Is this really big news? The Skype for Android client has supported Skype calls for over one year. It works around the carriers' limitations by initiating an outbound call to a toll-free Skype number.
Every day, I happily roll down the highway at 75mph talking to my Skype contacts in Europe and Asia.
How is this any different for me? (Note: it's much cheaper for Skype, because they can now offer the same functionality without maintaining the toll-free local numbers that they need to maintain today.)
This allows you to avoid using outgoing minutes entirely.
At that point, you can use use skype-out minutes without paying for Both the Skype cost, as well as the Verizon per minutes cost. Further, if Verizon allows a data-only plan, you would be able to use it without missing out on voice calls.
What's the rational behind this? Are they hoping that people won't abuse it because the quality isn't that great? Or are they just making more of their money off data than voice now to justify this?
Hard to believe, in any case, perhaps Skype is giving them a kickback now that it is an independent entity and can make disruptive progress again without being held back by the bureaucracy that is ebay.
I got the impression that voice prices are dropping (now everybody has unlimited voice and text messaging for $70).
Affordable data packages can't be purchased without voice packages, so very few (if any) consumers will save money trying to use Skype instead of using their voice plans. Consequently, not many people will use Skype over 3G anyway. It's not worth risking the government mandating stronger net neutrality guarantees that would force them to allow Skype over 3G and worse. In particular, the government could "go overboard" and make such legislation require data plans to be de-bundled from voice plans and/or ban "triple play" bundles.
You hit it right. According to this article: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13970_7-10453550-78.html Verizon is having trouble getting voice to work over LTE in their test markets, so they are going to go data only on LTE initially and use CDMA for voice. When I read that, I wondered if the voice problem was a function of something basic in LTE (like latency) or if the voice gear just doesn't play well with LTE yet. If it's the latter, then Skype VoIP applications would help offload voice traffic from CDMA for "power users".
Voice over LTE is supposed to work using IMS - but will require a fairly expensive upgrade to the network. Operators are keenly aware of the pitfalls of over-the-top voice losing them revenue, but this is an experiment to see if they can do away with IMS altogether. That, and the fact that someone else may try it first...
I think it's more they see that they'll have too. The current FTC/FCC has been sending signals that companies with high market share cannot block whatever they feel like without consequences. Attempting to do this on their own terms preempts being forced to do it in a disadvantageous way.
