frankly speaking

Skype: Can You Here Me Now?

Earlier this week it was announced that eBay was going to finally cut Skype loose and spin off the company via an IPO. There have been many things said regarding this and you can now count me in the camp of believing this is a good move for all stakeholders involved.

It’s no secret that eBay has been struggling for the past few years. Ever since Meg Whitman it has struggled to find it’s footing as THE go to place for commerce on the internet. This week eBay started to take steps to return to its roots by selling social bookmark sharing site Stumble Upon back to its owners and announcing the Skype IPO. Doing this allows eBay to focus on its core business offering and allows it not be sidetracked by pet projects that, frankly speaking remove value (yeah, I said it) from the company.

This is a win for Skype because it allows the new independent communications company to scale in a way that it hasn’t been able to do before.The original intent of eBay was to turn it into a communications tool between buyers and sellers on the site. To me, this never made sense. Skype now has the chance to become the preferred choice of voice communication of people all over the world. It’s far cheaper to use Skype than it is to pick up a telephone. Given the accessibility of computers, broadband web access, and now apps for the iPhone and (coming soon) the blackberry, Skype will be able to dominate global voice communication.

And finally, it’s a win for customers. As mentioned earlier, the original intent of Skype was to facilitate communication between buyers and sellers. Why, as a (hypothetical powerseller on eBay), would I want to ‘talk’ to some random person who was looking at one of thousands of auctions that I have running on the site? It would take too much time away from running my core business of selling on eBay. The same can be done via tools that already exist via email, or the eBay messaging service.

I’m greatly encouraged by the future for both Skype and eBay in this move. (Disclosure, I’m a former eBay employee)

Tags: eBay Skype Frankly Speaking

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Date: 04.18.09 Time: 19:28 PM
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