Why Use Skype?
*Your friends and family are already there. Growing usage of Skype means that it"s now much more likely that you"ll know someone using it already. Skype consistently tops its previous records for numbers of people online at once and is actually taking business from international telecoms companies. It"s estimated that Skype "gave away" 12.9 billion US dollars of international phone calls in 2009 alone. That"s money which the big telephone companies lost at least a part of.*You can have worry-free conversations. Skype users are proven to talk longer and more frequently than traditional phone users. The average mobile phone conversation lasts under four minutes, while the typical VoIP conversation on Skype lasts about twenty normally and over half an hour on the highest quality service. As a result, if you"d like to have longer conversations, it"s likely that Skype is for you. After all, with computer-to-computer Skype services, calling is free no matter how long you talk ð€“ most people have unlimited broadband and thus never have to worry about minutes or cost.
*You will always know when someone is available. Little is more annoying than trying to call your friend or family member only to discover that they aren"t around when you finally have free time to speak to them. Skype"s instant messaging client means you can let people know when you are available and see when they"re online, too. You won"t be leaving awkward voicemail messages these days.
*It"s easy to contact friends. If you don"t have much to say, you can just send your friend an instant message. Skype has multiple levels of conversing, so if it"s short and sweet, leave it as text. You won"t clog up your email inbox and your friend will see what you had to say when they next log in to their Skype client.
*Skype is as expensive as you want it to be. If you want Skype to be free, that"s easy; just use it only for computer-to-computer calls and instant messages. But if you want to pay extra, you can have a whole bevy of features, and usually the cost isn"t all that much. You can add call forwarding at no expense to your callers, if you want to receive Skype calls on your mobile. You can add minutes to call other countries at a much discounted rate, pay for a voice mail box, or add a phone number that is local to your family.
Skype plans to roll out a variety of new features in the middle and latter half of 2010. It will be interesting to see whether they plan to expand their paid or free offerings. Regardless, Skype is a great VoIP offering and is well worth the free download for anyone who is eager to remain in touch with the people that they love the most.