Skype Looking More And More Like a Telco
When I saw that Skype was launching their Skype Prime service, where you can essentially charge for someone to talk to you, I immediately thought: 900 numbers. Pat Phelan thought the same thing, but then again, he should know a thing or two about that. And Dan York also went to the obvious use of this: phone sex!
So what are you really getting out of this? Phil Wolff lays it out pretty clearly for us: Skype takes 30%, you don’t get paid for 120 days, and you can’t bill less than $0.50 an hour, which Skype takes 30% of. And what exactly is Skype providing here, exactly? I mean, it’s a peer to peer call, thus there is no way they can actually guarantee quality of service. People are paying with money Skype has (theoretically anyway) already confirmed is valid and genuine. What value is Skype actually giving us for that 30% they are charging us, exactly?
In addition to offering another telco-like service, they are charging rates for it that remind me of what a telco would charge. And they appear to be providing even less value for that money than the telcos of old. Either Skype is being really stupid or there’s something I’m missing in this whole thing.
