The bizarre and macabre world of Skype Phones

Okay, so I wasn't too kind to Skype's new Prime feature yesterday, however, I am a big fan of Skype overall. I have now replaced my 'landline replacement' phone service at home with Skype (I am still using an Ol' Skool POTS line for most calls), and I have found the quality to be pretty darn good. Recently, I have been coming across a wide swath of Skype Phones and devices, and they range from the normal to the quite eccentric. While Skype's own Gear Blog seems to provide good insight and reviews on the latest and greatest products for Skype, I thought I would take a specific look at some of the more 'portable' gadgets for Skype, since many of us Skype users travel with our laptops and use Skype to call home from whereever we are at the moment. Obviously, we all like to travel light, so here are some interesting, if not weird options:

1. The Sony USB Mouse Phone (above Right), if you normally lug a mouse with you on the road, this option is essentially a mouse the folds open into a phone. This is very stealthy looking device, and it very sexy and functional in the classic sony style, but it begs the one question: Let's say I'm on the Skype Call, how do I use my computer?

Next up is the Panasonic Skype Router phone. Panasonic followed the lead of others like D-Link and Linksys and created a travel router. These small form factor routers are designed for travelers to create a hotspot out of your hotel room's wired connection. This one also comes with a Skype Phone as well (however, it is unclear to me if this is a true wi-fi skype phone than can be used with any open hotspot, or if it will only work with this hotspot). Again, an interesting concept, complete with a leather travel case, but do you really want to shlep this around on business trips, when you can by the Belkin or Netgear phones for less?



Finally, the Kensington's PC Card phone rounds out this interesting trio. Essentially, this is a bluetooth Skype Handset. No LCD, nothing fancy, just your average bluetooth headset but in a handset form factor. But here is the kicker - it fits into a PC card slot and charges itself off of your computer's battery - I smell a winner.

If by chance you make skype gadgets, and you want me to review one, please feel free to contact me :)

The good and the bad of Skype Prime

Last week Skype announced Skype Prime. In a nutshell, Skype prime allows individuals to run their own pay-per-use or pay-per-minute VoIP services. I have not tried this service yet, but I can already realize how this is both a great and potentially bad thing:

What makes it great? It makes it very simple for you to offer premium phone services to the Skype community. You could offer tech support or homework help for $0.50 a minute or you could offer a daily joke for a $1 a call. Or, you can charge certain people more money to call you so that they don't call you every 3 seconds. While not necessarily good, although not necessarily bad, I wouldn't be surprised if this turns into a huge porn venue (heck, you can charge for video calls, I would be surprised if someone didn't start such as service already). But then there are the downsides.

Imagine if you will that you initiate a call legitimately to a 'Prime' provider and you accept their fees, but then feel you didn't get what you were promised? Or you agreed to a high per-minute rate and felt that they were prolonging the call? What is your medium for dispute? How are both buyer and seller protected? (funny, doesn't this sound a lot like eBay issues?)

Worse than that, I am sure that it won't be long before folks find illegitimate ways to profit from this. For example, a malicious user could theoretically force you to download a skype Plug-in that randomly calls a 'prime' service and eats away your credits. They wouldn't even have to rob you blind - they could extract 10 or 20 cents from a few hundred thousand people and still make some serious cash. Or, they could offer prime services in some obscure currency that masks the real rate and makes the service seem cheaper. In the former case, it would cause skype to change the rules and permissions for writing extras, thereby eliminating some of those skype extras that are legitimate.

While I think that this has a lot of potential on the upside, the downside of it is really scary, and I hope the Beta Period Helps Skype figure out how to address some of the security concerns.

My Review of the iPhone (uh... the Linksys CIT 300)

I know what you're thinking, but unfortunately I do not have the 'Inside Scoop from Infinite Loop'. I do however enjoy the many benefits of VoIP. While I have been using Skype for a while, I never quite viewed it as a true VoIP phone, in the vane of VoIP providers like Vonage, OptimumVoice, and Broadvoice who actually provide me with something akin to a traditional phone experience. Skype was too IM-like for me to consider using. But then the lovely folks at Skype offered free calling to any phone in the US and Canada for free to the end of 2006. Since my phone calls at work are metered (we are only allowed a certain amount of long distance calls for non-business use per month), I starte using Skype to make long distance calls via the PC. And while it wasn't perfect, I was definitely impressed with the call clarity, and its ease of use. Although I didn't use them, Skype also had dirt-cheap rates for international calling.

Still, as impressed as I was, I didn't look to skype as a full-time replacement for my VoIP phone - that is until last week. Last week Skype upped the ante in the VoIP wars - it began offering a full year of unlimited calls to the US and Canada for $29.95 (only $14.95 if you sign up before 12/31/06). In essence, Skype's annual rate is what its competitors charge monthly! While I was very intrigued by this, I knew that I couldn't sell skype to my wife without having a 'real' phone to call on. Since our VoIP phones offer low international rates, we actually use that as the only source to keep up with family and friends overseas.

Thankfully, I discovered the CIT 300 - one of new Linksys's new iPhones (touche Apple!) that connects to your PC and landline (i.e. it's a two-line phone) so that you can choose to make calls either from Skype or your home phone. I also discovered that with a $10 Linksys Rebate and Google Checkout's $20 discount, I was able to get this phone for $50 (a lot cheaper than the current Wi-Fi skype phones which run about $150 on the street).

So I bought the CIT 300, and have since installed it half-way (I don't have an available landline near my PC) and here are some of my impressions so far:

For starters, the phone has several large drawbacks. First and formost, this phone is just like all of the other USB phones that one can use for Skype in that it requires you to interact with the existing Skype application to work. This means that your computer will always need to be turned on with Skype running and you being logged in. Essentially, the Skype phone is set up so that all of your audio for Skype calls is routed through the phone. This means that if you don't have the phone handy (or if someone else is using it for a landline call), you won't be able to answer a skype call with your PC. In addition, there is no way (that I have discovered yet) to make a call directly from your PC without dialing it from the handset. So if you are sitting at the computer and want to call someone, you need to initiate it from the phone first, or change your Audio settings.

Another inherent issue with Skype is that it allows you to log in from multiple places at once. If someone tries to call you on Skype, and you are logged in at Work and at home, it will ring in both places, but whoever picks up first, wins. So if your CIT 300 is at home, and someone answers it while you are waiting for a work call, you won't be able to pick it up. It can also be annoying to have the phone ring at home even if they know not to pick up.

2 other pet peeves of mine about this phone - to dial a landline using Skype, you need to either prefix your number with 001 or a + sign, otherwise it won't go through. In addition, there is no way to bridge the gap between the landline and Skype - so if you want to make a three way call, you will need to do it with SkypeOut and not the landlines.

Quirks aside, this is a good phone. All of my skype contacts come through to the handset for speed dialing (both Skype contacts and landlines that I have added to Skype as SkypeOut contacts), and the speaker phone is great. Call Quality is as good as your skype quality - i.e. it's not the phone's fault, and the backlit keys make it easy to dial in the dark.

All told, this phone is a decent option if you want to use Skype for VoIP, but if you can afford it, you will get a little more flexibility with a Wi-Fi skype phone or Linksys' CIT-400 iPhone (which has skype built-in, and doesn't require your computer to be on to work).

One more note, it seems that these Linksys phones allow for multiple handsets, but I have yet to find where they offer an individual handset for sale. However, since they just released some new products in the 'iPhone' line, it could be that those are not too far away.