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Comments: 125 +- Technology: EBay Sells Skype To Marc Andreessen on Tuesday September 01, @08:05AM
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CmdrTaco
on Tuesday September 01, @08:05AM
from the must-be-nice-to-have-that-bankroll dept.
from the must-be-nice-to-have-that-bankroll dept.
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Julefrokost writes "Computerworld has a story about eBay selling Skype. Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Netscape, along with a group of investors, are reported to have paid $2 billion for Skype. According to the New York Times, Google was also a potential buyer. Also, the original founders of Skype are said to have placed a bid, but Marc Andreessen & Co was the highest bidder."
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I hope they improve it... as it was. (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope the new owners make it better and re-incorporate the functionality it had before.
I really miss Skypecasts, it was a really useful tool for practicing languages and having informal meetings (moderation, talk turns, etc)...
Just today I spent about an hour looking for a skypecast alternative where I could practice my German with others (maybe first only hearing and talking a bit later).
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I have found online sex chats/video with foreign women as a good alternative for learning new languages.
Skype worth half the value of Marvel? (Score:5, Interesting)
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They charge for calls to regular phones.
Re:Skype worth half the value of Marvel? (Score:4, Informative)
If you RTFA you would know that "its revenue grew 25 percent year-on-year to $170 million in the second quarter".
Parent
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WTF is "GAFIDA"?
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If it was GAFDIAF, it'd be Go And Fucking Die In A Fire, but it's not so I don't know what it means.
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You forgot to substract operating expenses (payroll, data centers, facilities, bills, etc.). Try this:
(revenue - expenses) = profit
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giving skype money is the best alternative currently available to "explaining to your mom how to get skype to work"
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Does Skype even make money..?
Does Marc Andreessen?
Re:Skype worth half the value of Marvel? (Score:4, Funny)
No, I'd say Skype is only worth about 2 X-Men and a Spiderman.
Parent
Oops. (Score:2)
Ekiga (Score:2)
Is there a Windows port?
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Is there a Windows port?
Sure, http://wiki.ekiga.org/index.php/Windows_Users [ekiga.org]
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Which is cool. If you've got Mac, Windows, and Linux versions of a decent SIP solution (Ekiga's become one and there's a few good alternatives if you don't like that...) then all you'd need is a sip service that has PSTN dial-out/in support. There's a few, but the truth of the matter is that all of them have issues and it's entertaining trying to find SIP hardware like you can Skype stuff in the stores.
Surprised (Score:5, Informative)
Surprised? Oh my yes... (Score:3, Interesting)
The fact that the "underlying P2P" technology was not property of Skype made me wonder about the possibility of the technology owners enabling eavesdropping mechanisms behind closed doors..
Sometimes it takes a very long time for the penny to drop. Ah, I'm getting old.
Could it possibly be that a *much* larger organisation than the Hollywood studios is actually behind the drive to quash P2P technology universally?
Follow the money, they say. Now... it's not a question of who would benefit most, but who would lose the most if P2P was allowed to roam free?
Next question - Who is shaping down P2P network traffic without telling us? The ISP's? And they're owned by...
The Telcos. Yep, all of them.
Buy now!!! (Score:2, Funny)
I wonder if there was a "Skype" item on sale in eBay...
Google must have hit a "speed bump". :)
Re:Buy now!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Buy now!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
With Google voice I can call Europe for 2 cents a minute from any U.S. phone, without having to log onto my computer.
With Google Voice, you need a land line, or to burn up cell minutes. That's a major liability. I use GV every day, but it's no substitute for internet telephony. (There are numerous SIP providers out there, though.)
Parent
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Naw. Google Voice works just fine with Gizmo5 over SIP. It looks pretty easy to set up, and by all appearances is totally free.
Re:Buy now!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Buy now!!! (Score:4, Interesting)
They aren't the same thing at all. With Google Voice, you still need some kind of phone service to make calls. In fact, one cost effective way to use Google Voice is to combine it with Skype.
It would be nice if Google provided an internet phone service as part of Google Voice. I'm currently looking into using Google Voice in combination with Gizmo5 [gizmovoice.com], which looks very promising. Whether Skype or Gizmo5 is a less expensive pairing for Google Voice depends on your usage patterns - Gizmo5 is cheaper up front, but Skype offers unlimited domestic calling for a set price.
If anyone has experience with this, please share your advice. I have been annoyed by Skype's billing policies and customer service lately, which is what is making me want to switch.
Parent
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Google Voice + Magic Jack (http://www.magicjack.com/1/index.asp)?
Great, more price increases for Skype users now? (Score:2, Offtopic)
I stopped using skype years ago because the quality was never great, not compared to my Cisco 7960G anyway. For a while I was even considering buying dedicated Skype hardware but now I'm very glad I didn't
Re:Great, more price increases for Skype users now (Score:4, Informative)
I did the same thing, purchasing a Linksys SPA-2200 and connecting it to a Canadian SIP provider (Acanac). That's after purchasing a crappy Skype USB phone. The difference is astounding and it's a dirt cheap, full replacement for a landline. I even use ekiga on a netbook when I wan't a "portable" phone line. And if Acanac ever raised their price, I can easily switch to a different provider and use the same box.
Parent
Buy it now? (Score:4, Funny)
eBay sells at a great loss (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:eBay sells at a great loss (Score:5, Informative)
According to the Washington Post [washingtonpost.com], they are selling a 65% stake and are retaining the other 35%. This values it at $2.75 Billion so not as big a loss as originally stated.
Parent
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When eBay bought Skype it was seen by many as the worst IT business deal, ever!
I don't know about that statement, Time Warner got raped for $164 billion when it merged with AOL and had to write off 99bln of it just two years later
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I hope they'll opensource it (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I hope they'll opensource it (Score:4, Insightful)
We already have an open VoIP protocol. Just switch to a provider like Gizmo and use whatever VoIP client you like--Ekiga, Twinkle, Gizmo's own client, whatever.
What Skype needs to do is die. The world doesn't need a closed proprietary phone network.
Parent
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You can point a video camera at an LCD screen to record a Blu-ray movie, but that doesn't make it open.
Skype is closed because only they know their protocol and can make clients for it.
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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.com]
Andreessen gets a tiny slice.... (Score:2, Insightful)
What would be funny... (Score:2)
...is if Skype was put up on an eBay auction :)
Ebay (Score:2)
Just released a new Linux client (Score:5, Informative)
This would have been more impressive ... (Score:2)
if they had actually sold it on E-Bay.
I don't trust a company that won't use their own product.
Re:Internet black magic not dead yet (Score:5, Insightful)
This would be an interesting insight if weren't for the fact it's already been sold before.
Parent
Re:Internet black magic not dead yet (Score:5, Informative)
Yet another free service gets snapped up for billions, in the hopes that it will somehow generate more than the expended value in ad revenue. Either that or some other magical source of cash influx that will not be spent by its users who are used to getting it free and will jump ship if subscription models become mandatory.
It seems a lot of people still believe that when the internet is involved, tried and true business rules and plain old common sense do not apply. Is the black magic of the interwebs not dead yet?
Last i checked, Skype was ad-free and financed itself through charging for connections to "real" phones and for national phone numbers.
You have no clue what you are writing about.
Parent
Re:Internet black magic not dead yet (Score:5, Informative)
I pay for SkypeIN and SkypeOut. It's a great deal. Unlimited Skype to Skype and 10,000 minutes per month to and from land lines. I have a real local phone number which displays on peoples caller ID if I so desire. Prices vary by locality, so check. It's about the same yearly as many people pay monthly for their cellular plan.
I have incoming calls redirect to my cellphone and office phone after so many seconds. You can load Skype up on your Windows Mobile, iPhone, and iPod touch with the Apple microphone headphones. While this is in no way a cell phone replacement, it's free minutes if you are near a good WIFI and need to place an outgoing call. There are physical wireless Skype Phones, but the quality is not near the level of a cell phone yet.
You can run Skype on many PC's at the same time and answer on which ever one you are sitting at. I have an ASUS EEE BOX PC at home wall mounted as an IPCCTV server, also running Skype. It's also running on my Laptop at work at the moment. My wife and I often video chat through Skype instead of using our phones. The audio is better quality than what my cellular provider offers.
Hopefully more people will see the benefits of the paid services and Skype will continue.
Parent
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Another major benefit is that there are Skype clients for Linux. I have Skype installed "just in case" on both my netbooks. If I can find wifi and have a credit card on me, I can get a phone. Seems like a wacky corner case, but it's not a lot of disk space. But more importantly, it's a bridge between the nerd world, and everyone else :)
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On S60 too.
Also, Skype is good for those stupid American companies that think they are being nice by providing 1800 numbers and don't realise that it's impossible/difficult/awkward to dial them from anywhere outside the US (or something like that). You can dial them using Skype...quality is mamahuhu, but it does work.