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New Skype Update Is Horrible

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Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#11

Post by JumpCrisscross »

Meekro wrote: post #10

What could I switch to (on both Mac and PC) that would give me better video chat functionality? Edit: Just to clarify, here's what I'm looking for: 1. Free plan; available everywhere in the world (I have family outside the US). 2. Both Mac and PC clients that are actually good. 3. Video chat quality (including noise filtering and such) that matches or exceeds what Skype can do. 4. IM-like client that supports text, v…

Signal, Join.me, FaceTime, et cetera. I no longer accept invitations to communicate via Skype.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#12

Post by fspacef »

Meekro wrote: post #10

What could I switch to (on both Mac and PC) that would give me better video chat functionality? Edit: Just to clarify, here's what I'm looking for: 1. Free plan; available everywhere in the world (I have family outside the US). 2. Both Mac and PC clients that are actually good. 3. Video chat quality (including noise filtering and such) that matches or exceeds what Skype can do. 4. IM-like client that supports text, v…

For one-on-one interactions, I haven't found anything better than FaceTime on Macs.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#13

Post by madaxe_again »

Meekro wrote: post #10

What could I switch to (on both Mac and PC) that would give me better video chat functionality? Edit: Just to clarify, here's what I'm looking for: 1. Free plan; available everywhere in the world (I have family outside the US). 2. Both Mac and PC clients that are actually good. 3. Video chat quality (including noise filtering and such) that matches or exceeds what Skype can do. 4. IM-like client that supports text, v…

FaceTime, if you're on mac.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#14

Post by nemothekid »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #9
komali2 wrote: post #5

Has skype ever been good? For as long as I can remember it was a necessary evil until we finally managed to replace it with Hangouts and the like.

...Has Hangouts ever been good? Like, I totally get complaining about Skype. The P2P stuff caused it to be kinda wonky. But your choice for "better" is Hangouts? Between the five or six alternative Google chat offerings, the attempts to merge it with the dialer and SMS apps, the cutting out of the online/offline statuses. Google Talk was great though, back in the day.

It's really hard to find a decent, no frills video conferencing tool. FaceTime comes the closest to this, but unfortunately it can only be used on Apple products.

I'm continually frustrated by the fact Chrome constantly breaks in Hangouts.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#15

Post by sotojuan »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #11
Meekro wrote: post #10

What could I switch to (on both Mac and PC) that would give me better video chat functionality? Edit: Just to clarify, here's what I'm looking for: 1. Free plan; available everywhere in the world (I have family outside the US). 2. Both Mac and PC clients that are actually good. 3. Video chat quality (including noise filtering and such) that matches or exceeds what Skype can do. 4. IM-like client that supports text, v…

Signal, Join.me, FaceTime, et cetera . I no longer accept invitations to communicate via Skype.

appear.in has worked fine with me too.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#17

Post by burntcookie90 »

Meekro wrote: post #10

What could I switch to (on both Mac and PC) that would give me better video chat functionality? Edit: Just to clarify, here's what I'm looking for: 1. Free plan; available everywhere in the world (I have family outside the US). 2. Both Mac and PC clients that are actually good. 3. Video chat quality (including noise filtering and such) that matches or exceeds what Skype can do. 4. IM-like client that supports text, v…

zoom.us is what we use at Trello with 100+ people at times.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#18

Post by derefr »

Question: does Skype for Business (nee Lync) mirror these same UX changes as Skype makes them, or does it do its own thing?

Because I'm guessing this is just Microsoft further differentiating their product categories: today's Skype is for consumers (ala Facebook Messenger), so it gets "cute" features at the expense of the ability to use it for productivity; while Skype for Business continues to be about efficient collaboration and productivity (ala Slack) at the expense of "fun."

The real thing that's upsetting people, I think, is that before Skype for Business existed, Skype was for both use-cases, so a lot of people used "Skype" to get things done and were satisfied with it, and it has since evolved into a product that's not for them. The product that serves those people's needs now is Skype for Business, not Skype.

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#19

Post by [deleted] »

madaxe_again wrote: post #13
Meekro wrote: post #10

What could I switch to (on both Mac and PC) that would give me better video chat functionality? Edit: Just to clarify, here's what I'm looking for: 1. Free plan; available everywhere in the world (I have family outside the US). 2. Both Mac and PC clients that are actually good. 3. Video chat quality (including noise filtering and such) that matches or exceeds what Skype can do. 4. IM-like client that supports text, v…

FaceTime, if you're on mac.

[deleted]

Re: New Skype Update Is Horrible

#20

Post by jchw »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #9
komali2 wrote: post #5

Has skype ever been good? For as long as I can remember it was a necessary evil until we finally managed to replace it with Hangouts and the like.

...Has Hangouts ever been good? Like, I totally get complaining about Skype. The P2P stuff caused it to be kinda wonky. But your choice for "better" is Hangouts? Between the five or six alternative Google chat offerings, the attempts to merge it with the dialer and SMS apps, the cutting out of the online/offline statuses. Google Talk was great though, back in the day.

Hangouts has worked well for me on Chromium on Linux. We use it for meetings and while I'll admit it amazes me there's not really anything better, it does the trick. If anything, I hope Google continues to improve it.
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