical call info ...."; then run your cursor over the active call window to bring up the technical info for your call.
² In one instance the other party found his speed to be about 400 kbps download; he thought he had subscribed for a 3 Mbps service 3 years ago so checked with his service provider who confirmed he was only getting a 500 kbps service. At this point he is seeking compensation from his service provider!
³ Sustainable means to have a 30 minute or longer video call while maintaining the High Quality Video status as indicated by the presence of the logo at both ends.

Posted by Jim Courtney at 08:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I have complained several times about misleading SkypePro advertising in the past. Tony Austin posted a long but interesting explanation with the following title in iTWire: "1300 reasons to avoid Skype Pro in Australia."

He begins:

There are examples all around us of misleading and deceptive advertising, inflicted upon us either deliberately or due to the lack of attention to detail or even the incompetence of the advertisers. Where does Skype Pro stand in this regard?

And ends with:

Skype needs to change its Skype Pro documentation to read something like:

"Pay nothing per minute for calls to landlines within the same country -- except for certain classes of landlines for which we'll charge the SkypeOut rate and not the Skype Pro rate and this will cost you much much more than nothing per minute!"

I have to agree 100% with Tony!

And Skype can't say they are not aware: the regular questions concerning the SkypePro costs on the Skype Forum don't go unnoticed by Skype staff.
How much money is Skype taking from customers in Australia, Brazil and a lot of other countries with this misleading SkypePro advertising?

Jean Mercier blogs clearly at Skype Numerology.

Posted by Jean Mercier at 07:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Time for a break from our usual programming....

It's always special when the "generally underdog" team" wins a professional sports championship.And it's got nothing to do with Skype; the 900,000 people of Canadian prairie province of Saskatchewan had reason to celebrate last night after their Saskatchewan Roughriders' 23-19 Grey Cup victory over arch rival Winnipeg Blue Bombers this evening at Toronto's Rogers Centre.

Jon Arnold has his lifelong Boston Red Sox baseball team devotion; Alec Saunders' Ottawa Senators almost made it to the Stanley Cup last year, playing in the final; Lester Madden has his favourite English Premier League team (but I forget which North London team). Now I can reveal that my upbringing in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan has left me a lifelong member of the Rider nation. When it comes to football, especially the more exciting Canadian version (three downs, larger field, 12 players/side), like learning to ride a bike, being a Roughrider fan has never left my blood. Maybe it was traveling all over northern Saskatchewan as my father carried out his work; maybe it was my time as an stadium employee of the then very popular Saskatoon Hilltops junior team (which in those days developed many players for the Roughriders).

In any event congratulations to the Saskatchewan Roughriders team, organization and fans on winning their third Grey Cup over its 95-year history.

As a bonus, doing some High Quality Video testing while watching portions of the game via my Slingbox revealed some interesting information about High Quality Video performance! And, yes, the 52,000-seat Rogers Centre is owned by the same Rogers organization that provides my wireless, Internet and cable TV services.

Posted by Jim Courtney at 04:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I got a very interesting comment of Sascha Vitzthum on a previous post, and I distilled the following graph out of it:

According to eBay …

"Direct contribution consists of net revenues from external customers less direct costs. Direct costs include specific costs of net revenues, sales and marketing expenses, and general and administrative expenses over which segment managers have direct discretionary control, such as advertising and marketing programs, customer support expenses, bank charges, site operations expenses, product development expenses, billing operations, certain technology and facilities expenses, transaction expenses, provisions for doubtful accounts, authorized credits and transaction losses. Segment managers do not have discretionary control over expenses such as our corporate center costs …"

This means Skype had a 15% contribution compared to revenue in the last quarter. This is quite OK. From the graph we also see that 2007 will be probably the first year that Skype contributes really to eBay’s profitability.

Jean Mercier also contributes to Skype Numerology.

Posted by Jean Mercier at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

iSkoot is not architected as a "Call Back" service; impact of having a WiFi-enabled Blackberry

New billing features in my Rogers bill can tell you something about how wireless calls accessing Skype are made. Yesterday I received my monthly wireless billing from Rogers who now include, via the callerID, the name of the party called on their call detail report.. Looks like the detail shows that iSkoot is not a "Call Back" service:

The fact that there is a number (rather than simply "Incoming") in the relevant column tells me that iSkoot initiates a call by calling the local iSkoot point-of-presence (647 is a local Toronto call for me) and then, incorporating data concurrently sent to the same server, transparently makes the connection to my called party (whether via Skype or SkypeOut)¹. The whole process takes about five to ten seconds. As discussed in more detail last week, the user experience is virtually identical to that of making a traditional wireless call.

It also demonstrates that calls via Skype access services, whether via iSkoot, IM+ for Skype or Mobivox, are still charged against your wireless data plan, in terms of minutes if not actual per minute usage charges.

Also revealed in the bill:

• My wireless data plan usage, using a Blackberry 8820 with WiFi, remains somewhat lower than the average usage when I did not have a Blackberry with WiFi. Yet I now use the Blackberry for data services much more heavily in WiFi zones, especially when at the home office. In fact, I try to do all application downloads only when in a WiFi zone.
• Here's a tip for using Google Maps, which uses the 8820's GPS feature: get directions for your trip prior to leaving a WiFi zone and scan through the trip. This will download all the relevant map information for the trip into memory via WiFi such that while traveling the route, you significantly reduce use of the wireless data plan to track the trip.
  
• My total calling time while in Boston at Fall VON for three days was 13 minutes for which I had to pay roaming charges of $0.95 per minute in addition to any long distance charges. All I can say here is that (i) having such high roaming charges means I look for other means of making my voice calls (as did Alec Saunders) and (ii) I did use Truphone in a WiFi zone on my Nokia N95 to make a few "no charge" calls. (Using iSkoot or Mobivox when roaming still invokes the roaming charge of $0.95 per minute even if iSkoot calls the local iSkoot point-of-presence.) Bottom line: having such high roaming charges actually reduces significantly the amount I use my Rogers service; it's effectively costing them business revenues.

¹Short calls but, as confirmation of the calls going through, I did get the called party's voice mail service.

Tags: Skype, iSkoot, Blackberry, Blackberry 8820, Rogers Wireless, Truphone, Mobivox, Nokia N95

Posted by Jim Courtney at 05:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Worried about eavesdropping? Worry less with Skype.

Reuters' reports Jörg Ziercke, president of Federal Criminal Police Office of Germany (Bundeskriminalamts or BKA) said:

German police are unable to decipher the encryption used in the Internet telephone software Skype to monitor calls by suspected criminals and terrorists

Ziercke spoke at this week's Fall Session 2007 of "Internet crime scene-a global challenge to the internal security."

Quotes from the Reuters story:

• "The encryption with Skype telephone software ... creates grave difficulties for us,"

• "We can't decipher it. That's why we're talking about source telecommunication surveillance -- that is, getting to the source before encryption or after it's been decrypted."

• "There are no discussions with Skype. I don't think that would help," he said, adding that he did not want to harm the competitiveness of any company. "I don't think that any provider would go for that."

From a related Reuters story, terrorists use social media to educate, motivate, and collaborate.

I've long Skyped with people who assume their email and phone calls are surveilled by their government, employer, industrial competitors or criminals. So they appreciate Skype-level privacy, courtesy of end-to-end strong encryption.

In counterpoint, Skype's 3 Skypephone + iSkoot strategy, where the iSkoot half of a conversation is not encrypted, erodes public trust in Skype's confidentiality and security.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 12:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Guest post by Simon Perry of Digital-Lifestyles.

Skype has just written to owners of 0207 SkypeIn numbers to tell them that their number will have to change by 20th December 2007 - a mere month away. 0207 is the dialling prefix for Central London.

Although worded in a very friendly way, this bombshell email will not be welcomed by those who rely on SkypeIn to bring calls in to their business.

Digital-Lifestyles is an example of this. We made the decision to entrust our phone number - the telephone gateway to our business - to Skype - We’re living the Digital-Lifestyles dream, right? At no time did we ever imagine that we’d have to change our number - ever.

That’s not how phone numbers work. You’re given a number, and that remains your number until you decide to give it up. It doesn’t give you up.

It’s clear that Skype has either fallen out with their current telecoms provider, or have found a better deal elsewhere. Making their customers pay for this, is not the way to do business.

0208 is not 0207
As if the need to change numbers wasn’t bad enough, Skype casually drops late in the email that the number that you need to change to might not be a Central London number, but the far less desirable Outer London 0208 dialling prefix, or even the near-unused 0203.

Skype is offering 12 months free use of the SkypeIn number in return for the ‘inconvenience’.

Bizarre
What is strange about this, is that Skype is very actively trying to encourage the use of Skype in business, building in features into the software to encourage this.

Quite how they think they can encourage people to become dependant on their SkypeIn service and they pull a prank like this is beyond us.

Loss of Trust
Skype has seriously shot itself in the foot with this. Those who have to change their number against their will, will never trust Skype again.

Skype sign the email off “The (really, really sorry) people at Skype.” No matter what it costs Skype to make sure this doesn’t happen, they must meet it or they’ll end up being far more sorry than they could imagine when people abandon their service.

UPDATE: Skype responds...

Editor: Skype procurement didn't contract for automatic renewal at set rates up-front, assuming renegotiations would be kind. per this blog post by Skype spokesman Villu Arak.

also:

• Wikipedia: UK telephone code misconceptions

Posted by Phil Wolff at 05:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

I spent some time this afternoon interviewing Jonathan Christensen, Skype's General Manager for Audio and Video. After reviewing with me how Skype came to be able to offer High Quality Video (which will be the subject of another post), Skype released this statement of interest to those Skype enthusiasts who had been using a video configuration option (i.e. - "hacking" the config.xml file) to allow Skype video to use a 640 x 480 mode of non-Logitech webcams.

Last year, we created a configuration option to enable better video performance on Skype for Windows for tech-savvy users with webcams that could handle it. In Skype 3.6 for Windows, the option was removed. While it's true that the configuration option (which was essentially a garage hack) did offer better-than-average video, the quality was very unreliable. It worked for some users while frustrating others.

Any benefits of the removed option pale in comparison with High Quality Video, which was our focus in Skype 3.6 for Windows. High Quality Video has moved the video-quality bar significantly higher. That's because, together with Logitech, we worked on all aspects of the video system -- from optics to drivers to the video codec -- to achieve reliable High Quality Video performance.

Very few people used the previous video configuration option, so we were surprised at the reaction of some of these users when the option was removed. We'll therefore happily re-introduce the option very soon. However, we'd like to remind users that the restored configuration option will not provide the High Quality Video experience. In order to get that, users will need a combination of certified Logitech hardware and optimized Skype software.

Fundamentally Skype had set out some time ago high standards they wanted to achieve in terms of sustainable, reliable, robust video calling performance and evaluated many brands of webcams before partnering with Logitech. They then worked together on both hardware and software to achieve what has been released in Skype 3.6 as identified by a High Quality Video logo which appears when meeting all the appropriate conditions, including frame rate.

Skype listened to those who raised the issue. Of importance is to understand that users who deploy the video configuration option do so at their own risk; Skype can only guarantee High Quality Video to those whose PC, webcam, software and network conditions meet the High Quality Video specifications. No date has been given for the hot fix that will include not only the restoration of this capability but some other video operation improvements, but let's hope it's within the next couple of weeks..

Now as for Dan's question about getting High Quality Video on the Mac. Recall the difficulty of getting any tools to allow third party development on the iPhone? Suffice it to say it's not for lack of trying on the part of Logitech and Skype to work with Apple. When I tell the rest of the story about the level to which Logitech and Skype had to co-operate to achieve what we're seeing in Skype 3.6, you'll understand.

Update: related posts:

• High Quality Video: What's the Benchmark?
• High Quality Video: Definitely a Winner for Skype
• Expanding the High Quality Video Experience and Observations
• Installing a Logitech High Quality Video Camera: The Experience.

Posted by Jim Courtney at 11:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Pioneer Skype Extra application Pamela has this week released version 4.0 with a new user interface:

and several new features:

More screenshots here. Download here. Pamela Basic is always free; other versions of Pamela have a 30-day trial. We'll be doing a review, including a user case study, within the next ten days but in the meantime check out the free trial version.

Posted by Jim Courtney at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

When doing presentations via desktop sharing applications there are situations where you simply want the remote parties to passively view your desktop; I have seen this customer request with several desktop sharing applications over the years where ultimate simplicity is more appropriate to the participant who is following the session. Yugma has now developed a Yugma Viewer whereby one simply enters a name, email address and session ID on the Yugma Viewer web page, downloads a small Java plug-in and is able to view a shared desktop in a separate browser window but with no ability to do interactive features such as remote control or desktop sharing. Once again this is cross-platform between Mac and Windows.

Original Post: Yugma Skype Edition: Cross Platform Desktop Sharing

Posted by Jim Courtney at 08:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Facebook is no nirvana for VoIP services; six month total Facebook VoIP installations = 1.5 days' of Skype account registrations.

A real life Skype Conference Call experience: Last Friday, a situation arose while talking to a vendor in the Toronto area where I needed to introduce into the call a prospect at her office in San Diego, who, in turn, asked me to add a colleague on her Blackberry in San Francisco. For a variety of reasons, while all three participants had Skype accounts, at this point in time, all three were most readily accessed via the PSTN (requiring SkypeOut to all three parties). To add the San Diego and San Francisco contacts to my initial SkypeOut call I simply went to the "Add Callers" menu item in my active Call tab, entered each phone number and clicked on the Start button. In each case the addition to the Skype conference call was completed in less than a minute, required no additional action on the part of the party being added and we could focus on the business discussion at hand.

Bottom line: dead easy simple!

• Totally an ad hoc call.
• No conference call operators, no call back,
• No dialing into a central conferencing switch (with potential for long distance charges)
• No action required by the other participants other than to answer their ringing phones.
• No cost! (I am on the North America Unlimited Plan.).
• Technology transparent to the call.
• And achieved our business objective for the call.

In summary: An excellent user experience.

So what's the future for VoIP on Facebook?

Over the past few days lots has been written about the adoption of VoIP applications on Facebook. Launched by a link post from Stuart Henshall, Alec Saunders has elaborated with some statistics, and Jon Arnold has discussed. Om, in On Facebook, VoIP Has a Sore Throat, has the most interesting statistics provided by Ryan Nitz, CTO of Deft Labs, publisher of AppHound.

When Nitz ran queries using the keywords Skype and VoIP, AppHound found that the combined installs for all VoIP applications was 435,481, with 11,615 daily users. That’s about 2.7 percent. (See chart for the full breakdown.)

Check out the table in Om's post: CallMe on Skype leads with 110,650 of those "installs"; SkypeMe, under 4,000.

But here are some Skype numbers that put the whole picture in perspective:

• Daily Skype account additions: 292,000
  • based on eBay quarterly reports Q2-Q3,2007
• Skype Extra downloads: 288,819 (week of Nov. 1 -14, 2007).
  • and almost 23 million downloads in 11 months.
• Number of Skype Users Online at 0900h EST (1400h GMT) Nov. 20, 2007

• 

• Total number of Canadians on FaceBook: 7.8 million
  • 23.4% of Canadian population

HighSpeedConferencing had over 12,800 downloads last week; according to Alec's post referenced above FREE Conference Calls (which is not a VoIP application) on Facebook just passed 20,000 installations after almost three months. FREE Conference Calls is doing one service: introducing the concept of multi-party calls to a largely consumer audience. And they are generating some revenue but I use SkypeOut to call at no charge into FREE Conference Call sessions.

After losing his patience and making a few brief but succinct comments, Thomas Howe has gone back to writing his clients' mashups for enterprise applications:

I’m not going to dispute the numbers, but apparently, about six months after the Facebook API was made public, we’ve been through a complete market cycle. VoIP apps are failing on facebook, so it’s time to pack it in and call it a day. You would have to be a complete fool to waste your time there, no? Of course you would. There can’t be anymore than, say, 100k installs of Facebook voice apps to date, ....

Well, Thomas, it's only the "CallMe on Skype" app that's gone over 100,00 downloads but a total of 400,000 in six months is agreeably pathetic. Thomas' conclusion: "Six months is enough for a gazillion, right? Because that’s the way it is in any market… it fully develops in six months"

Further comments in a follow-up post; it's all about the user experience. And what platform is getting user traction for Voice 2.0 application developers?

Memo to VC's listening to Facebook VoIP application financing proposals: don't read this post.

Tags: VoIP, Facebook, Skype, Skype Conference Call, Alec Saunders, Jon Arnold, GigaOm, Thomas Howe, Skype Extras, High Speed Conferencing, FREE Conference Calls

Posted by Jim Courtney at 05:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I like the guy, but he's been infected with a dangerous idea. In An Open Letter to Comcast and Every cable/Telco on P2P he says

"BLOCK P2P TRAFFIC , PLEASE"

Mark Cuban calls Skypers "freeloaders." Says ISPs should charge a premium to allow supernodes to run (Skype supernodes being the backbone of Skype's p2p network).

Janko Roettgers holds his nose over Cuban's change of heart, citing prior positive blog posts and investments in p2p technology.

Skype expert Andrew Hansen commented:

www.skype.com is P2P - it saves me 10's of thousands of dollars a year and I run my entire business on it, I will gladly pay a little more to have more bandwidth. P2P isn't the problem, Internet providers who fail to see their role as pipe providers are the problem. I have a 10MB home office connection (outside of Toronto) it never hiccups, and in comparison to friends in Japan, Denmark etc., the speed I get is prehistoric. When greedy pipe providers stop worrying about (and trying to) control the syntax of the messages going over the network and concern themselves more with providing a better network, they will realize incredible profits. He who provides the best connection wins.

The joy of p2p is people helping each other.

Cuban thinks this is bad.

Mark, where does your notion come from?

Mark, why are you calling me a freeloader?

Posted by Phil Wolff at 07:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Andy have provided an excellent summary of the Minute Stealing space activity over the past few days and concludes with:

In my book we're not done seeing the end of the price drop for minutes, but we are seeing the end of where profits are found simply in minutes. Smarter companies like Migg33 and client Mobivox (as Alec Saunders pointed to) are able to leverage minutes to benefit their community members with added features and more than just minutes vs. a Jajah which only has people who want more for less. In the long run using minutes as a loss leader will be the coin of the realm, not simply minutes for minutes sake, because of what I've labeled the "no-loyalty" crowds modus operandi.

That crowd goes to whomever offers free next.

Alec Saunders provides his viewpoint. In particular with 400 points-of-presence in forty countries, including Canada, Mobivox remains our choice:

It's a good move for Jajah, but it's