171–180 of 277 posts
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Yes I am and don't call me Surely? (sorry, punctuation nazi + Airplane reference temptation overwhelming)
http://ignorethecode.net/blog/2011/03/30/skype_5/
I see. That makes the 8.5 billion (price + debt) make more sense.
This is Microsoft's ICQ moment. Overpaying for a company at the moment when its core competency is becoming a commodity. Does anyone have the slightest bit of loyalty to Skype? Of course not. They're going to use whichever video chat comes built into their SmartPhone, tablet, computer, etc. They're going to use FaceBook's eventual video chat service or something Google offers. No one is going to actively seek out Sky…
Which is now owned by DST the same large investors in Facebook and Zynga.
Maybe I've missed something, but what has changed in the two years since eBay spun off Skype at a valuation of < $3B to make it worth more than $7 billion today?
The value of the dollar's dropped. Not by that much, but it's certainly changed. That, and ebay never figured out how to monetize it. MS likely has some plans in place to aggressively make money from it. I'm a skype subscriber, and probably will continue to be one, assuming they keep at least the same level of support for Macs.
Some ppl in and around ebay monetized the buying and the selling big big time.
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linode.com
Yes. Instead of using the free app Skype, I should instead pay $20/month for a virtual server just so that I can have an always-on screen session with an IRC client running in it. Makes total sense.
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I think this is a reference to AOL buying ICQ.
I don't understand. AOL bought ICQ for 400M, got patent exclusivity to IM for some time, sold a bazillion ad dollars during the dotcom boom through the ICQ client, and then sold the company recently for 200M. I am sure AOL came out ahead on that deal. What is an ICQ moment?
First, the way for Skype to make decent revenues is to go for the enterprise market, which brings them paying customers. It would be really hard to convert end users to paying customers, because of all the competition out there (Google Voice). So, they need to cater to enterprise customers. And Microsoft is huge on the enterprise, they would be able to integrate it into their suites, and make it a multi-billion dollar product in a few years.
I don't see any reason for Facebook buying Skype (different technology, different culture, price too high). Also I don't see any reason for Google to buy it other than to kill it and fold it into Google Voice (possible anti-trust issues?). So, even if the Microsoft-Skype deal isn't a match made in heaven, it still makes much more sense than Facebook-Skype, or Google-Skype.
This is Microsoft's ICQ moment. Overpaying for a company at the moment when its core competency is becoming a commodity. Does anyone have the slightest bit of loyalty to Skype? Of course not. They're going to use whichever video chat comes built into their SmartPhone, tablet, computer, etc. They're going to use FaceBook's eventual video chat service or something Google offers. No one is going to actively seek out Sky…
This is Microsoft's ICQ moment. Overpaying for a company at the moment when its core competency is becoming a commodity. Does anyone have the slightest bit of loyalty to Skype? Of course not. They're going to use whichever video chat comes built into their SmartPhone, tablet, computer, etc. They're going to use FaceBook's eventual video chat service or something Google offers. No one is going to actively seek out Sky…
> This is Microsoft's ICQ moment Is that a reference to ICQ's "Uh-oh"? If so, I fully agree. If Apple stock is priced to perfection, MSFT is priced to stupidity. This kind of wasted earnings is exactly why Microsoft stock sells at a mere 10x earnings. Investors are fully aware that a large portion of all future earnings will be wasted.