photo credit: Altaide

Well I went back to the regular Skype interface today after months of using the Pidgin plugin.   At the beginning of the year, I was trying in vain to consolidate everything under one roof and I liked having all my contacts on one list.   So when I found the Skype plugin for Pidgin, I imported all my Skype contacts over.   All the buddy icons went with it and I generally found it nice to have everything bundled together.

But after a while, it started to irritate me.   You can’t make calls through Pidgin so when someone called me through Skype, both Skype and Pidgin would clash with one another leading to one of them crashing.    Plus the plug-in imported EVERYTHING over which meant I had to delete my 150 or so regular phone numbers from my Skype list which was intensely annoying.    Then when I chatted with a Skype contact through Pidgin, a Skype chat window would open too duplicating the chat messages…..

But the upshot of it all is that I missed the Skype user interface.   It is very user-friendly and easy to use and although Pidgin is also very good to use, I still prefer Skype.    So I went back to it today.    I just have to begin the tedious task of re-entering all those phone numbers again!

I am even considering returning to the Google Talk interface too….

Technorati Tags: API, pidgin, plugin, Skype

photo credit: STML

A new version of Skype - Skype 3.8 Beta for Windows - is out but I’m choosing to hold off installing it.   This is a first for me.   Normally I am first to install every beta version available of my favourite software (I am currently testing the new beta version of Filezilla) and I would be sitting there listing all the bugs and annoying the hell out of the developers!)    But this time….I don’t know.

I suppose I am not inclined to mess up my Skype up right now.  I am using Skype a lot at the moment for conference calls and I have things tweaked and set up the way I want it.   The last thing I want to do is to drop a bomb on my stable version by downloading a beta buggy version which, as Skype themselves admit doesn’t always “behave as it should”.

So when I heard from a lot of people about the tendency for 3.8 to drop a lot of calls or for it to freeze suddenly, I guess I got cold feet.     I can wait.   When I saw the features list, nothing sensational jumped out at me.   It’s not as if they re-invented the wheel or anything.    Most of it is just bugfixes.

Technorati Tags: beta, Skype, Software, VOIP

You’d think that with all their money and resources that CNN would be able to come up with the best video equipment that money can buy. But during a recent interview with CNN analyst Jeffrey Toobin about the Eliot Spitzer scandal, they ended up using a mobile phone, a laptop, a webcam - and Skype video.

Toobin apparently went to law school with Spitzer and CNN wanted his insights. But the analyst was on holiday with his family and the only way they could connect with him on Maui was through his laptop, mobile and Skype. So began Skype’s big moment of triumph.

CNN Senior Vice President David Bohrman said he was “pleasantly surprised at the quality of the video”

Technorati Tags: CNN, maui, mobile, news, Skype, spitzer, toobin, video, webcam

A post I wrote for Geeks Are Sexy. Multi-protocol instant messaging client Pidgin can do a lot of things, especially through built-in plug-ins, but has yet to integrate internet calling service Skype into its offerings. Enter the Skype API Plugin, an early attempt at getting Skype’s instant messaging features working in Pidgin.

read more | digg story

Technorati Tags: API, IM, integrate, pidgin, Skype

I am way behind with my blogging due to my recent trips and my other writing obligations so this story may be a little dated. But I read with some amusement that the German police are complaining that they can’t seem to intercept Skype calls due to the strong encryption involved. I was amused because it is like the police’s professional ego is getting a little dented and they have to vent off their frustration.

The president of the Bundeskriminalamt said :

“German police are unable to decipher the encryption used in the Internet telephone software Skype to monitor calls by suspected criminals and terrorists”.

This both scares me and concerns me. It concerns me in that it really makes me realise that my emails and phone calls are probably already being monitored by the government in the name of national security and law enforcement. Anyone who thinks that Patriot Act-style laws only exist in the US are deluding themselves. It’s in full force here in Europe too. In fact the German Interior Minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble, recently proposed that the German security services be given government permission to covertly install trojan horse devices in peoples computers to monitor their communications. Whether or not these trojan horse devices would be able to crack Skype I don’t know.

A suspicious part of me is wondering if this is a deliberate disinformation tactic on the part of the German police to pretend that Skype is uncrackable. Then all the criminals and terrorists would flock onto Skype to discuss their next job thinking that their conversations are secure. But in actual fact the BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst - the security services) would actually be listening in. Mashable theorizes that the US National Security Agency has already planted covert back-doors in Skype’s encryption algorithims.

But it also scares me in that Skype could inadvertantly be providing a safe haven for terrorists to congregate and talk without the police and security services listening in. Strong encryption is all well and good but if I had to choose between an uncrackable telephone system and getting killed in the next terrorist attack, I’ll readily open up a conference call for the BND to listen in.

Technorati Tags: Encryption, German, germany, Patriot Act, Security, Skype, trojan

Rumours about Skype is practically an industry in its own right. Never does a week go by without another rumour floating around about who could be buying them next, why it’s taking eBay so long to integrate Skype into eBay listings and where the company is going (and not going). The latest rumour to start floating around cyberspace is that Google could be interested in buying them.

I actually hope that this is a rumour that will eventually come true. I have been consistently shocked at how eBay bought Skype then threw them in the corner forgotten and unloved like one of their trashy auctions, where they made an impulse buy then regretted it the next day. I mean, look at how they have neglected Stumbleupon. They buy it then ignore it, except for putting a Stumble link on the eBay tools page. Gee thanks Meg Whitman.

Google on the other hand could integrate Skype into Google in so many different ways. Imagine a pumped up Google Talk, an integrated Google / Skype phone, a Skype application with a powerful Google search facility to find phone numbers in any country in the world (the phonebook on steroids!)

Download Squad speculates that we may even get developer API’s and even the Skype source code, in order for Skype third-party applications to be developed. So it would move from eBay’s Web 1.0 atmosphere to Google’s Web 2.0 atmosphere - and improvements may come as a result.

Wouldn’t it be nice for Skype to finally be properly appreciated by someone? I think it’s time for eBay to start their own auction - to sell Skype to someone who’ll actually do something meaningful with it.

Technorati Tags: eBay, Google, Skype, Stumbleupon, VOIP

I’ve just had someone else try to convert me to Campfire which is basically a chatroom where multiple chatters can get together. But with today’s stable release of Skype 3.6, I figured it was time to finally make this point. You don’t need to have Campfire when Skype does the job extremely well already - with webcam video conferencing features thrown in no less!

When you open a Skype chat window with a contact, there is an option to add other contacts to the chat (just click on the image to the left to see where the button is). Click on the blue button, add the other contacts that want to chat and if you all have webcams, you can chat away and see one another at the same time.

In that scenario, who needs anything else?

Technorati Tags: Campfire, IM, Instant Messaging, Skype, webcam

An extremely interesting post has appeared on Web Worker Daily about being more productive with instant messaging (IM).    The article isn’t anything new by any means but it is still good to read stuff like this every now and then.

At one point, Skype and IM were taking up so much of my time that I was forced to publish my Skype rules.    This led to a lot of hurt feeling and grumbling, but ironically the only people who were hurt and grumbling were the people who consider chatting all day perfectly acceptable.   You know, the students who are not studying, the unemployed who are supposed to be looking for work, the employed who were avoiding work, those sort of people.     While I try to be friendly and chatty to everyone who gets in touch with me, sometimes you just need to cut the conversation short to get back to work.    Constant chatting doesn’t pay the bills.

That’s why I put a lot of stock into status messages.     If it says “busy” then I am busy.    If it says “away”, I’m away.    You’d be amazed how many people just don’t “get it”.

Technorati Tags: chat, chatting, IM, Instant Messaging, Skype, web worker

Before anyone lectures me, I already know that a “beta” label means that a product is not fully ready and you should expect some bugs, but come on. If a company wants users to test a beta product, they should at least ensure that the thing works on a basic level. It should at the very least run without crashing the user’s computer. Unfortunately the new Skype beta doesn’t even fulfill this very basic simple requirement.

I was recently forced to downgrade to the current stable version (the first time I have ever had to downgrade my Skype) because the current beta version is, to put it mildly, a toxic time bomb on the computer. Let’s look at what the new Skype beta does :

• When someone calls, Skype freezes. When you do CTRL-ALT-DEL, the computer crashes (thank God for voice mail)
• When you are talking to someone, the sound quality is atrocious. It sounds like a farting elephant (not that I have ever heard a farting elephant so I am just guessing here).
• When you are talking to somebody, Skype drops the call and disconnects you. This happens in EVERY call (good way to get nuisance callers off the phone I guess).
• When you start up the Skype beta, the computer crashes (Microsoft must be buried in unread error reports by now).

Now get this. When the current stable version is installed, the 4 problems mentioned above DISAPPEAR.

As I said, I know that a beta product is meant to be buggy and not perfect. But when it can’t even work on a basic level, are users really getting anything out of it?

Technorati Tags: beta, Skype

Auctionbytes is reporting that eBay will finally allow sellers to advertise their Skype ID’s inside their auctions, so that potential customers can call up and harass them.

Although when I checked my eBay Germany account just now, the Skype option was all greyed out. It seems that internet advances take a long time to come across the Atlantic Ocean!

Saying that though, I’m not sure if I would want to openly encourage potential eBay customers to Skype me. I seem to be meeting a lot of idiots on eBay these days, the kind that threaten a negative feedback because I dared to charge them for an envelope. Do I really want them phoning me up too? I’ll have to seriously consider that one. With emails, I can be diplomatic in my language. Over the phone, I may not be so restrained.

The big question though is why eBay has taken so long to allow sellers to advertise their Skype ID’s, given that eBay owns Skype. They paid an absurd amount of money to own the internet phone company and then basically forgot about them. From a business point of view, it made no sense. Did they suddenly look through the business accounts one day and say “wait a moment! This Skype company…..we own it right?”

Technorati Tags: auction, eBay, phone, Skype, telephone