Skype Review

I first learned about Skype right before I left to study abroad in China during the summer of 2007. Despite the fact that I had lived overseas before, my mom was worried. When I hurt my ankle two days before my flight, she became extremely worried. Like any mother, she wanted frequent status updates.

The price of the number of cell phone calls it would have taken to appease her anxiety would have been astronomical. Fortunately, I had discovered Skype before my trip and set my mother up with a Skype account and a webcam.

Calls over the Internet are completely free, and calling landlines from my Skype account is a fraction (a tiny fraction) of the cost of a regular phone call. But the price isn't the only benefit. To be able to see my mom as I talked to her was fantastic. It made an opportunity like living in China for a few months seem a lot more manageable and less intimidating.

While there are bugs in any program, Skype is pretty reliable and very straight-forward. The call clarity is great and webcams (either built in to your laptop or otherwise) generally give great video quality. Setting up an account along with audio and video is really easy to do.

So I became a fan of Skype in 2007. But I didn't become a Skype devotee until this year. A few months ago, my dad was transferred to Singapore. My mom can't move there for another year, so until that time, their main form of communication is over Skype. They both dreaded this year, but a quarter of it has already gone by and Skype has made things so much easier on both of them.

For years, my dad's job has required him to make international business calls during non-business hours due to time differences. He's found that Skype provides a great cost and convenience solution. My dad says that he uses Skype to call the landline, and that the call quality was so good that the people on the other end never realized that he wasn't using a traditional phone.

Also, I find that I actually talk to my dad more often now because of Skype than I did when he lived in the States. As a full-fledged member of a very tech-savvy (and tech-addicted) generation, I am on my computer all the time. I may lose my phone, or let the battery die, or leave the ringer on vibrate, but I am pretty much ALWAYS online.

With Skype, I get an alert as soon as my dad gets online, and I usually call him right away. Now I get a chance to talk to my dad multiple times a week, instead of a couple of times a month.

My family and friends are not only spread across the country, but also spread across the globe. Having a tool like Skype makes living in a globalized world so much easier.