When you were young, were you told off by your parents for incessantly being on the telephone? Were you held responsible for the mile-long telephone bills? Are you a student pursuing your studies abroad? It must be difficult and expensive to keep in touch with family and friends. Well, the latest fad in cyber communication can be the answer to your woes. Skype ~ Free Internet Telephony that just works!
Skype is “… a free program that uses the latest P2P…technology to bring affordable and high quality voice communications to people all over the world…”. Anyone familiar with KaZaA will know what I’m talking about. Peer-to-peer (P2P) technology allows users to share, search for and download files. Skype is compatible with not only Windows but also with Mac OS X, Pocket PC and Linux. Skype boasts of both excellent sound quality and highly secure calls with end-to-end encryption. Firewalls and routers don’t have to configured because Skype “just, you know… works. ” Instant messaging, conference calls and file transfers are also key features of the software. For a cheap price, you can also make calls to ordinary landlines and mobile phones using the SkypeOut feature.
Skype is quite easy to install. A wizard then guides you through the registration process. The built-in “Global User Directory” can help you to find long-lost friends or make new ones! The interface is very user-friendly. To make a call, you only have to right-click your contact and select call or click the Call icon. Both the caller and the recipient hear a ring tone. To answer the recipient simply clicks on the Answer icon.
Wasim Ahmed, an Indian student at the Asian Institute of Management says, “I regularly use Skype to chat with my family back at home. The other IM softwares (that I have used) coupled with their dial-up connection were a nightmare. Now, that they have a broadband connection it’s a party!”
The drawback to using Skype is that it uses proprietary protocols. Also there is a slight audible glitch, which can safely be overlooked when compared to other available IM or voicechat softwares. The use of Skype by corporates is also being debated.
All said and done, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Skype has already hit the 100, 000, 000 download mark. Think about it!