Skype is mutating

[#1]

There's announcements in the press about Microsoft closing the Skype London office and releasing (firing) 400 staff. Most of these are developers. Strangely enough Skype recruited 400 people to its London office about 2 years ago.

There's various theories running in the computer press, such as TheRegister, which go along the lines that the goliath software company wants to get rid of developers not committed to the new path. Managers with a Skype heritage will be replaced by MS clones.

Apparently this is down to the Skype software and infrastructure model being changed from a "peer to peer" voice communication to a "client to cloud" voice communication method. All of this to encourage people to sign up to an Office 365 subscription with Skype as  an integral part.

One paranoid person suggested the new model is easier for the Spooks to monitor when compared with the old PC to PC communication.

Edit adding a link: http://www.itpro.co.uk/strategy/27256/microsoft-shuts-down-uk-skype-office

[#2]

Ah TeamSpeak, makes skype look like a complete waste of time...

I was a happy skype user many years ago, even got an 0207 number to seem "more equal than others" (hey, I was still in my teens, brain hadn't worked out logic yet!!), and had a VOIPvoice Cyberphone to boot, then I had to go back to dialup so gave up skype & went back to traditional tellingbone lines (NTL at the time, before the virgin monopoly buyout), then in the interim, M$ bought it out, they scrapped the MSN in favour of skype because they wanted more people to use it instead but pushed them over to other non-annoying services, but, I didn't use it again 'til once last year, and it was pretty terrible frankly (that could also have been because the other person was using an ipad!!), don't particularly want to use it again, especially as it keeps randomly opening from scratch itself despite having it set to not start up at boot, which is highly suspicious...

[#3]

Not to worry, there's going to be a 'consultation' process! 

[#4]

Yes TS is excellent , far superior

[#5]

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@AlaricAdair wrote:

One paranoid person suggested the new model is easier for the Spooks to monitor when compared with the old PC to PC communication.

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Being paranoid doesn't make them wrong.. it usually just means they're further ahead in threat perception than normal people. And yes it would make it a lot easier for the spooks to monitor everything.. and the UK government who will no doubt be in bed with the yanks in return for favours of the intelligence kind.

I've yet to find a version of teamspeak that works on a mobile phone (not that i've looked) but a lot of people do use skype which made it ideal for mobiles.

[#6]

The good thing about TS is you dont have to look at the ugly mug you are talking too  

[#7]

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@7up wrote:

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I've yet to find a version of teamspeak that works on a mobile phone (not that i've looked) but a lot of people do use skype which made it ideal for mobiles.

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https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.teamspeak.ts3client&hl=en_GB

Just please use a decent headset, nothing is worse than listening to someone on their phone's included headset that sounds like they're speaking into a paper cup with their head down the toilet with the lid closed and flushing at the same time.....