[Asterisk-Dev] A crazy idea... Skype channel in Asterisk

[Michael Giagnocavo]

>>  
>> Because Skype currently has many million people already
>> using it?
>
>Don't underestimate IAX.
>
>The number of service providers supporting IAX is growing steadily
>because IAX is open. On the other hand Skype-Out is a monopolist
>service because Skype is closed. IAX providers are quite possibly
>terminating more minutes than Skype.
>
>I am confident that IAX will become an IETF standard in the not so
>distant future. On the other hand, there is very little chance that
>Skype's secretive and proprietary closed protocol will ever be opened,
>let alone become an official standard.

With our own channel, Skype-Out would be challenged. I can't do anything
with people wanting to connect (who are using Skype), nor can I help people
who want to connect TO people using Skype. Hopefully IAX will take over and
there'll be some really nice client-GUI programs to use it. Meanwhile, I
still don't have a solution for Skype users.

>> Connecting with Skype and having a better client aren't mutually
>> exclusive goals.
>
>They are. If people hadn't been so utterly stupid in the early
>nineties flirting with Microsoft, then we wouldn't have an illegal
>monopoly today so powerful that they can continuously break the law
>with impunity.
>
>So, I say it again. Stay away from Skype. It's another wannabe
>Microsoft in the making and we must not support their monopolist
>conquest. Avoid them like the plague.

Um, MS has a strong, loyal developer base. Skype doesn't. Rather different
approach hmm? As far as companies go, I think a lot of companies would love
to be "the next Microsoft" (i.e., ask their owners: do you want to be the
richest people in the world?). That's just simple ambition. Skype doesn't
really have a business model apart from getting termination traffic (AFAIK).
Nor the backing of MS/Yahoo/AOL to provide services for free. Meanwhile,
they have turned a few more million (they list 28 million downloads, which
is probably quite misleading to the actual number of users, but I think we
can assume it's 7-digits) people on to VoIP where they wouldn't have done so
otherwise. 

I don't see how opening up the Skype protocol fits in with their plan for
world domination. I especially don't see how someone else offering Skype-Out
service helps Skype. 

However, I think it's pointless to get into discussions over business models
and what's inherently good or evil. I don't want to see another
GPL-debate-like thread :). I just want to see Asterisk be the most capable
piece of stuff around: chan_skype, chan_msn, chan_aim, chan_ymsg, chan_etc.

-Michael