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Microsoft to Acquire Skype for $8.5 Billion
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ahhh just like iTunes. Sorry but your statement very much applies to what apple has done to iTunes over time. And I expect it to get bloated with even more tacky features *cough Ping cough* as iDevices become more and more popular.
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You are kidding, right? You know Microsoft's online services division is on pace to lose $3 billion this year? Cash cow indeed.
Why would Apple buy Skype when it has facetime?
our hope now is that Apple adds many features to FaceTime this WWDC, like IM, file transfers, make it more like iChat/Skype/MSN/Adium all merged together into one hell of a communication client, and write a Windows compatible FaceTime app, that way everyone gets a peek.
Don't worry, you can Facetime someone who cares
You serisouly have to pull your head out of the sand mate, the perception you have of Microsoft is very much 80s/90s, and the crap OS they made back then.... well upto Vista, Xp was good though, the company has matured a hell of a lot. Windows 7 is actually a big jump for m$ and a very good OS. This is a very good purchase for M$, skype is an excellent application, most people I know who own either a PC or mac use it, Facetime is a toy in comparrison. Apple should had made a bid for it, I will continue using skype on all my macs, its a great program.
that's it. i see a lot of cross over with MS purchasing skype, if FT don't do something for windows soon, it will be very silly i think
Exactly. How quickly people forget.
And ping....
And now, dot.mac errr, mobileme... err, icloud, whatever...
I can't believe all the negatives in this post. Leave it to the Apple lemmings to want all competition stifled and their iDevice development driven by the Board of Directors instead of consumers and their wallets.
Don't worry, you can Facetime someone who cares
He wasn't talking about software that Microsoft makes, he was talking about Microsoft's history of acquisitions. That has nothing to do with Windows.
nope. having skype is an abuse for everybody. they can't make it right. interface sucks, still no ipad version. their updates are downgrades in the end.. so, what do u wanna praise lol
FaceTime doesn't hold a candle to Skype in terms of overall value as a business product.
It seems many of you fail to see the potential here. Microsoft didn't buy Skype to keep perpetuating Skype in its current incarnation. They're going to be able to integrate it more deeply into Windows, and Skype is still popular among businesses. As someone else mentioned, they're also merging their current MSN user base with the Skype user base.
Lastly -- and possibly most importantly -- Microsoft has done something really well over the last decade (arguably better than anyone): console gaming. Moving this technology into the Xbox/Kinect realm will add a host of new users and give a platform for voice and video that's the best yet in the console gaming segment.
Edit: Just to be clear, I'm not saying this is an automatic win for MS. I'm only saying there's a vast amount of potential, if MS can harness it properly.
I can see a definite upside to this. Skype for Mac as an app blows chunks. Especially the new 5.x UI's assumption that everyone's either blind or 5 years old.
I don't really have a problem with the acquisition. I don't care that much about Skype as a company, or respect them to any great extent. As long as they do at least as (barely) adequately as they are already, it won't bother me. They can't drop Mac or other platform support, as it'd be a DOJ thing. Microsoft might even help Skype grow up. Their support and development strategy has been historically sucktacular (years to support proxy servers correctly), and frankly even a company like Microsoft can only help matters.
EDIT: Wait. Didn't eBay acquire Skype a few years ago? So what does that mean for eBay? Money troubles?
EDIT #2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype#History
I don't really have a problem with the acquisition. I don't care that much about Skype as a company, or respect them to any great extent. As long as they do at least as (barely) adequately as they are already, it won't bother me. They can't drop Mac or other platform support, as it'd be a DOJ thing. Microsoft might even help Skype grow up. Their support and development strategy has been historically sucktacular (years to support proxy servers correctly), and frankly even a company like Microsoft can only help matters.
EDIT: Wait. Didn't eBay acquire Skype a few years ago? So what does that mean for eBay? Money troubles?
EDIT #2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype#History
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Yeah iTunes is a good example also, but at the end of the day iTunes still lets you download, organise and play audio files as it once did.
Problem is: WLM is dying. People are using Facebook Chat now. Skype/Microsoft can just pray to the ancient transistor God that Facebook won't come out with a video chat or else Skype will lose active users faster than Myspace.
Sentillion and now Skype. Just another in the long line of purchases that don't appear to make sense. I'll keep an openmind but...
I agree. FaceTime is utter Tinkertoys compared to Skype on all fronts except video calling.
Most users on here, posters perhaps, think absolutely linearly. Whatever is now will be next year and forever: time and effort changes nothing. If MS didn't use Skype as a launchpad for something greater, MS is stupid... and... well, they are, but hopefully not THAT stupid.
Apple has several key objectives under Jobs, that I can tell. One is communications, and Apple should have been developing their own Skype-type service over the past decade. They've done baby steps that consolidate communications to Mac, but they could have done far-far better, especially since the iPhone has appeared.
Sooner or later they will have to develop something that turns the Macs (and other PCS) into "phones" or communication centers bypassing phone companies. And do it for pennies a day to go international. It's getting close, but it is still painfully expensive or tedious. MS might be bold and take that step, definitively. And thank God if they do... despite what other garbage might come down the pike in the MS sluice.
Anyone else find it very telling that Microsoft makes acquisitions to get customers they want while Apple makes acquisitions to get technology they want? Skype doesn't do anything that any of these other voice chat apps can't do (even Microsoft's) but what it has is pure numbers of users. Skype has become the de-facto way that "ordinary" people communicate over the internet mostly due to it's overly simplified interface that mimics an old fashioned phone.
Personally, I say good riddance. Skype has poor video chat quality and is lacking features that other chat apps have. Too bad Apple made Facetime a paid app, or they could take this opportunity to capture the inevitable fallout when Microsoft screws up Skype and everyone looks for a better solution. Instead people will just look elsewhere for one of the many other free solutions.
Personally, I say good riddance. Skype has poor video chat quality and is lacking features that other chat apps have. Too bad Apple made Facetime a paid app, or they could take this opportunity to capture the inevitable fallout when Microsoft screws up Skype and everyone looks for a better solution. Instead people will just look elsewhere for one of the many other free solutions.
unlike facetime skype is a lot more open and platform independent and the protocol is more efficient. microsoft will integrate it into x-box live and kinect so that you can call grandma from your x-box and she can see the whole family at once.
