New data released by TeleGeography shows that Skype’s share of international calling minutes has jumped to 12%, a 50% increase on last year’s figure of 8%. ‘The volume of traffic routed via Skype is growing at an astonishing pace’, says Telegeography’s annual report into the world of international telecommunications.

Skype retains its top spot as the ‘largest provider of cross-border communications in the world, by far’ according to the same report. Skype-to-Skype international calling minutes grew by 21 billion in 2009, a phenomenal acceleration of almost 100%. Telegeography strategy VP Stefan Beckert said at a meeting in Honolulu (why can’t we have meetings there?) that ‘he knew Skype hit a tipping point when his grandmother started using it’.

Sten Tamkivi’s presentation at eComm in Amsterdam explored some of the backstory behind Skype’s conquest of the international long distance calling space, and included some discussion of the reasons behind Skype’s increasing ubiquity. Definitely interesting viewing, if I say so myself, and there’s a transcript over at Skype Journal if you’d prefer to digest it in text form.

There’s been a slight change in methodology this year, which means that Telegeography is now comparing international Skype-to-Skype minutes to the total number of international minutes to get the 12% figure. In previous years, the ‘Skype’ share included Skype calls to landlines and mobiles too.

By

Skype Heartbeat

On the 18th February 2010, we will increase the price of calls to the Maldives to €0.485 per minute, the price of calls to Gabon to €0.324 per minute, and the price of calls to mobiles in Mozambique to €0.299 per minute. VAT may apply where appropriate.

By Skype Heartbeat

Skype 1.3 for iPhone is now available in the App Store – download it now (opens in App Store).

We’ve made a number of improvements, including:

• Landscape mode for IM – many of you have been asking for this
• Call quality indicator – new in this version; it’ll help you decide whether it’s the right time to call (a bit like the one in 4.2 beta for Windows)
• Hints and tips – particularly for first time users

We’ve also fixed the problem where calls would sometimes drop after returning from hold, for example when you receive a notification of a text message.

Two things this version doesn’t have in it:

• Calling over 3G – as Russ said a couple of weeks ago, we’re waiting for Apple on this one. As soon as Apple removes its current restrictions on calling over 3G, we’ll make a 3G-capable app available. We’ve got one up our sleeves ready for that moment, but for now, we’re being forced to wait.
• Push notifications – as Russ also said, we’re working on this; we’ll release a version with Push notifications when the experience has been perfected.

Download it now – and don’t forget to let us know what you think

By

Many people in Haiti are without landline or cell phone coverage since the earthquake hit on Tuesday, and so tools like Skype have become vital.

Skype-to-Skype voice and video calls are completely free, and many of you have been using them over the last couple of days to stay in touch with family and friends, or to contact co-workers or support agencies during this difficult time.

To help people further, we’re emailing vouchers for $2 US of Skype Credit to of all of our users in Haiti. They’ll start appearing in inboxes in about 24 hours’ time.

The credit will let you make at least an hour’s worth of calls to landlines in the US or other countries covered by our global rate, or at least 15 minutes of calls to the Dominican Republic. You can see all of our rates here.

You can also donate to relief efforts via UNICEF or the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Our hearts go out to all of you in Haiti.

By

Skype Heartbeat

Some of you who’ve just tried making a purchase, may have noticed that it is currently not possible to do so. You may have received some error such as “Internal error” from the web or “Check your connection” from the Skype Client. In addition, Auto-Recharge and recurring payments for Subscriptions will not work, those will be made after the issue has been resolved.

We’re working fast to address the problem – stay tuned.

[UPDATE] Issues have been resolved as of 07:52 GMT/UTC +0

By Skype Heartbeat

Skype Heartbeat

Due to problems with our payment partner, some of you may have trouble using credit cards or bank transfers to pay for Skype Credit, subscriptions or other purchases.

I’m sorry for the inconvenience – we’re working hard to fix the problems, but in the meantime, please use an alternative payment method.

By Skype Heartbeat

Tonight at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Skype’s CEO Josh Silverman keynoted the Leaders in Technology dinner. Hundreds of politicians, regulators and industry-types gathered to hear his remarks. Newly independent from eBay, the very fact that Skype is keynoting this event says a number of things about how far our company has come. Unlike a traditional telephony business, Skype is moving toward integration with a broader array of consumer electronics. The company now has relationships with companies like Panasonic, LG and others and is offering new ways to stay in touch with business partners or friends and family.

The “LiT” dinner is a yearly event that showcases important innovations and is a good opportunity to address policymakers from the United States and abroad. Josh’s speech toured the history of disruptive innovations that changed existing ways of doing business. Three lessons emerged from his talk : 1) progress is incremental, until it isn’t; 2) the pace of innovation is accelerating and 3) society wins when innovation thrives and consumers have choice.

For public policy folks such as me, Josh’s keynote is an opportunity to ask the question: What kind of competition and innovation policy do we want? My colleague, Staci Pies, has argued that the answer to this question will determine whether the U.S. reverses its slide in international broadband rankings or continues to slip further behind the rest of the world. Another colleague, Jean-Jacques Sahel, argues that broadband policy is about competition and innovation, but also enables basic human rights such as the freedom to express oneself. Both are forceful, well-reasoned arguments.

In the United States, the current paradigm in US telephonic regulation is predicated on the landmark 1996 Telecom Act. That law was designed to bring about one basic outcome: telephone and cable companies would compete with one another. This was an implicit condition in nearly every major telecom decision since the Act was passed. This ‘end state’ was called ‘intermodal’ competition – competition between different modes of reaching consumers – coaxial cable or twisted copper wires.

However, Skype submits that this is a dumbed-down, cramped way of defining success. Worse, this regulatory assumption has been transformed into a protection racket for the incumbents. Is ‘2’ the magic number when it comes to competition? Is that a sufficiently competitive marketplace? No. We can do better.

Given that broadband markets have settled largely into a cozy duopoly, we need competition and innovation wherever we can find it. Governments should therefore adopt a ‘multi-modal’ approach to competition and innovation policy that supports competition from not only Verizon and Comcast, but also encourages new players at the edge of the network.

Tonight, Josh demonstrated that innovation and choice are coming from companies such as Skype, Panasonic, LG, faceVsion, In Store Solutions, etc. These companies may not be traditional players in communications policy. Yet, they share something in common: each produces products that supply consumers with another reason to subscribe to ever-faster broadband connections. It is this fact that makes the edge companies central to the debate about U.S. broadband policy.

When I was in government working on a controversial competition issue, I remember that a particularly cynical and unhappy colleague told me that no matter what the outcome “AT&T eats first.” Soundbytes like this say a lot about what is broken in Washington and why we need a changed perspective.

No longer can the FCC Chairman worry only about a handful of big companies and whether the rules take care of them. The investment incentives of carriers AND innovative companies at the edge must be protected. This means that policymakers must move toward a balanced policy that expands the entire broadband ecosystem of carriers, device manufacturers and software companies:

• If network operators are content to charge tolls to innovators instead of building faster broadband connections, government should act to reduce barriers to entry and protect an open Internet.
• Where wireless networks are capacity constrained and innovative applications stall, we should be about the hard business of putting spectrum into the hands of operators who value it most, even if that means moving it out of the hands of broadcasters.
• In rural communities with no broadband, we should reform creaky universal service programs to bring fast broadband connections to these communities and we shouldn’t spend one dime more than is necessary to do so.

These three things should be part of the FCC’s National Broadband Strategy. Given the talented staff at the FCC who are working on this project, we expect they will be. But more important than any particular recommendation is pulling up the weeds of the limiting ‘intermodal’ competition assumption and clearing the ground for a more capable, future-oriented ‘multi-modal’ approach which recognizes the contributions of companies on the edge of broadband networks.

It has been said that in Washington, “doing things that are considered common sense are considered bold.” If the FCC’s National Broadband Strategy endorses a common sense, ‘multimodal’ approach, it will have a durable and bold impact on U.S. policy. Communications policy will have become innovation policy and the Congress and the FCC will have set the stage for ever more exciting CES shows like this in the years to come.

For our part, we promise to be back at CES next year, opening even more eyes to the future of communications.

By

Tonight at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Skype’s CEO Josh Silverman keynoted the Leaders in Technology dinner. Hundreds of politicians, regulators and industry-types gathered to hear his remarks. Newly independent from eBay, the very fact that Skype is keynoting this event says a number of things about how far our company has come. Unlike a traditional telephony business, Skype is moving toward integration with a broader array of consumer electronics. The company now has relationships with companies like Panasonic, LG and others and is offering new ways to stay in touch with business partners or friends and family.

The “LiT” dinner is a yearly event that showcases important innovations and is a good opportunity to address policymakers from the United States and abroad. Josh’s speech toured the history of disruptive innovations that changed existing ways of doing business. Three lessons emerged from his talk : 1) progress is incremental, until it isn’t; 2) the pace of innovation is accelerating and 3) society wins when innovation thrives and consumers have choice.

For public policy folks such as me, Josh’s keynote is an opportunity to ask the question: What kind of competition and innovation policy do we want? My colleague, Staci Pies, has argued that the answer to this question will determine whether the U.S. reverses its slide in international broadband rankings or continues to slip further behind the rest of the world. Another colleague, Jean-Jacques Sahel, argues that broadband policy is about competition and innovation, but also enables basic human rights such as the freedom to express oneself. Both are forceful, well-reasoned arguments.

In the United States, the current paradigm in US telephonic regulation is predicated on the landmark 1996 Telecom Act. That law was designed to bring about one basic outcome: telephone and cable companies would compete with one another. This was an implicit condition in nearly every major telecom decision since the Act was passed. This ‘end state’ was called ‘intermodal’ competition – competition between different modes of reaching consumers – coaxial cable or twisted copper wires.

However, Skype submits that this is a dumbed-down, cramped way of defining success. Worse, this regulatory assumption has been transformed into a protection racket for the incumbents. Is ‘2’ the magic number when it comes to competition? Is that a sufficiently competitive marketplace? No. We can do better.

Given that broadband markets have settled largely into a cozy duopoly, we need competition and innovation wherever we can find it. Governments should therefore adopt a ‘multi-modal’ approach to competition and innovation policy that supports competition from not only Verizon and Comcast, but also encourages new players at the edge of the network.

Tonight, Josh demonstrated that innovation and choice are coming from companies such as Skype, Panasonic, LG, faceVsion, In Store Solutions, etc. These companies may not be traditional players in communications policy. Yet, they share something in common: each produces products that supply consumers with another reason to subscribe to ever-faster broadband connections. It is this fact that makes the edge companies central to the debate about U.S. broadband policy.

When I was in government working on a controversial competition issue, I remember that a particularly cynical and unhappy colleague told me that no matter what the outcome “AT&T eats first.” Soundbytes like this say a lot about what is broken in Washington and why we need a changed perspective.

No longer can the FCC Chairman worry only about a handful of big companies and whether the rules take care of them. The investment incentives of carriers AND innovative companies at the edge must be protected. This means that policymakers must move toward a balanced policy that expands the entire broadband ecosystem of carriers, device manufacturers and software companies:

• If network operators are content to charge tolls to innovators instead of building faster broadband connections, government should act to reduce barriers to entry and protect an open Internet.
• Where wireless networks are capacity constrained and innovative applications stall, we should be about the hard business of putting spectrum into the hands of operators who value it most, even if that means moving it out of the hands of broadcasters.
• In rural communities with no broadband, we should reform creaky universal service programs to bring fast broadband connections to these communities and we shouldn’t spend one dime more than is necessary to do so.

These three things should be part of the FCC’s National Broadband Strategy. Given the talented staff at the FCC who are working on this project, we expect they will be. But more important than any particular recommendation is pulling up the weeds of the limiting ‘intermodal’ competition assumption and clearing the ground for a more capable, future-oriented ‘multi-modal’ approach which recognizes the contributions of companies on the edge of broadband networks.

It has been said that in Washington, “doing things that are considered common sense are considered bold.” If the FCC’s National Broadband Strategy endorses a common sense, ‘multimodal’ approach, it will have a durable and bold impact on U.S. policy. Communications policy will have become innovation policy and the Congress and the FCC will have set the stage for ever more exciting CES shows like this in the years to come.

For our part, we promise to be back at CES next year, opening even more eyes to the future of communications.

By

Skype Heartbeat

Our payment partner is having problems with processing bank transfers in Turkey.

If your payment hasn’t been applied to your account, please contact our customer support team with proof of payment.

Payments may be subject to delays – we apologise for the inconvenience.

By Skype Heartbeat

var so = new SWFObject(”http://download.skype.com/share/videos/player.swf”, “videoplayer”, “660″, “368″, “9″, “#00AFF0″);so.addParam(”allowFullScreen”, “true”);so.addVariable(”videoXML”, “http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2010/01/04/tv_video/tv.xml”);so.write(”tv_video”);

In just a few months’ time, you’ll be able to get Skype on your TV – and you can find out more in the video above.

We’re bringing Skype into the living room, so that you can share family moments – celebrating a birthday, organising a holiday or just having a chat with friends on a Sunday evening – all on the big screen.

How will it work?

Thanks to our TV manufacturing partners LG and Panasonic, we’ve been able to embed Skype in the latest generation of internet-connected widescreen HDTVs.

They’ve been tested in our labs in Tallinn, Estonia by our team of engineers to make sure that everything works well together, and once you’ve bought yours, all you’ll need to do is get hold of a TV-ready webcam – developed specially to work with your TV and with Skype.

These webcams include specially-designed microphones which let you make calls from the comfort of your sofa, without having to move closer to the TV or shout*. And the TVs from Panasonic and LG will even allow you to make HD video calls.

We also recommend that you have a 1Mbs symmetric broadband connection for the best possible video experience.

Why Skype-enabled TVs?

We’ve had numerous in-depth conversations with people all around the world about their communication needs – our team of user experience researchers, lead by David Dinka (who features in the video above), identified a desire among people to communicate away from their computers.

Many people we spoke to emphasised to us they want to speak to their friends and family from somewhere comfortable, and preferably make video calls on a big screen. Logically then, we needed to make Skype available on their TV.

When can I get one?

Skype-enabled TVs will be available in spring this year. For now, follow @skypeonyourtv on Twitter for updates, and as they say on TV – stay tuned

* You’ll need a webcam even if you just want to make voice calls (e.g. to landlines and mobiles) because they contain the extra-special microphones.

By