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They are starting to roll out enterprise service. Skype for SIP now available in Beta.

Skype For SIP is the perfect way to integrate Skype with your existing PBX, allowing the communications from your PBX to be complemented by Skype functionality – head over to the Business blog to find out more about the Beta programme.

Somehow I don't think PBX interoperability is aimed at the consumer market. (though SIP support might help some consumers)

Not sure why you didn't link to the actual article on Skype http://blogs.skype.com/en/2010/12/cio_update.html [skype.com] Instead of the blogspam site.

Here's why: "Your organization's Internet use policy restricts access to this web page.
"Reason:
"Internet Telephony is filtered." - So I'm glad slashdot linked to the blog so I'd be able to read what was going on. My workplace is so backwards they still use old-fashioned telephone lines rather than internet phones. Oh and hot water radiators with that classic "thunk thunk thunk" sound when they turn on. Feels like I'm living in the 1930s. ;-)

Not sure why you didn't link to the actual article on Skype http://blogs.skype.com/en/2010/12/cio_update.html Instead of the blogspam site.

Providers offer free and unlimited use of Skype because 'it's what everyone uses'

If they were doing things for that reason, you would see phone providers providing free everything on their network because "it's what everyone uses", I don't buy it.

To be honest, all I don't like in Skype is the fact of not using a standard and open protocol (SIP) but their own closed protocol: this breaks the support from the open source community.

I have setup Asterisk previously with Skype's SIP terminator for a company, I fail to see how that broke the support of open source SIP software.

reg ADD "HKLM\Software\Policies\Skype\Phone" /v DisableSupernode /d 1 /t REG_DWORD /f

Mod that up someone.

>>'For a communications system this large to go down, it's almost unheard of,'
except it is not. Skype has failed before I've had a skype in number at home for two years. I do not use it any longer owing to lack of reliability. Often (way too often) I get busy signals on numbers that are not busy. I can hold my cell in on had my skype phone in the other and get a busy signal. I assume when the peer-to-peer network saturates in my area, I get a busy signal.

I won't use it for my home phone, who in their right mind would use it for a business? I wish it did work. I like the idea and I like the price, but stuff like this can't "mostly" work.

Mod that up someone.

>>'For a communications system this large to go down, it's almost unheard of,'
except it is not. Skype has failed before I've had a skype in number at home for two years. I do not use it any longer owing to lack of reliability. Often (way too often) I get busy signals on numbers that are not busy. I can hold my cell in on had my skype phone in the other and get a busy signal. I assume when the peer-to-peer network saturates in my area, I get a busy signal.

I won't use it for my home phone, who in their right mind would use it for a business? I wish it did work. I like the idea and I like the price, but stuff like this can't "mostly" work.

It’s worth noting that our enterprise product, Skype Connect , is working normally

From: http://www.skype.com/content/skype/intl/en-us/StatusUpdate.html?cm_mmc=PXTW|0700_B6-_-downtime-20101222-2

MEGA SUPER NODES

What are we doing to help? Our engineers are creating new ‘mega-supernodes’ as fast as they can, which should gradually return things to normal.

http://blogs.skype.com/en/2010/12/skype_downtime_today.html

The skype protocol isn't reimplemented here.
This software used skype4java

http://blogs.skype.com/developer/2006/10/skype4java_a_developers_collab.html

As does the information page

Requirements

• Android 2.1 operating system and above.
• *Please note that data usage costs apply for using Skype over 3G mobile networks (EDGE, EV-DO and UMTS), so we recommend an unlimited data plan or WiFi connection.

This page:
http://forum.skype.com/index.php?showtopic=62535

estimates 40hours/GB.

This makes a 2 GB of a data plan worth 4800 minutes. Considering "unlimited" runs $25-$50 and includes 5GB (memory and from what I've seen), I would say you can comfortably save money using it to talk.

On t-mobile, I generally use 2-3 GB, giving me plenty of breathing space to use lots and lots of data for voice (though I have unlimited minutes, so withing the US, I don't really care).

Note, I've seen other lower estimates of data use too.

Even if your iOS device were able to match the functionality of an open OS (which it is far from doing)

Functionality such as...? Please list all the use cases for an Android phone that cannot be matched by an iPhone?

You can't even use an alternate browser or email client

ibisMail, and tne numerous webkit-based browsers available on the itunes store would beg to differ with you.

I don't think you can even use Skype over 3G on the iPhone.

You could think that, but you'd be wrong - hint: read the part where it says "Use Skype everywhere - over 3G or WiFi!" Remind me again how awesome Skype for Android is? Oh wait, it's only available on Verizon, isn't it? Have you rooted yours yet to install a custom ROM?

Yeah, I can see how your mythical "open" device totally kicks the ass of the iPhone.

(about Android fragmentation) Huh? It's a lot less fragmented and inconsistent than Windows or the desktop Linux market, and those seem to be doing quite well. Seriously, I've been using Android since the G1 came out, and I know tons of people with everything from Samsung Galaxies to Nexus Ones, and I've yet to hear that complaint. Not once.

I bought a new Android phone, HTC Wildfire, for my girlfriend a month ago. Applications like Skype and Evernote still aren't available for this phone, unfortunately - so Android fragmentation is a fact of life. She couldn't get spotify to work either, but that might have been resolved since then.

Yes - but they'd apply to the AiGuru if the OP chooses that option. For completeness (and anyone who's still reading), the skype fair use policy is at http://www.skype.com/intl/en/legal/terms/fair_usage/.

actually @ 250Kb/sec
That is 31.25kB/sec
Which is 1.875mB/min
Equates to 112.5mB/hour
And totals ~2.7gB/day each way.

Besides its more like this. Therefore a nice unlimited plan (or one with a high shaping speed plan) would be nice =D

With Skype for...TVs it even begins to look like the old scifi dream...

Might be interesting if TVs/large displays on both sides are at the ends of tables.

Yes, I've used Skype and other video conferencing apps on a 56" HD TV. It really is cool to see larger-than-life representations of people on the other end. Kinda like being on the bridge of a typical Federation starship, where everyone you interact on-screen with is bigger than you are. Well, okay, like that minus all the nifty consoles, pointed ears, warp drives and hot Bantu women in miniskirts. But other than that.

Unless he's has a corporate-level Internet connection, he'll probably not want the thing transmitting continuously, just when someone is in the room. Might make sense, in that case, to interface the system with a motion sensor and only load the video conferencing application when the sensor picks someone up (or if you're using an open-source app, modify it to monitor the sensor directly.) I know some security programs that I've worked with (well, okay, pretty much all of them) for monitoring remote cameras have motion detect in software, but that's a different application entirely.

With Skype for...TVs it even begins to look like the old scifi dream...

Might be interesting if TVs/large displays on both sides are at the ends of tables.

I guess VoIP is verging on basic, but there are apps that work over wifi - the 3G restrictions are carrier based.

Skype now works over 3G.

if they did that, they could even make a web page
http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/get-skype/on-your-mobile/skype-mobile/

all about it....

That said, I don't like what Skype's been doing lately either - exclusive partnerships with Verizon, no Android app whatsoever...

no Android app? Really?

What's this, then? http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/get-skype/on-your-mobile/skype-mobile/android/

I have it on my android phone

The trouble with Skype is that the thing they are calling an "API" is not really an API to the Skype network. It is an interface to a running Skype process. That makes it quite hard for other networks to communicate with Skype network - the protocol is not open and there is no proper API.

5 years ago, when Google announced Google Talk (which is based on open protocol Jabber/XMPP), Skype soiled its collective pants, and without much thought, promised a proper api which they called SkypeNET API - http://blogs.skype.com/devzone/2005/08/skype_opens_im_and_presence_to_1.html
That promise was never delivered. As time went by Skype saw that Google Talk was not gaining enough momentum and they silently dropped the plan.

There is still no proper way to communicate with the Skype network - not even IM, much less voice or video. The way Fring and other such services do it, is by running a Skype process for every user and transferring data between that process and their own network, be it XMPP or something else.

I call for Skype to open up its protocol or deliver a proper API. Imagine that you could not send e-mail to a user of a different network - how much less useful tool it would be. Or that you couldn't call people from another telephone network from your phone. This is unfortunately the situation with Skype - you can not IM or call people in other networks. In the long run the only viable option is to make communication networks interoperable - telephone, e-mail etc has taught us that. It is inevitably the only viable solution. Skype has damaged the progress towards that direction seriously.

Let me guess... Verizon phone?

http://blogs.skype.com/en/2010/02/verizon.html
http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/25/skype-mobile-for-verizon-on-android-hands-on-with-wifi-off/

There is no Android Skype app other than this one as far as I know. If you've found one, please share it with us :)

Skype still haven't released a 64-bit version of the Linux client

Errmmmm, what, apart from this one?

Skype Downloads page

Ok, it's one of those perpetual "beta" releases. But it works, runs with Pulseaudio, and I'm looking at the webcam prefs right now and my face is definitely there.

I agree, the 2.0 and prior releases were dreadful but the 2.1 builds have been good for me.

You cannot use the Skype client as a SIP softphone without going via Skype themselves

No, but you could use Skype's Skype for SIP to do it, one of the SIP Skype gateway software combos out there or even a SIP service provider that I am too lazy to Google right now.

Being that Skype is providing this functionality directly, I honestly don't see the issue.

There is currently a proprietary Skype channel driver for Asterisk that you can buy and bolt onto your Asterisk server to make Skype calls. Does the availability of this new SDK mean that it will now be trivial for someone to build such a module and release it (minus the "Open SDK" of course) as open source?

• Skype open source (skype.com)
• Skype For Linux To Be Open-Sourced "In the Nearest Future" (slashdot.org)

Anybody who's tried to find Skype for an Android phone could clear that up. There used be an official Skype client for Android, but it's been withdrawn "in order to improve the mobile experience". Translation: if you want Skype on any mobile platform other than iPhone, you have to switch to Verizon. Hard to enforce if there's an Android SDK.

This is a win for Skype because they get some help in creating Linux clients, and it is theoretically a win for the Open Source community as they get a working Skype client.

Skype already provides a working Linux client here. I have used it on both popular (Ubuntu) and not-as-popular (Gentoo and Arch) distributions and it works great.

The idea is to get the Open Source hackers to work out the tricky bits like figuring out which API allows access to the web cam, and which API should be used for audio input/output. The folks working on the various distributions know how this is done, and Skype (apparently) does not.

Skype's official client uses V4L2 for video (the only current video API) and ALSA for audio (the most popular audio API.) I'd say they have it figured out pretty well.

Some folks are pushing again the variant integrated "into" TVs...

And don't get me wrong, videocalling can have its places of course - the private scenario for example - in controlled surroundings, to which you don't have to pay attention. iPhone somehow falls under that, too, being WiFi-only - but in the process limiting you only to other iPhone4 users, and that's a miniscule group in comparison to some others.
The latter part is really that little something one can have biggest problem with - there wouldn't be much of a problem with integrating also UMTS 3G videocalling, instantly giving access to hundreds of millions of other installed handsets (however underused it is also there). Or, if looking for something more "free" (regarding charges by the minute, etc.) - there's Jingle already available (also as already open standard), and using practically the same underlying networking & encoding technologies as this new Apple thing - but of course it wasn't good enough for Apple? (hm, could it be perhaps because Google is the initiator and probably the biggest "user" of Jingle?)

Who knows, on the iPad the balance might work out decently enough - a device which can be reasonably used while placed in front of you; and generally used in controlled / private / comfortable place more often than not.

But then, it would be not that different or easier from Skype on a laptop. Or on TV

And hell, there was hue and cry for a front facing camera on the iPhone, too. Now, if it only was made in a standards compatible way...

http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/get-skype/on-your-mobile/download/iphone-for-skype/

Skype-to-Skype calling on 3G is free until the end of 2010, after that there'll be a small monthly fee.

They are already facing some serious time in court over the hoopla with VOI>P and it is only going to get more ugly before the Feds step in and regulate them.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/06/atandt-now-allowing-iphone-voip-calls-over-3g/

http://www.skype.com/download/skype/iphone/
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/185433/vonage_offers_unlimited_intl_calling_for_iphone_blackberry.html
http://www.truphone.com/applications/devices/iphone/
http://www.fring.com/default.php

So GoogleVoice will be available someday? I already have Skype on my phone with a 3G unrestricter (jailbroken)

AT&T is already allowing VOIP over 3G.

http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2009/10/good_move_att.html

Fring / Skype / etc. can pop up a dialog when you get a call or SMS as long as you enable Push notifications.
As of last July for Fring
and September for Skype.

I wonder if you could run a skype ap over wifi? Just saw this: http://www.skype.com/intl/en/download/skype/iphone/ I assume it would work on speaker. Bluetooth headset option?

Ah, that's why... http://heartbeat.skype.com/

Okay seems like everyone and their brother has a different idea and since this interests me I tried to roll up as many of the interesting looking ones as possible into one posting :-) Did I miss any?

http://www.teamviewer.com/

https://secure.logmein.com/products/free/

http://www.copilot.com/

http://skype.com/

http://www.uvnc.com/addons/singleclick.html (reverse VNC)

http://www.crossloop.com/

http://www.mikogo.com/en/

http://showmypc.com/

https://www.ntrconnect.com/

http://www.zolved.com/remote_control

http://www.wippien.com/ (VPN)

http://code.google.com/p/gitso/ (reverse VNC)

The latest version of Skype is suppose to be able to share a desktop (they call it "screen sharing" http://www.skype.com/download/skype/windows/)

Tell me how an Apple developer can run a server allowing the client to select the program and it'll download and install the correct version, like Debian repositories. That problem has already been solved, and the solution is better (it also gives you plenty of other features).

Oh, and closed-source companies can have their own repositories too. Example: http://download.skype.com/linux/repos/debian/

I have seen the work has to be done rolling a Firefox update to clients on a large enterprise network, a truly large one. I really understand your feelings and in fact, I really wished a Mozilla foundation "suit" should see the amount of that work and compare it to IE update/domain level changes which absolutely looked like some basic computer game in comparison.

MS was evilly clever to roll out that IAK right when IE 4 shipped (or 3?), the companies, ISPs and large portals (Yahoo etc) loved that idea. How many years have passed? It is absolutely stunning that they expect companies to download some third party supplied MSI.

Look what Skype does, that mainly end user P2P phone company who doesn't really know enterprise:
http://www.skype.com/intl/en/download/skype/windows/business/ , I picked it immediately for a single laptop office. It would still have advantage like "repair" even on a single company machine.

In fact, the days where Apple admins and large home network users ask for a .package (think like MSI for OS X) has come already. Even with Apple's genius "drag&drop" install method became pain at homes with 5+ computers.

http://share.skype.com/sites/linux/2009/11/skype_open_source.html

Oh look! A skype SIP gateway http://www.skype.com/go/sip/

The only 'extra' I ever used:
http://forum.skype.com/index.php?showtopic=412061&st=0&p=1886351&#entry1886351

It blocks the irritating contact-spammers that you can't get rid of through skype's settings. Hopefully it'll keep working for a while yet.

Please feel free to vent to eBay where they will helpfully file your comments in /dev/null.

Why would eBay care? You might have better luck complaining to marca instead, since he just bought the frakkin' thing.

What? Skype supports SIP. Okay they slap a beta tag on it, and document the setup is more technical than your average Skype install. Oh, and you need to be running your own SIP server. But there's no walled garden that I can see.

http://www.skype.com/business/form/sip-beta/

Skype 2.1 Beta for Linux was released two days ago.

Google Voice for phone calls uses at&t minutes, which don't cost Apple.

Yes but using Google voice to make international calls would be way cheaper than making a phone call on your cell phone with AT&T. At the moment, the iPhone isn't just the device, it's also the infrastructure that supports the iPhone (which you pay gobs for). Google voice offers services that compete with AT&T and the iPhone infrastructure in ways big enough to hurt the bottom line of AT&T, which as you can see from other comments at the least, made this app go pouf disappear.

So, why didn't they pull Skype for those same reasons?

Just about anything with .deb works like a cross between .rpm in Red Hat type builds and .exe in Windows.

Lets take Skype for example: If you go to Skype's Linux Download page after you click on the "Download" button they ask you what distro you're using. Regardless of what it says you just need to pick the Ubuntu option. That download will be some long string of letters and numbers ending with i386.deb. Save that to your directory of choice (probably /home/user and if you're nasty /home/user/Download...in this way /home/user acts just like C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\My Documents). Now all you have to do is double-click that file just like you would skype.exe in Windows and the Synaptic Package Manager will pretty much do the rest similar to how Windows Application Manager does.

Now there are situations where its more involved like if you want to compile your own .deb package or something, or if you're installing a .bin file, but even then it isn't really too hard considering Ubuntu's deep forum support. When it comes to business environments most network admins in small or large businesses limit what a user can install anyway. If you'd want a program installed on your office PC you'd ask the admin who'd be able to take care of it regardless.

Another easy way to install apps in Linux is through the repositories and GNOME's Add/Remove Applications feature. This feature works the same in a Fedora build as it would in Ubuntu, but Ubuntu also has the Synaptic Package Manager to give you a GUI of your repository options. With these options its as easy as checking off what you want, then putting in the root password, then using the app! That's even easier than Windows!

Your webcam may be driver related in which case, yeah you'll probably be working from terminal a lot. Many webcams don't have proper Linux driver support (like my Orbit!) but that's more of a strike against the manufacturer or the community (in Ubuntu's case Canonical) than the distro itself (its not Ubuntu's fault nobody wants to get the drivers ready for your device...there are a lot of devices to figure out!).

Well first off Skype sucks. Not trolling, I promise. It just really sucks for quality and that is my own experience and that of several others.

I use Skype as my home phone, and dial in to conference calls for work. The quality is as good as my cell phone - it's not CD quality, but it's perfectly fine.

One big problem is most people have crappy audio on their computers, for example trying to use built-in laptop speakers and microphone. A decent microphone and headphones (not speakers) does wonders. I use a Logitech Quickcam Pro 9000 and some random iPod headphones.

I've tried Skype on my iPhone as well and the people I called couldn't tell the difference between calling using my cell minutes and using Skype.

A nice landlane-to-landline call is of course better quality - but how often does that happen any more? Many providers now use VoIP for backhaul, and even my desk phone at work is VoIP.

Skype also does require you to "pony up" more money to connect to "regular" phones. So it's not as free of a solution as one might think and I believe the person in the article wants to connect to the regular or traditional phone systems.

Indeed, it's $2.99/month for unlimited outbound calls to the US: http://www.skype.com/allfeatures/subscriptions/uscanada/

If you pay per minute, it's $0.021/minute, so if you use more than 142 minutes a month (about two and a half hours) then the subscription is better.

If you get an incoming number, it's $60/year ($5/month), but it's half off if you also get the unlimited outbound calling, so winds up being $60/2/12 = $2.50/month for inbound plus $2.99 month for outbound = $5.49/month for in and outbound. Plus they threw in free voicemail.

So for $5.49/month I get a phone that works anywhere in the world I have internet. I'm quite happy with Skype.

Slightly related, I'm going to plug my other favorite virtual service - http://www.earthclassmail.com/ They receive your snail mail, scan it via robots (frickin robots!), and give you SSL website access to the PDFs. $10/month for the basic plan, which is plenty for me since I have e-bills for most things, and basically only the government sends me dead trees. For physical things that make it to your mailbox (like replacement credit cards) they'll store it until you're ready to ship it to yourself. They're awesome.

I've been a paying customer of both Skype and ECM for about a year a and half now, and I'm very happy with both services.