I have been using Skype, the popular VoIP application. We run parts of our business using it, talking to our designers and techies in different countries. I have introduced several friends, clients and associates to it, who after initial incredulity, happily joined the ranks of the Skyping.

So, I was not surprised that James Fallows gave it the thumbs up.

Skype's distinction is that, for now at least, it is the easiest, fastest and cheapest way for individual customers to begin using VoIP. It works this way:

First, you download free software from skype.com. Skype runs on most major operating systems, including Windows XP and 2000, Linux, Pocket PC for portable devices and, as of this summer, Mac OS. On three of the computers on which I installed it, it ran with no tweaking at all. On the fourth, I had to change one setting for the sound card, following easy instructions on the site.

What is the secret of Skype's success? Network effect and open and free access, which despite being the watchwords of the dot.com fiasco, are increasingly validated in this dot.net era.

Skype illustrates network economics in the purest form: free connections within the network become more valuable to each user as more users sign up. Because of the system's peer-to-peer design, loosely related to the Kazaa file-sharing program that Mr. Zennstrom and Skype's other co-founder, Janus Friis, invented four years ago, the system scales well - that is, it doesn't bog down as more users join. The peer-to-peer design also allows it to work behind most Internet firewalls.

However, there seems no reason for Skype not to make it even bigger, other than eager regulators and entrenched telecoms rising to the VoIP 'challenge'.

In the meantime, let's Skype into the sunset.

via Boing Boing

Back to Big Blog Company