Dan York: Skype's 5 Years of Disruption

OK, so it's the fourth post this week where I've referenced Dan York. But over the two years I have known Dan I have to say he is, in my view, one of the most respected authorities on the technology behind today's communications revolution. Yet he also understands the value of the user experience.
In celebration of Skype's fifth birthday Dan has written the most thorough post yet on Skype's accomplishments and how it has changed not only his life but also the communications market space he works in. He starts out with a personal reminder (along the lines of many of the "What Skype Means to Me" posts that Phil has been coordinating):

I had a personal reminder of that the other day when I wound up in a video chat with one of my closest friends who was my best man at my wedding 12 years ago. Although we have spoken in the intervening years, we had not actually seen each other in probably most of 10 years due to living far apart. He and his wife emailed a group of folks that they now had a Skype ID. I added them as a contact, opened an IM chat and wound up calling them... and then moving into video and seeing them both. It was a powerful moment - and a great reminder of the power of Skype to easily connect people.

Articulating his contribution to our Skype discussion on yesterday's SquawkBox, Dan then goes on to talk about the many unique aspects of Skype:

• How Skype Disrupted Technology
• Skype "Just Worked"
• Wideband Audio
• Secure VoIP
• P2P VoIP
• Voice First
• Multi-Modal Communication
• PSTN Interconnection
• Cheap Calls
• Challenging SIP and Open Standards
• Persistent Chat - with History

Dan goes on to discuss some of the imperfections and bumps that Skype has experienced over the years and the need for the new executive team to express its vision for the future. (Although Josh's "liquid communication" term is an appropriate description when I look at the variety of ways I can converse currently via Skype over my PC's, Blackberry, Nokia N-series phones, Sony mylo, Nokia N-800 tablet, Skypephone).
Last week at Rogers' Blackberry Bold launch, RIM's Director of PR pointed out how, during the famous patent lawsuit, settled over two years ago, enterprise IT managers were seeking out alternatives to the Blackberry, should a court injunction force disruption of the Blackberry service in the U.S. This turned out to be one of the best "zero cost" marketing tools RIM has ever had. The IT managers could all report back that the only total solution to their mobile communications needs was indeed Blackberry. (And will remain so, in spite of iPhone's success.)
So show me another multi-modal, secure, archiving, interconnected conversation platform that provides all the features above in a user-friendly means and that can deliver all the user experiences posted on Skype Journal over the past few days and I'll stop being a Skype Cheerleader. (But, going forward, the Skype team still has to earn their way ... and will.) Yet I'll also be a cheerleader for anyone else who delivers beneficial user experiences with access to over 40 million ongoing users.

Powered by Qumana

Cyprien Lomas: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Cyprien Lomas is the Director of The Learning Centre in the Faculty of Land and Food Systems at the University of British Columbia. I first met Cyprien at the annual Northern Voice blogging conference held in Vancouver.

Skype is the communication application that is most likely to work. It is a star behind the types of firewalls that I encounter in schools and other semi-hostile environments on the road. Skype seems to be able to punch through and connect to the net where other chat apps are unable to.

Skype also promotes that serendipitous contact with long lost friends, relations and enemies - no matter where they have ended up. I love Skype because it is the best tool to connect with people on other continents.

Happy Birthday Skype!

tags: skype, cyprienlomas, stories, life, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

SquawkBox Discusses Skype's Fifth Anniversary

Over the past few months I have been a frequent participant on Alec Saunders' daily SquawkBox conference call where several of those involved in following today's communications and web developments will discuss topics of the day. Subjects for yesterday's call were the impact of the Internet on this years U.S. President campaign and Skype's fifth anniversary today. Participants included Dan York of Voxeo, James Body of Truphone, William Volk of MyNumo (one of the more successful iPhone Apps developers) and Jonathan Jensen amongst others. The Saunderslog post is here.
The Skype discussion commences about half-way through the call. The one universal agreement was that Skype has succeeded because of the user experience. You can build all the communications technology you want but unless people can get all the way through the setup and readily make a call, people will not use it routinely. And the discussion highlights the importance of getting the Skype 4.0 user interface right but starting with some experimentation that challenges all of us to think through how to set up and manage a multi-modal conversation experience.. Some comments from the SquawkBox discussion:

• James Body: participating in a discussion at a smoke-filled bar in London with Nicklas just after Skype launched: "this proprietary thing will never work because it does not use SIP". James then goes on to point out that if Skype had not had the success it has achieved, Truphone may never have been funded to the level they have obtained.
• Alec Saunders: basically it was the first VoIP-based service that "just worked".
• I then discussed my memories of watching the Quarterdeck team develop WebTalk back in 1995 - and how our CEO of the day drove the engineers to make it work on 50MHz (not 50 GHz - a slip of the tongue) Pentium PC's and over 14.4 kbps modems. But the overall infrastructure was just not there to let it become viable as a consumer in the 1996 time frame.Yes, having widely deployed broadband was one major contributor to the timing element that helped achieve Skype's immediate success. (I did have WebTalk running over a 56kbps modem on a 100MHz Pentium but it was challenging to carry on a conversation. Yet a few small businesses did adopt it.)
• William talked about the importance of usability. "Just because it - VoIP - works is not enough. Users are fickle. You will lose a significant number of users at each step where the process of installing and completing a call may fail. The user experience is everything."
• Dan York the security expert amongst us, got into a discussion of how Skype worked when offerings such as NetMeeting and CU CMe just did not get significant traction. Firewall traveral across NAT - a major failing of SIP, the first true high quality wideband codec, and Skype's inherent security are all features that impressed Dan.

But listen to the recording via the link/player on the Saunderslog post to get the full story, especially helpful for Skype employees involved in the Skype 4.0 beta.
And Happy Fifth Anniversary to Skype from all of us on the call! There are many challenges ahead as Skype liquifies communications - we look forward to the next generation of Skype under its new executive team. And thanks to the iotum team and SquawkBox producer Alec Saunders for making such a conversation feasible

Powered by Qumana

Josh Silverman on Skype's next five years

Skype CEO Josh Silverman wrote Five Years of Wow, reflections on Skype's history and promise. About the future...

When I think of the future, I think of Skype as liquid communication. Instead of being condemned to a frozen shape like the telephone, it will flow into any device whenever you want and wherever you are. And, like water can turn into ice or steam, Skype can shift its form to match what you need at the moment: from voice to video to IM to SMS to filesharing.

Skype blurs the line between the real and the virtual. It bends space and cuts through time. Today, when a conversation wants to be had, technology is not the bottleneck. But technology isn't the goal either. There's no question in my mind about what stands at the heart of the communication revolution. So, as we celebrate the first five years of Skype, let's raise a toast to the human desire to connect.

tags: skype, josh, silverman, joshsilverman, liquid communication, future

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Michael Bartlett: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Mike Bartlett is Skype's Director of Windows Product Management, working from London.

Having worked at Skype for over 3 years, sometimes you forget the human power of communication. I had a powerful reminder of it a few months ago.

My girlfriend's father moved to Australia last year and she had not seen him since. I gave her a webcam and told her all about video calling. She was sceptical. She thought it would be weird. Well… she was, quite literally, in tears after her first call with him. Her two sisters down in Cornwall (which is on the south coast of England) actually got a broadband subscription just to make video calls after hearing about it.

So I was sitting in their lounge, it was quite late at night (those pesky time zones) and there were the three daughters kneeling on the floor huddled, around the laptop in their dressing gowns having a video conversation with their father and their two half-sisters who were getting ready to go to school in Australia. If you could see the smiles on their faces and hear the laughter, the giggling and the excitement then you'd know how amazing I felt sitting on the sofa watching this, knowing that I've played a part in bringing these emotions to millions of people around the World every day.

I can picture that scene clear as day, and that is what Skype means to me.

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, stories, australia

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Three big milestones in Skype's fifth year

Skype's fifth birthday is 29 August. As we count down, two huge milestones changed Skype's future in the last twelve months.

The bad one happened last month.

29 July 2008

BT buys Ribbit
natural monopoly
talk for all onlives

1. BT purchased Ribbit.

Ribbit is the platform play Skype might have been. They are ready to start scaling. And now they have the money, customer base, telecom core, and international operations to reach their potential.

Ribbit seeks to become a natural monopoly for the web's talkification.

Like Skype, Ribbit worked for years to build a software and network infrastructure that combines user computers, phone networks, commerce, social networks, and the Internet.

Skype treats voice like an application, where you control the user experience to control the end-customer relationship.

Unlike Skype, Ribbit thinks of voice as a feature. Features belong in other applications. Developed by the six million people who design and code software. People who solve problems in every country, in every culture, for every situation.

And those people don't work for Ribbit.

Or BT.

They are in the wild. Out of control.

Both BT and Ribbit are happy with that. 

Happy not to control the user experience.

Happy not to control the customer relationship.

Once upon a time (a few world wars' ago) the phone company provided your phone. One model. And it was black.

Then the phone company became a carrier. And you could use whatever phone you liked. Even pink ones for princesses.

Today you can get your Skype any way you like it, so long as it is Skype's user interface.

Ribbit will let you get your phone any way you like it. Period.

Made by anyone who can code.

That's what it means to have a public platform culture.

And Ribbit is bringing that culture to BT. And BT is grooving on it.

The race to add talk everywhere heated up.

The frog is no further ahead in the race, but Ribbit now has the fuel to execute on its vision.

And Skype is catching up but remains far behind.

Ribbit/BT is far from the only company building and selling web talkification infrastructure, but they are one of the few with customers, with funding, and a with a compelling architecture.

Exactly how many talkification infrastructure APIs will programmers learn? That's how much room there is in the market.

 

3 March 2008

"Thank God for Skype!"
-- Oprah Winfrey

2. Skype Sponsors Oprah's "A New Earth" Web Event.

Some people are more influential than others. And then there's Oprah Winfrey.

"Thank God for Skype!"

You can't believe what Oprah's unpaid endorsement and personal enthusiasm has meant to Skype in the United States.

Name recognition is up.

Anxiety is down.

Use is up.

Producers Skype speakers into the studio.

Reporters Skype from the field, including the Democratic and Republican conventions. 

People drag their social networks onto Skype. Friends and family and workplaces don't want to be left out. 

No mention of VoIP, not even of voice, just video calls. Video became the reason you use Skype.

This was a breakthrough moment in Skype's last hold-out market. The ice has been broken.

How will Skype continue the conversation with the United States and Canadian publics that Oprah started? 

 

1 October 2007

free from buyout cuffs
visionaries innovate
skype breathes free again

3. Niklas Zennstrom Steps Down as CEO of Skype.

This was a great thing for Skype.

It broke the bonds eBay put on Skype.

They didn't mean to, but when eBay offered Skype's founders US$1.7 billion if they hit sales and census targets, eBay forced a myopic tunnel vision on the company.

Any new hire, new feature, new product, new partnership needed to advance sales, to advance user adoption. Any new idea or opportunity, no matter how strategic, that didn't meet that payout test starved for management attention and resources.

So the Skype products didn't change much for two years.

eBay paying off the founders and writing down the purchase left Skype with a fresh start. Free to innovate and reengineer. Free to respond to competitive threats from phone companies (like BT). Free to experiment and examine Skype's underlying purpose and value.

Proof?

Look at the new Skype directory. Hybrid web service and rich client.

Look at how the new Skype 4 beta client is running on top of a Skype for Windows 3.8 engine, further separating UI from services, the way you must to deliver talk via browser. 

Look at Skype hiring leaders from outside the phone carriers with street cred at Evite and Motorola.

Look at the coming Skypecasts service retirement.

Each of these decisions speak to a company liberated. A company becoming decisive and thoughtful in its direction.

Very good for Skype.

 

To recap:

A bad day: Skype isn't even in the paradigm-shifting race to talkify the web

A good day: Skype's US and Canadian markets are warming nicely in Oprah's glow

A great day: Skype freed from golden shackles.

 

Doesn't year six look interesting?

 

See also:

• Video of Ribbit's Crick Waters describing the Ribbit platform ("the voiceware economy") at the Emerging Communications Conference earlier this year. 20 minutes.
  
• Video of Trevor Baca of Jaduka at eComm. Jaduka offers much of the same infrastructure.
• CNN Joins Oprah; Puts Skype in the Picture

tags: skype, ribbit, ebay, voiceware, bt, telephony, voip

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Ellen Sander: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Ellen Sander is a screenwriter and music journalist.

Skype has for years been an important connection in my life.

When I lived in China, it was my line to the outside world. Today in business, my colleagues across the U.S. and I can have conference calls with attendees in excess of what our respective telephone services allow.

But most importantly, I can video chat with my two year old grandson, who lives 500 miles away. I heard him say "Gamma" for the first time on Skype. This helps keep our family in touch and together.

I can have total freedom of communication...for free. How wonderful is that? Around the world, or around the corner, Skype keeps me connected. Thank you, Skype.

Happy Birthday!

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Brough Turner: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com. 

Brough Turner is CTO of NMS Communications. In the 1990s, Brough was a leader in PC-based telephony and contributed to the emergence of VoIP technologies, products, and standards.

Skype was a revelation – now love and disappointment.

When I first tried Skype in early September 2003, it was a revelation. First it just worked! I don’t mean it installed and executed properly – many software packages do that. With Skype, I could make voice connections through our corporate firewall, despite our IT department blocking all UDP traffic. Now that was a breakthrough.

Next it combined IM and voice in a useful fashion, something no one else had done at that time.

Finally, it used wideband audio! Skype connections were better than “toll quality.” Assuming adequate broadband, Skype audio beat anything else. I recall an early conversation with a friend in Tokyo. There was music playing in their apartment and it felt like I was in the room with them.

Today I use Skype on a daily basis for business and with friends, but almost always with people in Europe or Asia. It seems Skype’s adoption rate in the US is much lower. Also, mobility trumps presence. For US associates, I can use whatever IM reaches the desired party and then call them on my mobile. There’s no per minute charge for mobile calls (within the US), so all that matters is what IM the other party is using.

I continue to love Skype’s voice quality, especially given the diverse accents of some of my friends and associates. J and I routinely use SkypeOut and Skype voice mail.

The disappointment? They stumbled. The eBay acquisition meant a nice chunk of cash for the founders and early staffers, but no synergies, and in due course the founders were gone.

Communications services need critical mass. But other instant messengers have grown their user bases more rapidly – certainly QQ and likely Windows Live Messenger. This afternoon, there were 11-12 million Skype users on-line (10.5 million right now) while QQ had 37-40M (admittedly mostly Chinese) users simultaneously on-line. Skype is not enough for my IM needs. To see status for the people I communicate with, I have to run four IM clients at once.

Looking back, initiatives to increase their user base or wrap other instant messengers might have been better than the focus on video (which I seldom use). Looking forward, I dream of the day I get integrated mobile IM and voice that just works, everywhere.

For now, I’m encouraged that current Skype management seems to have their eye back on the ball. And I still love and use Skype with those friends (disproportionately European and Asian) who are routinely available on-line.

tags: skype, stories, whatskypemeanstome, strategy, qq, wlm

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Bruce Wang: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Bruce Wang blogs from Shanghai, China, on content syndication, instant messaging, digital ID, and social media technologies.

Skype is a daily tool I can't live without.

Skype is a perfect way to share ideas with a group of friends instantly,  no matter where they are.

I use it at my office with my colleagues,
with my friends at NPO groups/conference,
with my wife when we live in different cities 3000km away

Thank you Skype and happy birthday!

tags: skype, stories, work, life, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Alexander Hager: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Alex Hager is a law student and amateur photographer in Vienna, Austria.

Skype helps me to stay in touch with friends and family, no matter where I am, whether I travel or stay at home. Besides enabling me to hear and see loved ones, I use it to practice different language skills.

I still am euphoric about the fact that I can reach my contacts from everywhere, using some Internet café and my thumbdrive or my own laptop, and all of this (nearly) for free. In my eyes, Skype is best when it comes to online community, friendships and family.

Happy birthday, Skype! Go on like this!!

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, travel, family, at, austria, wien

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Petr Silon: What Skype Means To Me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Petr Silon is Managing Director at xTel Ltd which runs Skype Hardware shop in the Czech Republic.

Opportunity. My Business. New friends. Everyday communication tool. Cool thing.

I use Skype daily nearly for five years. I started with Skype 0.8 beta version and shortly afterwards I first translated Skype's user interface into the Czech language. I became a volunteer translator for Skype for Windows. I’m helping people use Skype and I’m happy that the Skype family is growing. I started to sell Skype hardware and accessories also and this became my full-time job. I enjoy it.

Thank you Skype!

In Czech:

Petr Silon je ředitel společnosti xTel s.r.o., která provozuje obchod Skype Hardware shop v České Republice.

Příležitost. Moje podnikání. Noví známí. Každodenní prostředek komunikace. Bezva věc.

Skype používám skoro denně už 5 let. Začal jsem s verzí 0.8 beta a brzy jsem začal dělat český překlad Skype po Windows. Stal jsem se dobrovolným Skype překladatelem. Pomáhám lidem používat Skype a mám radost, že Skype používá čím dál více lidí. Začal jsem taky prodávat Skype techniku a příslušenství a stala se z toho moje práce na plný úvazek. Baví mě to.

Děkuji Ti Skype!

tags: skype, translation, localization, xtel, hardware, cz, czech, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Alex Kazim: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Alex Kazim, former President of Skype, is now CEO of Tokoni, a true life storytelling community.

Skype changed my world.

I was involved in the acquisition of the company and its management. But I worked through Skype. We used it extensively to manage Skype's offices in Tallinn, Luxembourg, London, Stockholm and San Jose. And I lived through Skype. I used it to spend time with my young kids every night, to see with my own eyes how much they changed each and every day as I commuted around the world.

I've since moved on from both Skype and eBay, but it's still very much part of my world. I use it to see my family when I travel. And we use it exclusively for Tokoni, my new startup, connecting our employees in the Bay Area, Seattle and Austin and even our testers in China.

But Skype changed a lot of people's worlds.

I still remember the South African mother who told me how thrilled she was to be able to see her grandkids after her daughter had moved to Australia. I remember coming home one day and having my young daughter look at me and the computer and wonder why I wasn't still in the little box. And I remember the story about how a mission in Africa was able to participate in the funeral of their Father in Atlanta. Live. As if they were there.

Because that's really what Skype is all about. It brings us together. It keeps us connected. Even when we're worlds apart.

tags: skype, tokoni, life, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

IPEVO will give away a Solo Skype desk phone for Skype's birthday

Tomorrow, Skype will celebrate the launch of the first public beta five years' ago.

Honoring this, IPEVO is gifting a lovely Skype desk phone to one of the people who wrote a "What Skype Means To Me" essay for Skype Journal.

Deadline:	Midnight Pacific Thursday night, Friday Morning
Judgment:	We'll pick a name randomly from those who submitted entries to Skype Journal. Employees of IPEVO are not eligible.
How to enter:	Please email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com. Be sure to tell us how you'd like to be credited. While we don't take anonymous submissions, if you tell us who you are Skype Journal can publish your entry anonymously or pseudonymously.
Prize:	An IPEVO SO10 Skype Desktop Phone.

tags: skype, ipevo, whatskypemeanstome, phone, solo

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Daksh Sharma: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Daksh Sharma is an executive for online strategies at an IT consulting firm in New Delhi, India. Daksh follows social-media and web2.0 trends on The Marketing Blog.

"Common you don't know about Skype ? Are you kidding me mate?" That is my common reaction if I come across people who have not heard about Skype. Talk about ‘Voice’ and Skype is the first thing that comes to your mind.

The thing that I really like about is not that its free but the fact that its voice-quality is unbeatable. I am aware of multiple VOIP clients which have come and gone, however none has matched Skype.

As time has evolved, Skype’s feature set has quadrupled. We’re now witnessing different upgrades in Skype for e.g. group conference, video preview etc. Several third party applications are also extending Skype’s functionality. I can now access Skype on the go, thanks to fring mobile application. I can even access Skype through web-applications like imo.im which is really cool.

"Think Voice – Think Skype" that's the mantra of life for all of net-users out there.

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, stories, voip, voice, marketing

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Wesley Fryer: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Wesley Fryer is an educator, a digital storyteller, a technologist, and an innovator in bringing the three together. He is an alumnus of AT&T, lives in Oklahoma City, and is completing his doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction at Texas Tech University. Wes started Moving at the Speed of Creativity, his edutech blog, the month before Skype's second birthday in 2005.

Skype is one of the most valuable communication tools I have. Every week I now meet with different educators around the United States, and sometimes in different parts of the world, using Skype. As a co-convener for the free K-12 Online Conference it is impossible to imagine my life without Skype. Skype is the lifeline which connects us as conveners for our weekly meetings as well as many others in our K12Online learning communities.

In addition to these professional uses of Skype, I frequently use it to videochat with my family when I am traveling, and to connect my own children with their grandparents who live in other states.

Skype is one of the most powerful, transformative technology tools I've ever used. I can't imagine living my life and doing my work now without Skype.

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, oklahoma, ok, us, edutech, education, k12online, community

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Calley Nye: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Calley Nye is a social media entrepreneur, a viral marketing expert, social media marketing consultant, marketing strategist, and recovering fashion model. Her blog, Silicon Calley, and her twitter stream capture the vibrant Los Angeles tech scene and Calley's adventures in startup life.

Hm, I have to admit that it was hard for me to answer this question. In a short time, Skype has made itself an integral part of my daily life. So I had to think about what my life would be like without it. Only then did I realize how important it has been to me in business, and with my family and friends.

I've only been on Skype for a couple months, since May, I think. The first time I used Skype was when a friend invited me into a chat with several friends. So I downloaded Skype, joined the chat, and met everyone. That chat is what made me start blogging. So, it's easy to say that were it not for Skype, I would not be where I am today.

Skype has been an amazing tool for business, helping me communicate with the community in Silicon Valley and San Francisco, from the comfort of my own home in Los Angeles. In that sense, it has opened me up to many opportunities that would not have been possible otherwise. Similarly, it has proven itself to be an amazing way to stay in touch with my family back in Connecticut. Sometimes I get really homesick, and talking to my family through Skype video makes me feel like I'm not missing so much.

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, work, homesick, siliconcalley, calleynye

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Evgeny Gorbarsky: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Evgeny Gorbarsky is my counterpart at Skypeclub.ru, Russia's top, independent, Skype portal.

Skype means a lot in my life these days. Since skypeclub.ru was opened, Skype became not only my job, but the best hobby. It's great that our news and reviews help thousands of Russian Internet users get to know Skype and its potential.

The most pleasant part is to hear thanks from people that now can call their friends in other cities and abroad, from businessmen that can cut phone expenses and implement new means of communication at their enterprises.

I like to watch the development of Skype and watch new gadgets appear.

I like to test any Skype-device in my lab and present the results on my personal blog.

My partners and I do our best to deliver the most popular Skype accessories to the Russian users.

In Russian, Евгений Горбарский says:

Сегодня Skype играет в моей жизни огромную роль. Со времени создания skypeclub.ru, он стал не просто моей работой, но и лучшим  увлечением.

Я рад, что ежедневно наши новости и обзоры помогают тысячам российских пользователей  узнать о программе Skype и всех ее возможностях.

Особенно приятно слышать слова благодарности от людей, которые, благодаря Skype и моей помощи, смогли  свободно общаться  со своими близкими за рубежом или в других городах, от бизнесменов, сэкономивших средства на телефонных звонках и внедривших новые схемы связи на предприятиях.

Мне нравится следить за развитием Skype, за появлением нового интересного оборудования.

Нравится испытывать  Skype устройства в моей лаборатории,  и рассказывать о результатах на страницах личного блога.

Я и мои партнеры постарались сделать все, чтобы российским пользователям стали доступны самые популярные Skype аксессуары со всего мира.

tags: skype, russia, skypeclub, ru

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Dimitry Korolkov: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Dimitry Korolkov works in marketing for Program-Ace LLC, a software house in Kharkiv City, Ukraine.

Skype is an ultimate excitement, which not only erases the borders and brings the whole world touch-close to you, it is an incarnation of the completely new reality of communications in a digital century. Universal, many-sided, friendly and really FUN!!!

For business, Skype opens doors and hearts of customers and partners around the globe and, at the same time, offers an incomparable variety of options and features, which “surprisingly” meet the expectations of users and the market in the most exact way. And sometimes, the product goes ahead of the needs and creates new possibilities.

In two words: Skype ROCKS!!! ;-)

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, stories, business

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Dmitrii: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Dmitrii is a psychology student at a Bulgarian university, sells advertising for a British newspaper, and is soon to be a father.

So, for me Skype is something very very special. It is the easiest way to talk with friends. For example, you are working all day and you don't have the possibility to go out with friends, but you are interested in what they are doing and how they are, you use Skype. You talk with them for free, you can see them, it's virtual of course, but it's not a big deal. :)

With Skype we can send and receive everything that you imagine: photos, files, music, film, everything. On Skype you can play some very funny games. In only two days, I was able to send fax by Skype.

And one of the privileges of Skype is that this is the best way to make business, the best program for companies. And nothing can be lost in Skype, because all the chat conversations are written because there is chronology.

tags: skype, whatskypemeanstome, bulgaria, bg, friends, memory

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Maren Hogan: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Maren K. Hogan is managing partner at HCI, Capital Management, for Humans.

Skype should be called Bridge, although that's not as compelling as the cool name SKYPE. But that's what it is.

It's a bridge from my children to their grandfather in New York, from my husband to his sisters and their families in Minnesota and from me to my clients around the world.

Skype creates connections between people who haven't yet met, forming bonds through facial expressions, shared chats and calls that don't break the bank. Skype also help people identify themselves as current, accessible and friendly, which is a lot for simply signing up through a service!

tags: skype, life, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Ashim Roy: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Dr. Ashim Roy is India Country Head for Stoke Networks, providing local support to network operators in the region. Dr. Roy sent this post called "Skyping at Stoke - Keeping the fire alive."

While happily Skyping away, we often forget to thank the team that created Skype. Some good things in life are still free.

I am heading a small energetic band 20+ networking professionals and we are developing a product to enable better quality of service in broadband networks. My team is in Bangalore, India and the other team is in Santa Clara, CA. Skype has become lifeline for us as we are using Skype extensively for better communications between the team members and that too at no cost. I still have a cell phone and I am certain that within next couple of years I will be using voice Skyping over my cell phone. I am sure you have heard of all this before so it may not be very exciting. However, let me tell you a story which will give you a feel for why we love Skype.

About 3 weeks ago, our equipment was in Japan for an equipment trial. We had one engineer in Tokyo and rest of the team was spread between Santa Clara and Bangalore. Time difference between Santa Clara and Bangalore is 11.5 hours and time difference between Tokyo and Bangalore is 3.5 hours.

Anyway, I received a Skype message around noon in Tokyo (night time in CA) that the software had some problems. We had a Skype session set up between our engineer at customer site in Tokyo and our engineers in Bangalore, who started looking at the error messages (which were cut-n-pasted) into the Skype chat session with a simultaneous Skype voice call. The problem was that we did not have any equipment in Bangalore to replicate the problem so we needed someone to transfer messages showing up on the screen in Tokyo site.

In the mean time, we woke up one of the engineers in CA and included him in the chat session. In about 3 hours we were able to figure out the problem and 2 more hours later we had a patch sent to the engineer in Tokyo before the end of the day. Customer was really blown away by the global cooperation and speed of execution. That evening, I took the team out for a drink and I toasted “Skype” for the success.

Thanks for best communications tool to date.

tags: skype, ashimroy, stoke, globalization, collaboration, communication, whatskypemeanstome

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Howard Wolinsky: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me." You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.  

Howard Wolinsky covered high tech and health care for 26 years from Chicagoland (Barack Obama is his Senator) before writing Skype's U.S. blog.

Back in late 1995, I was new on the tech beat at the Chicago Sun-Times.

I asked to cover the Net because I was tired of the medical beat. My bosses knew I was an early Net adopter so they set me loose to cover the emerging tech. I covered the pre-boom Internet, the dot-com boom and the dot-bomb, and then on to Web 2 and beyond before I left the paper in January.

Voice on the Net was among the technologies that intrigued me back then and does to this day, both personally and as Skype's US blogger.

The problem back in those days was you couldn't easily connect with friends and family. It was a bit like ham radio.

I remember using some early tech and speaking with a guy who claimed to be on a hammock on a Hawaiian beach. Another guy claimed to be in Austria. So they said.

Then, new tech came along, with an interface resembling a cell phone, that enabled you to put your IP address in as a substitute for a phone number.

It was a step in the right direction. But it was hard to get those friends and family on the line unless they were nerds.

There were always problems with sound quality. Echo. Echo. We were still on dial-ups modems in those days.

The big breakthrough came with broadband service. And of course Skype arrived five years ago and changed the game.

Regular audio calling is a great leap forward with Skype, with hi-fi sound quality. You can use cordless Wi-Fi phones so you don't even need your computer on to make a call. And you can make Skype calls over a regular phone; so you don't have to use headsets (though personally I prefer them).

Plus, you can use SkypeOut to connect at reasonable rates with people on old-fashioned phones. Video Calling on Skype will expand horizons further as people become accustomed to seeing the people with whom they are speaking.

Skype, with its low rates, has expanded my world, enabling me to do interviews with sources around the world for international and domestic publications. If I had to pay standard phone rates, I wouldn't be able to afford to do some of the work I do, interviewing people in Europe, Africa, South America, Australia and Asia.

Skype, which on August 29th is five years old, has changed my world — and I hope yours — for the better over the past five years.

The barriers of cost that once made global calling prohibitive are falling in the Skype world.

Thanks to Skype calling and IM, I am in touch with friends and family in Western and Eastern Europe, Australia and the Middle East. While in Peru earlier this summer, I helped new friends call their families back in the US; they were thrilled, grinning ear to ear.

As I rode on a bus to Stonehenge recently, I was chatting on a 3 Skypephone to a friend in Tucson. In London, I talked on the wireless phone to a friend back in Chicago. I hope this will come to the USA, along with other mobile technologies

More changes will be coming as the technology expands and improves.

Happy Fifth Birthday, Skype. Many happy returns.

tags: skype, life, reporting, journalism, What skype means to me, voip, howardwolinsky

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Fons Tuinstra: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me". You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.  

Fons Tuinstra is a journalist, Internet entrepreneur, new media advisor and China-consultant in Brasschaat, Shanghai. Fons writes the China Herald and is a principal of the China Speakers Bureau, the leading speakers' agency for Greater China.

On my social networks: In the past months I have used and dumped MSN, Yahoo, QQ, LinkedIn, Seesmic, twhirl and indenti.ca. I'm still on twitter, FriendFeed, facebook, gtalk and use ping.fm. My phone numbers tend to change each six months. The only stable force over the past dynamic years has been Skype. It keeps on humming in the background, while I subscribe to other social networks and related tools. And dump them again, of course.

tags: skype, stories, whatskypemeanstome, china, fonstuinstra, chinaspeakersbureau, socialnetworks, journalism, reporting

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Dean McGuire Jr: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me". You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.  

Dean McGuire Jr. lives in Bangkok.

It's a true gift for me because I am an American who now lives in Thailand. I have four kids back in the U.S. It gives me a chance to talk and look at my kids every day and that is worth more to me than another program or email out there!!

Thank you Skype. You are truly Love.
 

tags: skype, stories, what skype means to me, human capital, staffing, recruiting, career, video call, video, interviews, vlog, vlogging, videointerviews, podcasting, jobs, small business

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Ben Metcalfe: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me". You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.  

Skype is the text book example of the mixed fortune that can come from using 'closed source' software. By building their own proprietary VoIP protocol, Skype have been able to create a product with practically zero configuration that almost always works, even within the toughest environments (strict firewalls, multi-NAT'd routers, etc). 

However development and innovation has been stifled by the fact that only Skype, and their parent company eBay, can move the product along - no one from the community is really able to bring new direction to the product. With eBay's lack of vision for the product, users have been left with a service that has barely changed in the last two years, and looks unlikely to receive a significant revamp whilst it remains under the auspices of the auction house.

Ben Metcalfe explores the intersections of social media, Web2.0 projects in the enterprise, grassroots media/blogging, online media, platforms & API's, and disruptive technologies. I know Ben from his activity at the Spring 2008 Data Sharing Summit and several DataPortability.org meetings. You may see him speak at SxSW 2009 on Taking Platforms to the Next Level or Puppets, Theatre and the Conflation of ’Successful’ with ‘Popular’.

tags: skype, stories, what skype means to me, open, closed source, ebay, innovation, change, vision

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Bill Vick: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me". You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.

Bill Vick is an authority on finding talent for employers. Bill is a co-author of LinkedIn for Recruiting, wrote Big Billers, and is a sought after speaker in human capital circles.

Skype changed my business and opened up new worlds to me and the many others I network with. A few months ago I started using Skype Video to conduct video interviews with thought leaders in the recruiting, staffing and human resources area. So far I have over 60 interviews posted on my web site and most of those I interviewed had never used Skype video before our interview. Without exception they are all incorporating Skype video into their business model. Some of the videos I recorded have generated thousands of views and are featured at XtremeRecruiting.tv.

tags: skype, stories, what skype means to me, human capital, staffing, recruiting, career, video call, video, interviews, vlog, vlogging, videointerviews, podcasting, jobs, small business

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.

Andrew Y Ng: What Skype means to me

On the occasion of Skype's fifth birthday, Skype Journal will publish a series on "What Skype Means To Me". You are invited to email your essay or short thoughts to editor@SkypeJournal.com.  

Andrew Y Ng writes:

I started using Skype when my girlfriend was living in London for a summer, I tried various ways to call her and Skype offered high voice quality, ease of use, and was cost effective. After that I kept using Skype mostly as an IM client as it provides encryption under the hood. And then I discovered the greatness of Skype's group chat feature when a number of friends and forum members at SuperFuture started using it for group and voice chat. I was amazed how I could get to know someone across the globe so well via Skype.

I changed careers and got into the "web 2.0" business and was the VP of Technology of OnMyList.com, I suggested using Skype group chat to collaborate among the 4 people we had in the company. It worked extremely well and it was paramount to our communication. When I joined another startup I got them to use Skype as well for collaboration.

I am now working as a freelance consultant on Ruby on Rails sites, Facbeook, and other social applications, my partner and I communicate exclusively via Skype. We created Dealistic.com while he lives in DC and I am in San Francisco, 70% of the work done together via Skype voice chat and iChat screen sharing. We would have Skype voice chats for over 12 hours and it works flawlessly.

So what Skype means to me? It means staying closer to my closest friends and family, it means saving cost while running my own consulting practice, it means getting things done and collaborating effectively.

tags: skype, stories, life, love, relationships, superfuture, onmylist, collaboration, dealistic, ichat, what skype means to me

Follow Phil Wolff on Twitter or FriendFeed or on Skype.