I nominate Skype being a company that NEVER listens to their users!

[dontwalkhand]

Of all the developers that develop for iOS, Skype has to be the worst of them all. The following are things that users such as myself have been complaining about for quite a while now:

Group chats on iPhone renders the entire Skype app UNUSABLE I have tried just about everything, but as Skype opens up, over a million chat history messages decides to populate. You can't even try to use the app while this happens. You turn chat history off on the Mac and it alleviates the issue only on the Mac, but not the iPhone. What gives? Now when I open the app on the iPhone, I have to set the device down for over an hour before I can begin to use the app, because it insists on loading chat history from chats I have had months ago.

iPad support...there's none! And exhibits the same behavior as iPhone!

Doesn't utilize push notifications service. instead insists on running in the background draining your battery...no worries, this is going to happen anyway as it is busy trying to refresh chat messages from months ago...not like I can use the app anyway.

Why does anyone even bother with such a sub par service? I think I rather just pay Verizon more money to call internationally than deal with something that just crashes on iOS. I am surprised Apple isn't stepping in, as novice users may just decide to blame apple rather than Skype.

 

[ct2k7]

I agree with points 1 and 2.

 

[SilentLoner]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8H7 Safari/6533.18.5)

Yeah they never update the app

 

[psywzrd]

I totally agree and their customer service is non-existent. Great product and concept, poor execution and support.

 

[Che Castro]

Well the app is free

That says it all

 

[iApples]

I totally agree and their customer service is non-existent. Great product and concept, poor execution and support.

A lot of companies are like this. They introduce great products but they lack in the most important areas.

 

[Apple 26.2]

As been said, it's free... what else do you want for nothing?

 

[iceterminal]

As been said, it's free... what else do you want for nothing?

Not asking for much. Just that if you're going to put out an app, have it work properly and not fail, lock up, crash and burn, etc.
Thats all, just have it work.

 

[jacollins]

I'm assuming the Skype app is contracted out, from how little they update it.

 

[AdrianK]

Well the app is free

That says it all

As been said, it's free... what else do you want for nothing?

Some people pay for the service, and they get the same crappy user experience as people who pay nothing.

 

[Daveoc64]

Doesn't utilize push notifications service. instead insists on running in the background draining your battery...no worries, this is going to happen anyway as it is busy trying to refresh chat messages from months ago...not like I can use the app anyway.

They are simply following Apple's Developer Guidelines. A VOIP app (which Skype primarily is) should NOT use Push Notifications.

People seriously misunderstand how apps in the background work on iOS.

 

[BlaqkAudio]

Well the app is free

That says it all

As been said, it's free... what else do you want for nothing?

So? Skype tries to gouge its users by charging for things as simple as group video calling. I can't even do a group video call between myself and two other people.

If they can't even get the app to work properly, what makes them think I want to pay for a subscription?

 

[ndatx]

Skype Out Caller ID

New to this. Had used skype for video calls, so thought I'd give it a shot on the iPhone app.

Just want a straight answer, since Skype/ATT won't give me one.

If you set up your ATT cell as your caller ID for ONLY SkypeOut calls, will it work?

Thanks!

 

[dmk1974]

They ever going to enable bluetooth for Skype on the iPhone?

 

[Vizin]

.

 

[ct2k7]

They are simply following Apple's Developer Guidelines. A VOIP app (which Skype primarily is) should NOT use Push Notifications.

People seriously misunderstand how apps in the background work on iOS.

However, it may use push notifications for the sending of messages. I've just used my only support ticket now :/

 

[hitekalex]

This I did not know. Holy cow what bad design.

Backgrounding is what VoIP apps like Skype are SUPPOSED to do. It's supported by iOS v4 API, and is recommended by Apple's developer guideline. Push is not reliable enough to use for inbound VoIP calls.

The battery loss with VoIP backgrounding is mostly negligible. I will take that anytime over Push and missing half of my calls.

 

[roadbloc]

Be lucky you're using iOS over Android. The Android version is very buggy, lacks webcam and group chat support and drains the battery. In that respect, I appreciate the iOS version and all the features that it possesses.

Be patient.

 

[orpheus1120]

They are simply following Apple's Developer Guidelines. A VOIP app (which Skype primarily is) should NOT use Push Notifications.

People seriously misunderstand how apps in the background work on iOS.

In that case, Tango fails miserably because it uses push notification. So does Viber.

 

[steadysignal]

Of all the developers that develop for iOS, Skype has to be the worst of them all.

ok.

 

[Daveoc64]

In that case, Tango fails miserably because it uses push notification. So does Viber.

It's not necessarily "wrong", it just means that they aren't making the most of the platform's APIs.

Apple's designed a very good VOIP API set that enables very responsive VOIP calls while ensuring that battery life is not used too much.

Push Notifications are notoriously unreliable.