Skype #1 in international calls
If you have been wondering all these years where all your money went, telecoms should be at the top of your list. I do not want to think of the unavoidably huge amounts that went to calls for family and friends… It is with great happiness and a feeling of sweet revenge that I read that Skype is now the number one international call provider with approximately 33 billion minutes in 2008, an increase of 40% over 2007. And there is more coming for cash strapped 2009…
All this traffic is mainly Skype-to-Skype calls (about 25 billion minutes) that are 100% IP based (and free), the remaining is Skypeout calls from a PC to a normal land-line or mobile telephone. All these billions of minutes are a good explanation of the turnover stalemate of telecoms, a fact about which I am more than happy. All these years I have seen pricing lowered at a crawling rate and in many cases implemented after pressure by regulatory bodies (see what is happening now in the EU with mobile operators).
Of course, voice minutes have also been wiped out by other forms of communication. Emails, chat sessions, social networking, these are all forms of communication that in many occasions make voice unnecessary. In my experience, Skypeout is a great way to do calls to landlines. Pricing is for many countries as low as 0.01 euro/minute, but just take care with mobile phones. Prices there are a lot higher and even change with operators. So check beforehand. In general however, you are not into selling your TV set to keep in touch.
Wait! There is even more coming. The good news is that Skype is now introduced to the iPhone and Blackberries. These are at the moment very popular platforms for data. So there is no reason users shouldn’t switch to Skype whenever conditions allow, to get away with some pretty cheap or even free calls. Voice calls are here to stay. Rocket high pricing isn’t. Let’s celebrate and thank Skype for this.
[Wired]
