Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Microsoft is killing Skype

windowscentral.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 682 posts

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#131

Post by kaon_ »

drooopy wrote: post #101

The way Microsoft and Skype missed their opportunity during the pandemic to maintain or even expand their lead in video conferencing, while allowing a complete unknown (outside of the corporate world, at least) like Zoom to become the dominant platform, should be studied in business schools. The term 'Skype' is so synonymous with video calling that, based on personal experience, it is still used in place of FaceTime…

This. In German the word for "video-calling" is "Skyping". Similar to MSN, the strength of the brand and goodwill that it has in some geographies is on-par with Google for search, or Coca Cola for coke. The fact that the software got consistently worse, year on year on year is hard to grasp for me. Microsoft made the right call to cannibalize and use teams. But how was Skype such a pain? Not being able to share screenshots in chat killed it for me.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#132

Post by dcow »

KeplerBoy wrote: post #117
robertlagrant wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I remember correctly, the CEO at the time Steve Ballmer said they were betting the farm on mobile and ARM-based tablet computing. They went very hard on mobile until SatNad came along and killed it. (Former Touch Diamond user here.)

And here we are, in a world where Apple has made arm work wonders for them and Windows still isn't really a thing on ARM 10 years after ballmer resigned. Then again arm doesn't seem to be necessary when looking at AMDs APU offerings. It was just a decade of intel struggling with their fabs.

Windows is definitely on arm. It just sucks because Qualcomm failed to deliver a good cpu package. The experience is within a stones throw of Apple, though.

I also have one of the new AMD 300 AI platforms, and it still can’t do power right. Either the laptop is miserably slow on battery, or runs way too hot on power.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#133

Post by OskarS »

l33tman wrote: post #124
OvbiousError wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost everything I do for work uses teams, so I can't say MS missed any boats. It's spectacular how pervasive teams is given how universally reviled it is. I'd personally switch back to slack in a heartbeat for instance.

Don't know about Slack's videoconf, but Slack's cheap insistence that we pay a rip-off amount of money per month for storing some TEXT messages more than 90 days has continuously degraded my appreciation for it over the last years to the level of me hating it now. They're so cheap. Just put a quota on total storage or something, that actually map to their costs.. We have a Slack for a shared office of 10 people or so…

Slack is primarily a business tool, and for a business tool $10/user/month is extremely reasonable for the value (perceived or real) it brings. The company has to make money, and you do that by charging for your products and services, and that price is not exorbitant.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#134

Post by dzhiurgis »

wuschel wrote: post #62
edwcross wrote: post #32

Microsoft killed Skype for me a few months ago: the Linux version simply stopped working, and unless I install a Snap-based one (which I cannot do remotely on family computers), it's now useless. Also, my Skype credit simply disappeared from the account (granted, it had been sitting idle for a few years, but still). WhatsApp, Signal and similar apps completely replaced Skype, which stopped innovating years ago. Other…

Skype was very useful to call landlines from or two countries e.g. Europe to India. To my knowledge, Whatsapp et al do not fill this niche. Is there another solution that has this functionality?

Used to, now they are kinda expensive (as most of providers).

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#135

Post by SXX »

croisillon wrote: post #67
edwcross wrote: post #32

Microsoft killed Skype for me a few months ago: the Linux version simply stopped working, and unless I install a Snap-based one (which I cannot do remotely on family computers), it's now useless. Also, my Skype credit simply disappeared from the account (granted, it had been sitting idle for a few years, but still). WhatsApp, Signal and similar apps completely replaced Skype, which stopped innovating years ago. Other…

yeah my Skype credit has been quietly gulped too but officially you can reactivate it when needed

It's still possible through website. Makes me wonder if they will refund me mine.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#136

Post by dzhiurgis »

EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK wrote: post #88
nneonneo wrote: post #31

I put $10 on an account over ten years ago to make sporadic calls (e.g. customer service in other countries). That account still has $5 left, and I’ve made a ton of calls to many different countries. What’s a good alternative here? I just want to make outgoing international calls cheaply.

I use MobileVOIP, but voice quality and the probability of a call to connect is inferior to Skype.

30-50 cents per minute is very expensive.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#137

Post by chrismorgan »

kennysoona wrote: post #57
chrismorgan wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I remember how it ceased working on Linux once they bought it I can’t speak for long ago, if that’s what you’re referring to, but the last two generations of the Skype client have run just fine on Linux. I’ve been using it for the last five years. My only real annoyance with it (that is, the Linux client rather than Skype problems in general, which have steadily got worse) is that it relies on an org.freedesktop.se…

That all sounds like an issue with your particular setup more than with Skype. Just because that isn't how the Linux app works for most people at all.

Which thing? Relying on keychain to stay logged in, or bad startup performance, or the most recent minute-long freeze?

GNOME/KDE users should have a keychain running, so it won’t affect them. It’ll only affect people who roll their own stack a bit more. I don’t object to it using the keychain if it’s available, but refusing to keep you logged in if it’s absent is bad. Nothing else acts like that.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#138

Post by high_na_euv »

drooopy wrote: post #101

The way Microsoft and Skype missed their opportunity during the pandemic to maintain or even expand their lead in video conferencing, while allowing a complete unknown (outside of the corporate world, at least) like Zoom to become the dominant platform, should be studied in business schools. The term 'Skype' is so synonymous with video calling that, based on personal experience, it is still used in place of FaceTime…

Missed?

They grew Teams, lol.

Zoom - wtf, who the hell uses it after.

Discord would be better example since it is huge, even LLVM community uses it

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#139

Post by dzhiurgis »

jim180 wrote: post #58
AnonC wrote: post #7

Tangential: I have a U.S. Skype Number (i.e., a real phone number offered by the Skype service) that's mainly used to receive and make (occasional) calls from/to a bank and to receive SMS occasionally. The cost is about $40 a year. With Skype Number not available for purchase since December and the Skype platform (including Skype Number) going away soon, what are some simple, good (and preferably cheaper) alternative…

I use tello.com. You can get eSIM and activate it while you are outside the U.S. If you won't activate roaming, sms and calling will use wifi calling.

Do you know how providers detect your country when using wifi calling? Mine says it's only valid while you are within the country, wonder if VPN would work around it.

Re: Microsoft is killing Skype

#140

Post by mid-kid »

seydor wrote: post #114
mid-kid wrote: post #65

This makes me wonder, are my old chats still around? Is there any tool to back them up? Skype played a major role in my life for a good while, which I'd want to preserve.

yes you can download your skype chats https://secure.skype.com/en/data-export

Thanks! I exported my data through this and it didn't take too long. Unfortunately this has the same issue as every other data export tool, in that it doesn't let you infer context in surrounding messages, it only saves yours.

Also apparently chat logs didn't start being kept until sometime around 2017, most of my extensive skype use was around 2014, so I reckon it's all gone by now. Shame.

Post reply on HN