freesoftwaremagazine.com— A new, full-featured free software application pops its head into the VoIP world, and it nominates itself as the most serious competitor of Skype. It’s name is Wengophone.
Jun 16, 2006View in Crawl 4
Skype is free. It is just as free as Wengophone or whatever it is. They both are free to other users of their service, they both have conference calling (I think), and they both charge for calls to land-lines. There might be differences in the rates, but skype is free to the US and Canada until the end of the year.
I used Wengo and Gizmo for a while, then went back to Skype. Nobody in the industry can compete with Skype when it comes to conference calling. You don't have to log into a special server or send out invitations. Just pick a mix of landline and Skype users and start the call. And you can add or drop users at any time during the call. It's perfect.
Gizmo is affordable for CallOut .01 per minute US, granted Skype is free for the moment, so I use Skype for POTS calls, but Skype will not interconnect with others because of protocol, and you can't use your Skype account as a trunk for Asterisk. Skype also has the new Skypecasts that allow moderation of conferences up to 100 people (I think)
At least it's saving me lots of skype out credits. I don't have a land line so Skype is working out very nice for me now. I lowered my cell phone minutes to the minimum monthly plan and I'm saving 15$ a month on that on top of whatever it would cost me to have a land line. Gizmo (another VOIP service) would be my second choice but I need to see what the call quality is like.
i really like skype. but, two different times i lost my minutes. after it was announced that the calls would be free for the rest of the year my minutes disappeared. when i go to the skype page it shows my minutes. i sent a email to skype and the return mail said to check questions and answers. anybody else had a problem?
bobbob1016Jun 16, 2006
Skype is free. It is just as free as Wengophone or whatever it is. They both are free to other users of their service, they both have conference calling (I think), and they both charge for calls to land-lines. There might be differences in the rates, but skype is free to the US and Canada until the end of the year.
terminalpariahJun 16, 2006
I used Wengo and Gizmo for a while, then went back to Skype. Nobody in the industry can compete with Skype when it comes to conference calling. You don't have to log into a special server or send out invitations. Just pick a mix of landline and Skype users and start the call. And you can add or drop users at any time during the call. It's perfect.
mickgyverJun 17, 2006
Gizmo is affordable for CallOut .01 per minute US, granted Skype is free for the moment, so I use Skype for POTS calls, but Skype will not interconnect with others because of protocol, and you can't use your Skype account as a trunk for Asterisk. Skype also has the new Skypecasts that allow moderation of conferences up to 100 people (I think)
alej744Jun 17, 2006
P'WND ! ! ! !btw, holy s**t It supports Linux, That's kinda stupid actually.
duffman03Jun 17, 2006
At least it's saving me lots of skype out credits. I don't have a land line so Skype is working out very nice for me now. I lowered my cell phone minutes to the minimum monthly plan and I'm saving 15$ a month on that on top of whatever it would cost me to have a land line. Gizmo (another VOIP service) would be my second choice but I need to see what the call quality is like.
einfeldtJun 17, 2006
I *think* that the Gizmo team is planning to open Gizmo.I use Gizmo, and it runs well on GNU/Linux.
stevegeorgeJun 19, 2006
I don't think Skype will get killed off when POTS goes. The network effect they are building up is going to mean that you'll have to have Skype: even now my main-stream friends who are a little technically savvy only use Skype. Just wait until Ebay manages to really integrate them.Tom Evslin (<a class="user" href="http://blog.tomevslin.com/)">http://blog.tomevslin.com/)</a> has written some pretty interesting posts about them, for example <a class="user" href="http://blog.tomevslin.com/2005/04/as_the_phone_wo_2.html">http://blog.tomevslin.com/2005/04/as_the_phone_wo_2.html</a>
howdbillJul 3, 2006
i really like skype. but, two different times i lost my minutes. after it was announced that the calls would be free for the rest of the year my minutes disappeared. when i go to the skype page it shows my minutes. i sent a email to skype and the return mail said to check questions and answers. anybody else had a problem?