I guess the situation has been sorted as far as i’m online since a while without disconnection….. I’m keen for that drink…. lol Can’t move from my place…. but thinking about a BBQ to go with the drink…..;-)

ST

Here in Belgium there has been intermittent service, but oddly enough (can anyone explain this) I had service for two hours late Friday afternoon, and managed to make a couple of Skype-out calls, but a colleague just a block away was still in the ‘grey button zone’ If it is of any importance (I am not a techie type so I wouldn’t know) he uses the same ISP — Belgian Telenet).

As I write this at 22,30 local time, I am still bouncing in and out of the grey zone. Like many others, I have now started to use another system as back-up (WengoPhone)and I wonder how this whole debacle is going to affect Skype in the long term.

And how will it affect the parent company E-bay on the Nasdaq? There is already a deal of viral spruiking going on for other VOIP providers — and it could take a slice off of E-bay’s share price. But let’s not go there: let’s hope this weeked will give the guys at Skype time to get their act together. Anybody going to join me in a drink to that?

Having been in internet business for almost 18 years now, I have had problems like this in the past with my companies, unfortunately these problems will happen. I do not criticize Skype for having a problem, but if they do not tell us the truth, then my trust will be gone and with that my business. I have about 200k users on my platform all with Skype access, this is not good for my business - yet I’m not able to get more information from Skype.

I will wait until this is over and see …..

ST

If your comment is related to mine then sorry. It seems that it mentioned a few techie terms but it’s a techie topic after all. We’re not talking about a damaged landline here, we’re talking about a phone that is not working because other phones magically “think” they do not want to work for this one service provider.

But then again. If you rethink the situation then Skype handles the issue in a unprofessional way. They seem to have no respect for their users, clients and customers. (And yes, I do consider even a non-paying user 1: a potential customer 2: an individual who will promote my brand)

They are not giving any details on what the error was, where it came from, how they try to solve it and WHEN this will be cleared. What do they expect businesses to tell their customers? Or even individuals to their contacts? What about media? Maybe we even have to believe that this was done on purpose to confuse media reports and make it seem a “minor problem”?

Also, the software caused many people to panic and seek the error out in their own systems - it’s not even saying “I have a problem here”, it’s just not working. Thats unprofessional.

Supporting something that has proven to fail can only be considered fanboyism - it’s not something that can be sold to customers and told to friends.
They’re using proprietary code on a communication protocoll on purpose - actually thats maybe why they’re so arrogant. I believe that it’ll be healthy to strongly support alternatives from now on and the best path should go in the direction of open source or at leat open protocolls.

The people who are in panic now are maybe a bit “off”, but it clearly shows that they expected a magical thing from a very mysterious company that keeps many secrets about how their technology works, including how fail safe it is. And obviously… well, all you know the story.

Regards,
nuR421

I guess the skype boys are working on a solution - but I understand your and others frustration. There is a lot to learn still for all of us online software and service providers - let’s hope lessons will be learned from this - Skype should be the better for it.

I have to admit that the announced 12-24 hours are up.