Random Bytes...by Ross Rader :: SkypeOut Launched

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by Ross at 08:43AM (EDT) on June 30, 2004 | Permanent Link

Competitive indeed. 1.2 cents per minute for PSTN calls to over 25 countries? This is exactly what Skype needed to do to take the lid off their business model. I wonder how they are going to deal with the attendant regulatory issues now that they are a phone company.

SkypeOut Launched! Earlier this week, Skype quitely launched their SkypeOut service which offers very competitive pricing for Skype users to place phone calls to the public switched telephone network around the world. The SkypeOut Price List is online....
[via The Jeff Pulver Blog]

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Comments

Re: SkypeOut Launched

by Tim A on Wed 30 Jun 2004 09:49 AM EDT | Profile | Permanent Link

I'm still largely unimpressed with Skype. About all it has going for it is the hype but that might be enough. I guess time will tell. I don't like the fact that they haven't adopted any standard protocols so they are likely to go down with all the others that don't like to play the standards game.

BTW, this doesn't seem any different than what a ton of companies were doing 4-5 years ago. I wonder if any of them exist anymore. Mind you, back then the technology wasn't up to par but still, it kind of worked.

Re: SkypeOut Launched

by Ross on Wed 30 Jun 2004 10:34 AM EDT | Profile | Permanent Link

I completely agree, but like it or not they've captured the fleeting essence of being in the right place at the right time and are building some pretty neat mindshare.

And while this will take the lid off their business, it won't blow the doors off the industry. Price won't drive them as far as the need to go and their application (as currently configured) won't scale to meet the demands of their business - I mean, there's a mismatch between the functional scalability of the application as it relates to their chosen model. Reselling minutes just ain't gonna do it guys.

Now if there was an API into that network instead of the Skype application, they might be able to do some real damage.