Now that Skype’s been around for a couple of years, seems that there’s some very interesting robustness now coming into existence with the technology. For those of you who don’t know what Skype is, Skype uses the Internet and your computer to make phone calls anywhere. Skype’s been around since 2002, and currently they claim to have over 270 million user accounts and are adding about 30 million subscribers every three months.

If you’re on the go, Skype’s great for being able to place and receive phone calls anywhere. All you need is a decent internet connection and a headset. Skype also has a mobile solution, so if you have a compatible mobile phone, you can use it for calling. It is available for Android and over 100 Java enabled mobile phones, but as of this writing still no support for the iPhone. Won’t be long. Don’t use it outside your home country, as you’ll get slammed with a lot of additional international rates and data fees. Calls to phones, mobiles or any of your Skype contacts via Skype are only available in Australia, Brazil (Rio de Janeiro & Sao Paulo), Denmark, Estonia, Finland, New Zealand, Poland, Sweden, the United States and the UK.

Want Video? Skype just released Skype 4.0, which includes support for full-screen video calls. Snazzy.

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Skype, along with VoIP sort of falls within a gray area of communication and security, not quite being defined as a true ‘telephony’ device and not quite a computer device. This allows for some interesting interpretation of the privacy laws and how they are governed. For example, in the US, Skype does not fall within the FCC’s Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act that requires digital phone networks to allow wiretapping in the presence of an FBI warrant. Skype so far, stated that it does not plan to comply to this act. China has developed a modified version of Skype which adds a layer of sensorship to the system, allowing easedropping of phone calls by the government.

While Skype used to be free, it now has to start charging for its services, which seem reasonable. It’s scalable and is still a great bargin. So if you’re contemplating on going mobile anytime soon, definitely get Skype rolling on your computer or mobile phone.

website: www.skype.com
mobile website: http://skype.com/download/skype/mobile/