Skype vs. Google Talk

I love Skype.

In fact, when I am working, I prefer to talk via my computer than my phone.

The cool thing about Skype is you can IM or talk on Skype, or both at the same time.

So the impending announcement of Google Talk seems to me to be an effort by Google to get in on the Skype thing more than the IM thing.

We'll see tomorrow I guess.

But one thing's for sure, its going to take something really amazing to get me to switch from Skype.

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Posted August 23, 2005 in Venture Capital and Technology

Comments

"But one thing's for sure, its going to take something really amazing to get me to switch from Skype."

That's exactly right. As fast and furious as these products seem to roll out nowadays, the age-old concept of switching cost remains. For me to switch away from Skype, I would have to transfer my Skype contact list with a one-click Wizard AND I would need to keep my SkypeIn phone number (which is on my business cards) AND it would have to integrate with Outlook and FireFox AND it would have to have some additional bells and whistles to make it all worth the effort.

Posted by: Carlos N Velez | Aug 23, 2005 10:54:16 AM

I'll quote from part of a longer essay I wrote on my site last week:

Google is cash flush, with about 2.9 billion greenbacks already stashed for a rainy day.

As we postulated yesterday, as Google breaks into more broadband-intensive activities, Catablast! Media Group thinks Google will acquire Skype! Networks.

Apparently, Murdoch of Fox News is also interested in the revolutionary Internet-based telephony service.

As a technology analyst as the PSGroup wrote this week, ''Google is a digital services infrastructure company...The digital service they're delivering today is advertising-supported search but the digital services they'll be delivering in the future will be much more widespread....."

Posted by: Danny | Aug 23, 2005 11:33:28 AM

Google seems to think it's all about the technology and the features. The more they try to become an integrated media machine (Yahoo!), the more painful lessons they'll have to learn -- it's the customers/market, stupid!

Posted by: just.a.guy | Aug 23, 2005 4:17:19 PM

Ouriel Ohayon, Director of Sales and Partnership for ICQ, has some insights on Skype:

"B2C Globalness: out of Vodaphone/ Orange in Europe a Docomo in Asia there are no real global b2c telco brand. there are usually just national players. Skype could be the first true b2c global telco brand bringing lots of economical advantages: the first one being scalable marketing expenditures and activities. The second one being the opportunity to challenge in one shot telco players with only one brand."

http://ouriel.typepad.com/myblog/2005/08/how_much_is_kyp.html#more

Posted by: Dimitar Vesselinov | Aug 23, 2005 6:11:23 PM

Posted by: leena arora | Oct 10, 2005 5:27:18 AM

Whoa!!!

Posted by: Sunny | Nov 21, 2006 6:12:03 AM

A VC

Musings of a VC in NYC