AmperorDirect Blog » Skype

Potential Skype Acquirers

Larry — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 22:18:31 +0000

There is speculation that eBay wants to sell Skype again. London Times published a list of potential suitors and listed why these companies may be interested. The article estimated that Skype would worth $1.6 billion, which is quite a bit less than the 2005 price tag of $2.6 billion squandered by eBay.

Potential interested parties are:

Microsoft: integrate Skype into its consumer communication products
Google: Enhance its own messaging, audio and video services
Yahoo: Enhance its own product offerings
Facebook: Offer new audio and video features to its existing chat and notification product

Microsoft, Google and Yahoo have the cash to pull the trigger; however I am not sure if Skype worths $1.6 billion to any of these companies.

Major Skype Announcements in 2009 CES

Larry — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 23:39:05 +0000

At the Consumer Electronics SHow, Skype COO Scott Durchslag made three major anouncements. Judging from these announcements, Skype is spending a lot of its R&D effort on finding more ways that people can make Skype calls. Smart Move!

The first announcement is the availability of a new Lite version of Skype for over 100 Java-enable phones. These phones are based on the Android platform and from companies like LG, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericssion. These phones are based on the Android platform which was initiated by Google and its partners. It would be interesting to see how this would compete with Apple’s iPhone.

The second announcement is the release of Skype 4.0 in early February. This version has been available in beta form for many months and provided major improvements in audio and video qualities. I am really interested to see its integration with Microsoft Outlook. It did not work when I tried it on a beta version.

The third announcement is Skype 1.0 Beta for Intel-based Mobile Internet Devices (MID). MID is a multimedia-capable handheld computer with wireless internet access capability. It is bigger than a cellular phone, but smaller than a ultra mobile PC or tablet PC. It runs mostly on Linux and its derivatives, although it is also capable of running Windows XP and Vista.

Unlike most Skype Wifi phones, a MID would have a browser and can be used in any hot spots around the world.

Video Chat is Becoming Our Lifestyle

Larry — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 17:29:38 +0000

Skype, Yahoo, Microsoft, AOL, and lately Google have all offered video chat as part of their services. Back in summer 2008, Skype reported that over 28% of the calls are video calls. This is way beyond my expectation.

With high speed internet becomes common household item and the cost and quality of web cams have improved significantly, video calls become very affordable. Most computers have speakers already and $20 investment would give you a very decent web cam along with a microphone. Calls are free.

How you use the video chat is only limited by your imagination; here are some examples:

Interview university applicants and job applicants
Tutor students remotely
Hold virtual parties and tours
Perform sales demonstration
Paint portraits by artists
Show off your new toys
…

Let me know on how you use video chat.

Skype releases Version 4.0 Beta 3 for Windows

Larry — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 20:43:56 +0000

Skype has been working on the beta version 4.0 for Windows for quite a few months already and I suspect that the offical release will come soon. I have been playing with the beta version for some time now and I like it — a lot. Here are some of the new features I like best:

Friendly User Interface
Full screen, high resolution video calls
History search by contact and event type
Automatic detection of hardware settings
Better record-keeping functions
View contacts from Microsoft Outlook
Import contacts from Microsoft Outlook, Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail
Better integration with PayPal
Better and faster installation process

I will review some of the new features later.

New Skype Installer

Larry — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:29:20 +0000

With the latest release of Skype beta client program version 4.0.0.169, instead of downloading the setup program (24+MB), Skype provides an installer program (2.5MB), which would download and install the latest Skype program for you.

This change was unexpected. I never had any problem installing or upgrading Skype before; however with the new installer, the process is much faster. The new installer must have the intelligence to download only the newly updated modules.

Star Wars Gadget for Skype

Larry — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 20:12:41 +0000

This is for Star Wars junkies – R2D2 webcam and lightsaber Skype phone. They look awesome and are the right size for my desktop. The web cam has excellent resolution. You can drive it around remotely via Skype and see what is going on inside your house.

The following is the product description:

The supreme Star Wars robot! Comes with a lightsaber-styled, Skype-compatible phone.

Access it from anywhere in the world! Get yourself an R2-D2 Web Cam!

Record and playback digital movies and snapshots with this multi-function R2-D2 Web Cam.

Use it to take pictures or monitor your room… and do so remotely. Using Skype software, you can actually access it from anywhere in the world!

Bearing a remarkable resemblance to a certain well-known and beloved droid, this extraordinary little guy measures 8 1/2-inches tall x 5 1/4-inches wide x 5 1/2-inches long and arrives in a flip-top box.

Both fun and functional, he’s the supreme Star Wars goody for the supreme Star Wars fan or collector! Batteries included. This awesome machine comes with a galaxy of features: Full-function forward, reverse, turn 360 62 vertical adjustment lens 2.0 zoom lens with 628 x 582 pixel resolution Lightsaber VOIP/USB phone 14-day battery life in standby mode.

I would love to play and write a review on it; however I do not have $350 to spare.

Moka Chat Enables English, Chinese, and Spanish Speaking Users to Chat With Each Other

Larry — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 17:10:19 +0000

Moka has announced a multilingual chat service for Skype, called Moka Chat. The language translation technology for Skype gives Skype users the ability to chat in English, Spanish or Chinese with other Skype users.

Moka Chat for Skype is now available for free during the beta period and can be downloaded from www.moka.com. After downloading and installing the Moka Chat for Skype application and selecting a language pair, users can easily enable real-time language translation for any text messaging conversation with anyone on their Skype buddy list. Because it allows the user to see both the original and translated text every time a message is sent, Moka Chat is also a powerful language learning tool. Moka’s learning-while-chatting feature makes language learning fun and interactive for all Skype users.

We will certainly give it a trial as we have Spanish-speaking customers who would like to contact us via Skype Chat.

Skype Has 14 Million Concurrent Users

Larry — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:53:55 +0000

Within 35 days, Skype has added another million concurrent users. This is good news for Skype as its growth rate (acceleration) had actually decreased in the second and third quarters of this year. The following table (most data was obtained from Jean Mercier) tracks the number of concurrent Skype users since the beginning.

Date	Online users (in 1000)	Days	Rate (1000/day)	Acceleration (1000/day²)
10/20/2008	14,000	35	28.57	0.680
09/15/2008	13,000	210	4.76	-0.091
02/18/2008	12,000	42	23.81	0.277
01/07/2008	11,000	82	12.20	0.102
10/17/2007	10,000	261	3.83	-0.032
01/29/2007	9,000	82	12.20	-0.023
11/08/2006	8,000	71	14.08	0.108
08/29/2006	7,000	155	6.45	-0.061
03/27/2006	6,000	63	15.87	0.087
01/23/2006	5,000	96	10.42	0.041
10/19/2005	4,000	154	6.49	-0.028
05/18/2005	3,000	93	10.75	0.024
02/14/2005	2,000	117	8.55	0.053
10/20/2004	1,000	418	2.39	0.006

The following graph was obtained from http://nyanyan.to/skype/7d_chart.php and it shows the number of online users in the past 7 days and the number of downloads.