Jon Stahl’s Journal

Skype is a new p2p IP telphony application from the makers of Kazaa. Key benefits are: encryption of calls, allegedly high quality, and zero configuration even in complex network environments. Interesting.

Followup: Now that I’ve installed and read the license agreement, I’m less excited. Quoth the license agreement:

“You acknowledge that certain functions in the Skype Software are only available to paid subscribers after a free trial period of the Skype Software and Services (the “Free Trial Period”) ends. Namely, you acknowledge that the ability to make and receive calls to non-paying users of the Skype Software and Services is only available as a paid subscription service (the “Subscription Services”). After the Free Trial Period ends, you will be presented with the option to subscribe to the Subscription Services. If you do not wish to subscribe, you acknowledge that you can only make and receive calls with subscribers of the Subscription Services and not with non-paying users of the Skype Software and Services”

In other words: you will pay to talk to people who don’t pay us. Lame. Still, the continuing action in low-end P2P IP Telephony bodes will for the future of low-cost Internet-enabled voice communication.

UPDATE - August 2004: Skype has matured a great deal in the past few months. It’s still completely free for PC-to-PC calls, and they’ve just launched a inexpensive pay service that lets you make calls to regular phones. We’ve been using Skype a great deal for calls to our field offices, and it has been working really well for us. The big pluses are ease of setup, ease of use and sound quality. Downsides: not standards-based, unclear long-term financial viability, and no Mac support. So, a cautious thumbs up.

Tags: VOIP