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Why Microsoft bought Skype

cringely.com

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Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#51

Post by Raphael »

cletus wrote: post #24
barrkel wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Australia has small and expensive pipes to the rest of the world, and it shows up as caps and high prices. I'd be surprised if Australian telcos weren't working hard to degrade VoIP generally. For my own part, I use Skype for almost every outgoing phone call. I spend perhaps 5 GBP/month on threshold auto-credit. The biggest problems with it happen with concurrent upload activity, especially torrents.

This was true 10 years ago but a lot has changed and it's fairly damning evidence of just how much the US has stood still on Internet access in the last decade. Consider iiNet, Australia's third largest ISP: http://www.iinet.net.au/broadband/plans.html 200GB/month ADSL2+ for $50/month (+$30/month "phone tax"). In NY I have Time Warner Cable 50Mbps but it's basically capped at 250GB and I think I pay $80/month for it.…

But if the overseas pipes are the bottleneck, improved local infrastructure would mean more are fighting to use them.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#52

Post by lurker19 »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #47
Raphael_Amiard wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're still the ones who make the most used OS in the world. They're not the ones innovating and creating new markets and paradigms. But were they, ever ?

I've waved the "What did Microsoft ever invent?" flag plenty in my life, so let me try and advocate for the devil: Microsoft basically invented the hardware-agnostic software platform. Before Microsoft, there were a variety of hardware platforms, each with their own libraries and languages... not unlike the situation today with phones. Developers had to choose what to target... not only Mac vs PC, but different video…

Execution is everything. For everything Microsoft copied from someone you know about, five things you know about were copied from someone you do not know about.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#53

Post by VladRussian »

strangely, to me Skype deal looks like Storagetek:

1.obsoleting technology (Skype's power is Internet (typically PC, not mobile device) to "real phones" only enabled endpoints - this power is diminishing with communication networks growing today in any other segment except the segment of "real phones"-only enabled endpoints)

2.and commoditization of the rest of their technology - i.e. speech and video over Internet, and their technology not even being better

3.and no noticeable presence in disproportionally growing and more numerous segment of devices - mobile

The Skype was just becoming a niche player (in its old niche) and one among many in the rest of the telecom world.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#54

Post by fauigerzigerk »

ansy wrote: post #40
raarky wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you. MS and SAP would be a pretty formidable force. Having said that, MS continue to make very good strides in the business market but they still need to play in the consumer market.

You guys do realize that SAP is at least one order of magnitude larger than Skype, right? It rings in at a $77 BILLION in market cap on the NYSE[1]. I'm not even sure that represents SAP's total value, either. There seems to be a separate listing valued at $55 BILLION that's traded on ETR[2]. SAP AG was the fourth largest software company in the entire world by revenue in 2010[3]. That kind of merger would be unique…

I'm aware of that. Usually deals of that size are done at least partly through a share swap, not all cash. Microsoft needs to do something big. Skype just won't move the needle and it still costs a whole lot of money.

But there is indeed a problem caused by SAP's size. It's completely uncertain whether regulators in Europe would allow such a deal to happen. Microsoft and SAP wanted to merge many years ago (when MS was arguably more powerful) but it was called off due to regulatory issues.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#55

Post by lurker20 »

Here is what Microsoft should do with Skype and it's 140Million-member social network:

Beat Facebook. Turn Skype into Diaspora. (Specifically, take Skype's persistent chatrooms into the next dimension)

Integrate Skype with Windows Photo Album, Movie Maker, Spaces, blah blah. Mayke Skype a local application for managing your personal content -- photos, videos, thoughts, whatever.

Leverage Skype's encrypted P2P infrastructure to make truly privacy-protected social networking. Automatically send status updates and comments and stuff to a user's friends over the Skype network.

Make social network truly social, and not dependent on a central server.

Monetizations: * ads in the the client software * for-pay special privacy settings for business/paranoid: An Enterprise version that runs inside a private (corporate) network, with centralized IT authority. * For-pay broadcast-type features for self-promoters. * For-pay "professional" and other custom front-end for more specifically-structure communities than Facebook's free for all pseudo-"Friend" relationship.

Let users import/export their data between Skype and other network and blog systems.

Skype could displace Facebook, making social networking better for everyone, and rain money on MS.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#56

Post by slowpoison »

mcantelon wrote: post #35

According to Cringely "Apple has no peer". I guess that depends on how you look at it. Apple's execution is unparalleled, but the broadness and disruptive nature of Google's strategy is hard to deny. The new Android Open Accessory Development Kit strategy, for example, is something I'd never expect to come from Cupertino or Redmond.

Apple did announce the APIs for iPhone accessories a year or so back with iOS 3.0. Scope and traction of Google's and Apple's specifications/APIs might vary.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#57

Post by sshah »

there are talks about skype integrating with television sets. Think its LG and more to come. Xbox sits next to that tv and is one of the successful products in it's stack. maybe msft wants to be part of your living room?

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#58

Post by barkingcat »

ansy wrote: post #40
raarky wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you. MS and SAP would be a pretty formidable force. Having said that, MS continue to make very good strides in the business market but they still need to play in the consumer market.

You guys do realize that SAP is at least one order of magnitude larger than Skype, right? It rings in at a $77 BILLION in market cap on the NYSE[1]. I'm not even sure that represents SAP's total value, either. There seems to be a separate listing valued at $55 BILLION that's traded on ETR[2]. SAP AG was the fourth largest software company in the entire world by revenue in 2010[3]. That kind of merger would be unique…

That's why it would be an interesting acquisition / merger. It would be a transformative event, changing both companies in radical ways that would require a true leader with vision to take the reigns and recreate both companies.

In my opinion, buying SAP would be Ballmer's worse nightmare - he wouldn't even know where to start in harnessing the energies of both companies, and that's why we'll probably never see this happen.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#59

Post by rbanffy »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #47
Raphael_Amiard wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're still the ones who make the most used OS in the world. They're not the ones innovating and creating new markets and paradigms. But were they, ever ?

I've waved the "What did Microsoft ever invent?" flag plenty in my life, so let me try and advocate for the devil: Microsoft basically invented the hardware-agnostic software platform. Before Microsoft, there were a variety of hardware platforms, each with their own libraries and languages... not unlike the situation today with phones. Developers had to choose what to target... not only Mac vs PC, but different video…

> Microsoft basically invented the hardware-agnostic software platform

Digital Research did that. You could run a CP/M program on any CP/M-capable computer. Microsoft tried that with MSX (and failed) and then with MS-DOS (and succeeded on a different hardware platform). Only then, different graphics cards and printers became relevant.

> Other than that, I don't think Microsoft invented much

Visual Basic is one thing that comes to mind. I don't remember anything like it before. Hypercard and Toolbook were huge and heavy in comparison. VB allowed BASIC programmers to write compact Windows programs. That more or less doomed DOS.

Re: Why Microsoft bought Skype

#60

Post by rbanffy »

cletus wrote: post #15

Am I the only one who has had terrible experience with Skype? I live in New York but my family is from Australia so I use video-calling them to them all the time. I've tried using Skype but basically it's terrible. Poor audio, choppy frame rates and at some point it will start giving messages about "degraded performance" and we'll lose video. My setup is a 50Mbps cable line using wireless (N) from a Macbook Pro. The…

> 50Mbps cable line using wireless (N) from a Macbook Pro.

The folks at FLOSS Weekly recommend interviews to be conducted over cabled networks. You may want to try it.

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