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Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

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Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#271

Post by RandyRanderson »

For those of us that can recall, skype wasn't that great even before the ebay purchase.

It seems like no one (incl google hangouts, msft, etc) has been able to solve the online conf call problem. Maybe it's not solvable? And no, other solutions are terrible too (join.me, ringcentral, etc).

I don't think i've ever been on a Internet-supported conf call where there hasn't been at least one major issue.

My cynical mind tells me the telcos have some custom software/hardware that detects conf call traffic and starts dropping packets but maybe that's just negative thinking[0]...

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandwidth_throttling

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#272

Post by Sephr »

jgaa wrote: post #149

Why is everybody hating skype? It's great! - It's almost as fast as SMTP for messages (pulling every 30 minutes or so). - If someone calls you, it never rings on the device you're currently using, allowing you play with that other device you had totally forgotten about. - It does it's best to distract you from what you want to do (communicate), by teasing you with social features you hate. - It's user interface is aw…

It used to be end to end encrypted secure p2p video/audio/text chat. That was removed, so there is every reason to hate it.

Skype used to actually be secure.

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#273

Post by brynjolf »

Me and my mom have used Skype for ages. The history is a big feature of that. With the new Skype I can't search that history, only newer stuff. Also she is permanently offline to me, she can't get notifications since there seems to be a mismatch between versions. Also if I use new client and search it shows me matches that don't matter at all, due to removing the search per conversation and turning it into a horribly messy universal search. I hate the new interface because it is worse, not because it is new. It is pleasant to look at, atrocious to use.

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#274

Post by Sephr »

crb002 wrote: post #42
patrickg_zill wrote: post #22

My view in the past was, that MSFT was essentially paid by the NSA to buy Skype and then remove the ability to make secure calls with it, by sending all the media (audio/video) through centralized servers that could easily tap the calls. Am I incorrect in that? Previously, Skype was peer-to-peer after the call was setup, with Skype servers only helping in setting up the call (essentially updating the registry of "who…

Does someone have a good writeup of this? Engineering wise they could still do peer to peer, but also send lower sampled audio to a central server via UDP, code it into text, then send it to the other client and brand it as an accessibility feature. Fast connection with NSA logs :)

A good talk on this subject is NSA Operation Orchestra: Annual Status Report[1].

1. https://youtu.be/fwcl17Q0bpk

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#275

Post by saagarjha »

israrkhan wrote: post #182
std_throwaway wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how software can get this much worse. Having done absolutely nothing would have left Skype in a better shape than what we have now. What did they do with it? Do they not regression test? Are they letting each new intern add a new feature while nobody really cares about quality? Did they just replace the old software with a new bug-riddled software that's getting pushed out the door without quality…

This happened because they migrated skype from a peer to peer software to centralized servers. While this has enabled certain innovations, like web-based skype and better integeration with other devices, it negatively impacted overall quality of skype.

Why can you not have a peer-to-peer Skype that works on the web?

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#276

Post by superkuh »

sandworm101 wrote: post #88
bigdubs wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's actually the other way around. "SuperNodes" (elective service as a kind of hub) caused lots of dropped calls and flaky connections because people were trying to do it on bad home connections. Microsoft switched to centralized servers to _increase_ call quality.

>> Microsoft switched to centralized servers to _increase_ call quality. Or to better address their CALEA requirements. It was about surveillance. It still is. The number of telephony decisions that are based on "security" boggles the mind. Why did Skype fail? Because I wouldn't trust Microsoft to protect my grocery list.

First eBay was encouraged to buy Skype. But they messed up and only bought the brand and users and didn't get the p2p backend which was still licensed from the European inventors. So then Microsoft was encouraged to buy Skype and they bought the p2p code as well and promptly put a stop to all the excellent end-to-end encrypted public communications going through Skype.

That was the end of Skype. And it's obvious who did the encouraging.

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#277

Post by saagarjha »

binarymax wrote: post #15

"Microsoft Corp. says the criticism is overblown and reflects, in part, people's grumpiness with software updates." Denial is the first stage of acceptance. Not sure how long the full cycle takes for a company as large as Microsoft, but Skype is dead.

I'm always always on the bleeding edge of software, and I'm still using Skype 7.59…

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#278

Post by saagarjha »

nikolay wrote: post #251

Many people replaced Skype with Viber as there's no spam. I have a very old Skype account with a vanity username, which results in tens of Russians adding me and wasting a few minutes a day blocking and reporting them for spam. Also, when abroad, Viber's audio codecs seem to use less bandwidth and provide better audio quality. I actually like the new Skype very much, but the spam issue needs to be solved! There are m…

> Many people replaced Skype with Viber as there's no spam

Except from Viber themselves, that is.

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#279

Post by hkmurakami »

Jun8 wrote: post #5

"Since acquiring Skype from private equity investors, Microsoft has refocused the online calling service on the corporate market, a change that has made Skype less intuitive and harder to use ..." This is absolutely not the bulk of the problem: simply put, the call quality is horrendous and dropping calls in the middle of the meeting is quite common. Modus operandi in most Skype conference calls in our company is to…

No wonder people are using Discord for corporate calls. And I find it humorous that Discord is imploring people to not use it for corporate stuff.

Re: Microsoft Turned Consumers Against the Skype Brand

#280

Post by saagarjha »

swtx wrote: post #270
zerostar07 wrote: post #93

I believe you can download the older version "skype classic" from somewhere. It keeps nagging me twice to update , but no i won't do that again.

The "classic" version is available here: https://go.skype.com/classic.skype

Great to see that that's still around. I had to go dig up a copy from Time Machine when they "updated" to Electron.
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