Campaigns and promotions

Change often starts with having a conversation. At Skype, we're proud to enable global conversations that can help end poverty. We are partnering with the United Nations Millennium Campaign to foster conversations about the most important issues facing our generation during "Stand Up and Take Action!," the annual mobilization where citizens gather at events around the world to demand that world leaders eradicate extreme poverty by 2015.

As part of the program, for the first time, Skype is collaborating with Ustream to enable video calls about global poverty between world leaders, celebrities, and citizens globally to be broadcast on the internet live via Ustream's interactive video broadcasting platform. The Skype calls will be broadcast on both the Stand Up Take Action! page on Facebook and Ustream's web site.

Those participating in the Skype video calls include former Irish President Mary Robinson, as well as African entertainers Femi Kuti and Angelique Kidjo. The calls will take place throughout this week, leading up to the "Stand Up and Take Action!" weekend on October 16-18 when millions of citizens will take part in activities demanding that world leaders keep their promises to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.

We hope you will join us to stand up to poverty by engaging in your own dialogues about this global crisis and what can be done to eradicate it. To find out how to get involved in "Stand Up and Take Action" events happening across the globe, please visit www.standagainstpoverty.org.

In 2007, 2.2 million homes and businesses in Sydney switched off their lights for an hour, and within a year, the event grew into a global sustainability movement.

Last year, 50 million people switched off their lights. The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, Rome’s Colosseum, the Sydney Opera House and the Coca Cola billboard in Times Square all stood in darkness.

This year, WWF has an even more ambitious target. To help them reach it, join Skype and vote earth. The result of the vote will be presented to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen later this year, and WWF are hoping to get 1 billion votes for Earth.

We’ll be turning off all of our office lights for the hour, and Skype employees across the globe will be joining in – and we hope that you do the same.

It’s our opportunity to demonstrate to world leaders that we care about tackling climate change – calling on them to take action to save the planet for future generations.

So don’t forget Earth Hour: 8:30pm local time, wherever you live on planet earth. Saturday 28 March 2009.

“I love you”, “Ich liebe Dich”, “Te Quiero”, “Je t’aime”, “Eu te amo”, “Ti amo”, “Mina Armastan Sind”, “Tora Dost Daram”, “Aku Sayang Enkow”, “Mahal Kita” – there are many ways to share your feelings this Valentine’s Day. Whether you say it in Swahili, Bengali or Catalan though, there’s one thing that makes those words unique – and that’s you.

Millions will be saying the same thing this February 14th but what’s special about those words isn’t that they’re original – it’s that they’re uniquely from you to your loved one.

Because we know how special that moment can be, it’s only right that you have an equally special way to say it. That’s why you can now send your own Valentine’s Video Card which allows you to get as personal as you like

When you visit the site, just choose a card design, record your video message to that special someone and either send it directly or copy the unique link and send your own e-mail. And of course it’s all for free.

Some of you may remember our Video Cards with Skype for last holiday season when tens of thousands of you sent video messages to friends and family – and many posted them to blogs. Because you all seemed to enjoy it so much, we thought we’d let you share the love this time too.

Have fun sending your Video Cards – and remember you can always just video call people on Skype any time for free. There’s no better time than now

A note of caution – there are spam emails circulating, purporting to be from Skype, which prompt you to download a malicious file called valentine.exe. More information is available on the Websense site.

Ever wanted to introduce people to using video on Skype? Missed the post and panicking about what to do last minute? Want to send something just a bit more personal this year to let friends and family know you’re thinking about them?

Now you can send your very own Video Cards with Skype.

But since seeing is believing in these matters, here’s a little demonstration from our very own Skype Santa:

Head over there now to send your own Video Card. Remember you can also link to your Video Card and embed it on your blog if you like.

We’ve also got a little surprise for those Facebook lovers out there. You can now try the application in the same way on Facebook. Just add the Video Cards with Skype Facebook app (you’ll need to login first) and you’ll be able to send the cards to all your Facebook friends instantly.

Hope you enjoy sending your Video Cards!

Happy holidays!

As I wrote on the UK blog a few minutes ago, Rebecca’s non-stop journey around the world has been recognised in the annual Interactive Marketing and Advertising Awards. She spent 33 days zooming around, not even pausing to eat or sleep (or talk on Skype), and shared her experiences on her blog, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube and even a column in the Telegraph — and (some of the time, at least) showed you just how easy it is to take Skype with you wherever you go.

It turns out that the Interactive Marketing and Advertising award jury rather liked the idea, particularly as it was lots of fun, got lots of attention (760,000 visits to the blog, 140,000 unique page views on Flickr and 300,000 total video views on YouTube during the 33 days) and didn’t cost us much at all. A bit like Skype itself, really.

As a result, the Skype Nomad was announced as the winner of the Technology category at the IMA awards ceremony in London last Thursday. It’s a great honour to win the award – and thanks are also due to our friends at Albion, 3 Monkeys, Outside Line, Sidekick and We Are Social who helped us get Rebecca from A to B, to C, to D, and so on

Hi there. I'm Nick Wright and I work in online marketing here at Skype. You may have seen my recent posts on the affiliate blog. I'd like to just let you know a little more about how our laughter chain is doing out on the web.

In his recent anthropological introduction to YouTube, Professor Michael Wesch, chose to reflect on the curious position of the webcam for the modern internet user. In a paraphrase of Carl Sagan's poem after seeing the first "earth-rise" photo from the Voyager 1 spacecraft, Wesch referred to the webcam, sitting near our monitors, as:

"the little glass dot..That's there. That's somewhere else. That's everybody.

...the little glass dot..the eyes of the world."

It's a strikingly poetic way to think of the internet video experience and a great way to think of the new vistas of possibility opened up by video calling. Above all, as it appeared a month into the release of the Skype Laughter Chain, I couldn't help drawing a comparison between the phenomenal response to our video and this view of the online video population.

Since the launch on July 1st, the video has been seen by almost 6 million people worldwide around the internet but what has really rocked our world is that almost 7,000 of you left a video response in our player. A big thank you to everyone who participated . Out of all those, we've added about 450 great laughs to our chain, which now comes in at around one hour and fifteen minutes. To give you a little taster, here's a short hilarious preview of the full chain:

Above everything, observing the response to the original video has been exceptionally gratifying and deeply heartening for everyone involved here at Skype and we certainly feel we've had a similar privileged insight into our own users and online video viewers, to the one that Professor Wesch described above.

We thought the least we could do would be to say thanks to all those that contributed to the chain by offering them Skype credit for 5 hours free calls to landlines and mobiles on Skype. So, if you find yourself appear in the chain (up until August 31st), please send an e-mail to hahaha@skypelaughterchain.com, including your name, Skype ID, the country you currently live in and 2 pictures of yourself so we can identify you in the chain. Please get back to us by September 30th to claim your voucher.

Did you know that we only smile 35% as much as we think we do? And that the longest recorded laughing fit was in a village in Tanzania in 1962 and lasted two years? Two years?!

Well, 1962 was ages ago. At Skype, we've decided it's high time we had another laughter epidemic -- but this time it should be around the world. So, we're creating the world's first and longest giggling fit, and we want you to join it

Just plug in your webcam, watch the start of the chain below, and film yourself watching it. Send us your video and your laugh could be added to the chain.

Find out more about the Laughter Chain (plus find out how many calories a good laugh burns up) at the Skype Laughter Chain website.

Over the past few weeks, Skype has been busy launching its new online shops across Europe and North America. If you live in one of the 19 countries where they are available, browsing and buying Skype Certified gadgets just got a bit easier.

We hope you like the revamp, as the right bit of hardware can help take the Skype experience to a higher level. Where conversations are more convenient and relationships easier to maintain. And you (or the target of your gift-giving powers) will look cool with a nice bit of gear that’s at home on the desk or in the pocket.

To create the best and most convenient shopping experience, we‘ve joined forces with Digital River, experts at helping run great online stores. So here’s what’s new:

* updated look and feel
* easier navigation
* bestsellers‘ list
* streamlined product list to help users find the right products
* new product pictures
* better help section with top ten FAQs to help users get the support they need
* improved translations and additional local languages supported

To celebrate, we’re offering free delivery on some of the hottest hardware. Logitech’s Quickcam Pro for Notebooks supports High Quality Video calls from £69.99 / €99.99 / $79.99. And with a free headset and calling vouchers thrown in, it’s everything a Skype user needs to get started in style.

You don’t even need to be tied to your PC anymore. Make and receive Skype calls from anywhere in the home or office with a dual-purpose Philips Cordless Phone. The package comes with a Skype credit voucher for calling landlines or mobiles anywhere in the world.

It’s also worth taking a peek at the great value offers exclusive to our Skype Shops. Whether you want to spend a little or a bit more, check out your local Skype Shop online at skype.com/shop. It might help fill your Christmas shopping basket for a little less.

Good things often come in threes. Godfather, anyone? The blue three-wheeled car in Mr. Bean's parking-lot revenge episode? Here is the third installment in a series of blog posts about cheaper SkypeOut calls to India: The "Talk more to Bangalore" campaign has been extended until the end of August.

Campaign pages are there for your perusal and consumption in the UK, US and the rest of the world.

It's worth remembering that it doesn't matter whether you call Indian landlines or mobiles. The price will be the same.

Our campaign that allows you to call India and Pakistan for up to 50% cheaper is coming to an end. Tomorrow (31st of July) will be the last day to take advantage of these really friendly prices. Note that international calls are real cheap even without any discounts. So if you have any friends or family who live in either India or Pakistan then go ahead, give them a call.

And if you're too lazy to check out the prices then it costs 7.9 euro cents to call India and 5.6 euro cents to call Pakistan. Doesn't matter if you call mobiles or landline numbers.

This may be worth reading if you have family, friends or colleagues in Pakistan or India. With a combined population of 1.3 billion, there are plenty of phone numbers to call. Our marketing folks figured this out as well and decided to chop SkypeOut prices to these countries in half for the month of July.

This may not qualify as a pure public-service announcement, but try calling Pakistan from a regular phone and you'll appreciate the price difference. So, in July, SkypeOut calls cost 6.9 eurocents (+ VAT) per minute to India and 4.9 eurocents (+VAT) per minute to Pakistan. You can call both landlines or mobiles registered in these two countries. Modest connection fees apply.

Our Small Business Pack is out now. [See the details on the business blog.](http://share.skype.com/sites/business/2007/05/introducing_the_small_business.html)

One thing that's interesting about this -- quite often, people ask me how they can resell Skype or otherwise benefit from it. We have various programs available. The first one I'd highlight is our [Affiliate program](http://www.skype.com/partners/affiliate/) where you can put a banner on your website and earn money after someone buys Skype products after they get to the Skype site through the banner.

This Small Business Pack offering also introduces reseller opportunities where you can purchase the Small Business Pack directly from Skype at a discounted rate (dependent on volumes). You can also sell additional vouchers when the customer needs to top up their account with Skype Credit.

To read more about the Reseller program go to [**skype.com/go/resellers**](http://www.skype.com/go/resellers) or send an email to **resellers 'at' skype.com**.

As the title says

See [this previous post](http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2007/05/skype_32_for_windows_final_ver.html) about the competition and instructions for entering. Three winners get a [digital photo frame...](http://www.skype.com/intl/en/campaigns/videosnapshot/) not too bad eh?

[See here](http://forum.skype.com/index.php?showforum=139) for entering and voting.

**New:** if you don't want to bother with uploading your entry to the forum, **you can now send your submission by email**. Just attach your snapshot to an email with your contact details, and email it to **humanemoticon 'at' skype.net**.

For those of you in the US and Canada, you shouldn’t forget that today is [Mother’s Day](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother%27s_Day) — and even if you have, it’s not too late to do something about it

Skype is offering free calls to US and Canadian residents to **anywhere in the world** * until 4.59am Eastern Time tomorrow.

If you don’t have Skype, it’s easy and free to [download and install](http://www.skype.com/go/getskype-gogmother).

This is a great opportunity to get in touch with the people you love, no matter where they are in the world. Plus, we won’t tell anyone if you don’t *actually* call your mother.

\* *There are a few [rules](http://www.skype.com/campaigns/giftofgab/terms.html), of course.*

I got this request from a co-worker. If you're using Send Money, please send us your story.

> With the recent launch of the Send Money feature we here at Skype are hoping to hear about some successes you've had with it.


Have you transferred money to a friend, relative or loved one in urgent need? Given a gift via Send Money? Whatever you've done with the new feature, we want to hear about it.


Get in touch with your story by posting a comment here, Skyping me (pete.jones4), or dropping me an email at .


Thanks

We created and unofficial directory of Skype public chats a few weeks back as I wrote in this post. It appeared were not the first to do so There's also searchskype.net and this nameless, but nicely designed directory (looks familiar, doesn't it?).

Some public chat hosts kindly added our eyes and ears to their chats. Thank you for doing so. It was quite fun to see what goes on in these chats. For example The Entrepreneur Story chat lead me to a group of students who set up functional businesses with only 100 dollars. Space science chat gave me regular updates on what Nasa had been up to and made me wonder why the Earth has only one moon. There were also some less educational chats where at least it was good to see people from different parts of the world getting to know each other. This is what Skype public chats are for.

We'll be contacting creators of Space science and The Entrepreneur Story chats to send both of them a Philips VOIP 321 phone. And we'll send creators of Search Skype, BarkerJr.Net and Trip hop, Chillout, Drum'n'Bass a Logitech webcam. That's more phones and less webcams that initially promised, but that's a change for better, not worse.

Public chats are great - provided you can find one on a topic that interests you. Unfortunately we don't have an official directory of Public Chats (yet), so here's an unofficial one. If you're hosting a Public chat or know good ones, please help other Skype users find out.

We want to give Skype hardware for hosts of most active public chats. We can't participate in all public chats, so we have to limit this to hosts who have added the contact publicchatfan to their chat before the 12th of March. It's not a contest for the most chat messages. Think of it as a small Thank you to users who have helped to make Skype more useful, fun or both. I'be announcing six lucky winners here on the 19th of March. One of them receives a Philips VOIP 321 phone and five will receive a Logitech webcam.

And here's a tip from Voidstar if you want to find out about more public chats, but can't find them in the directory - search for joinpublicchat which is an integral part of any public chat code and you'll see them beautifully displayed in your favourite search engine. Just some link "engineering" needed later

See the unofficial directory of public chats

Good news for European Skype users — from today, you can choose to pay a low monthly subscription of €2 and make zero cents per minute calls to domestic landlines in 15 countries in Europe.

The [Skype Pro subscription deal](http://www.skype.com/products/skypepro/) includes:

* Zero cents per minute calling to domestic landlines in your country — this means you can talk as long as you like and only pay the connection fee ([3.9 cents or equivalent](http://www.skype.com/products/skypeout/rates/connection_fee.html)) for each call that you make to domestic landlines
* Free [Skype Voicemail](http://www.skype.com/products/skypevoicemail/) (normally €15 per year)
* €30 discount on SkypeIn numbers
* €5 Skype Credit included as part of the introductory offer (see below)
* A €30 discount on a [Philips VoIP 841 cordless phone](http://accessories.skype.com/item?sku=VOIP8411B).
* A €10 discount on an [SMC WiFi phone](http://accessories.skype.com/item?sku=BWSKP100PRO).
* Money off a series of [Skype Extras](https://extras.skype.com/).

Bonus: If you get there quickly, you can [purchase Skype Pro](http://www.skype.com/products/skypepro/) on a five month basis for €10 and receive €5 Skype credit absolutely free.

This is great for regular Skype users, who will benefit from flat rate calling to domestic landlines, plus all of the other goodies.

### The lowdown

Skype Pro is now available across Europe in the following countries: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Portugal, Spain and the UK — it'll be launched in other countries across the world during 2007.

If you aren't based in one of these countries you can still purchase Skype Pro if you're really keen. You still get all the other benefits, but you don’t get the advantage of the zero per minute local calls.

Extra: You can use your Skype Pro deal wherever you are — if you're in France, you get free calls to French landlines; if you're in Austria, you get free calls to Austrian landlines, and so on.

### Show you're Pro

Feel free to show off the fact that you're using Skype Pro — you can steal the image at the top of this post to use as an avatar. Right click on it and save it to your computer, then [follow the instructions here](http://www.skype.com/help/guides/stepbystep/edityourprofile_windows/step6.html).

If you happen to live in one of the European countries served by the [Skype Accessories Shop](http://www.skype.com/go/shop.accessories) and have been hesitant about buying from them for some reason, there's now news for you -- they take PayPal. So you can head right over and get some fresh Skype hardware. You may want to check back once in a while, as I hear we have a new store in the works.

We've heard a lot of skepticism about Skype being suitable for use in a business setting. There are some things you couldn't do with Skype before, but Skype 3.0 for Windows is a great step forward towards gaining more traction in the business community with its advanced administration options. And even before that, many businesses have actually found Skype great for their purposes as is, or in connection with the [Skype for Business Control Panel](http://www.skype.com/products/skypegroups/) that lets you easily manage and track Skype-related costs. By the way, Skype won the in the VoIP product category of [Small Business Computing Excellence in Technology Awards](http://www.smallbusinesscomputing.com/news/article.php/3655761), perhaps indicating that it's not totally unknown in the small business space.

To celebrate and promote our business use, we're doing a bit of a business push to highlight some businesses that are successfully using Skype, and encourage others to follow the examples. See the general release about [new Skype for Business features](http://about.skype.com/2007/01/skype_means_business_saving_mo.html), or see how [Skype helps](http://about.skype.com/2007/01/skype_for_business_takes_lewis.html) the international architects firm Lewis & Hickey in their daily work. Or you can take a look at some other case studies like [Tractor](http://www.skype.com/business/casestudies/tractor/) or [Edison Ford](http://www.skype.com/business/casestudies/edison_ford/).

### Where to go from here?

Just remember [skype.biz](http://www.skype.biz) as your destination for "all things Skype and business". More specifically, you can take a look at the [Skype business security site](http://www.skype.com/security/business/) to learn how to manage and control the use of Skype in your network of Windows-based computers, or look at the [Skype extras for business](https://extras.skype.com/categories/4). Plus there is [Skype for Business Control panel](http://www.skype.com/products/skypegroups/) for business payments, cost reporting and management. UPDATE: we have received some questions about using the Control Panel -- [see here for comments](http://share.skype.com/sites/business/2007/01/three_faqs_about_the_control_p.html).

Remember the [wallpaper competition](http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2006/12/design_a_skype_wallpaper.html)? We invited everyone to send us their wallpaper designs for using in Skype to celebrate the launch of Skype 3.0 for Windows.

We received a good selection of entries. As said previously, the three winners will each receive a [USB Internet Mini Phone](http://www.usr-emea.com/products/p-voip-product.asp?prod=voip-9602&loc=unkg) from our friends at [US Robotics](http://www.usr.com/). We contact the winners personally to sort out the details.

Here's how we did the judging, before the finally get to the winners. Many people simply sent us "pretty pictures". This wasn't enough, as the submission had to be actually usable and functional as a wallpaper in Skype, with no visible cut edges with normal Skype window sizes or anything like that.

So, here we go... we also invented our own names to the submissions based on the initial impression of their looks. When downloading them from Flickr, be sure to download the original size.

### Winners

"Leaves" by [sky_1002](skype:sky_1002?userinfo)

"Matrix" by [skintradeuk](skype:skintradeuk?userinfo)

"Blue pattern" by [monkey050](skype:monkey050?userinfo)

### Honorable mention

Here are two other entries that didn't make it to the Top 3 but we still wanted to share them.

"Twirl" by [kenny.bsp](skype:kenny.bsp?userinfo)

"Grandma's wallpaper" by [kenny.bsp](skype:kenny.bsp?userinfo)

Thanks to everyone who participated

You've been asking what's our plan for 2007 with the free calls in North America. We've been saying we'll announce it before the end of this year. And today is the day.

Today, we [announced](http://about.skype.com/2006/12/skype_announces_new_skype_unli.html) Skype Unlimited. There's bad news and good news.

The bad news is that you'll have to pay a bit.

The good news is that it's a simple one-time purchase and there are no catches. You'll get free calls for a year for an incredible price, plus other goodies like coupons for discounts on top-notch Skype hardware from our selected partners.

How it works:

* you go to [Your Account](http://www.skype.com/go/myaccount). If you're eligible for the Unlimited plan, you'll automatically see the prompt to buy it.
* the price is $14.95 if you buy before end of January 2007. From February, the price will be $29.95.
* if you buy before end of 2006, you get free unlimited calls until the end of 2007. If you buy in 2007, you get free unlimited calls for 12 months after your purchase.
* the calls continue to be totally free until the end of 2006 as we've previously said, no change in that. But there's no risk in stocking up for 2007 so that you wouldn't forget it in the Christmas and New Year holiday craze -- if you go and buy the plan for $15 right away, you're good to go in the new year.
* you'll get the partner coupons delivered in the e-mail that we send you after the purchase.
* the details are mostly the same as with this year's free calls -- for example, it works within the US and Canada for both landline and mobile calls.

See also the [Knowledge Base section on Skype Unlimited](http://support.skype.com/index.php?_a=knowledgebase&_j=subcat&_i=59) for more details.

You know how those dark winter nights can get to you. (In Tallinn, it gets dark around 3-4 PM in the afternoon.) Talking helps a lot to lighten up the long dim hours. And even though you got free Skype calls, you may want to talk with someone who's not yet on Skype, so you need to use SkypeOut.

To help you out here, we'll be running our Winter Days campaign, starting next week. If you happen to live in some of the European Union countries (not all, though) or Japan, we offer you some free Skype Credit on certain dates. As with the previous Gift Days, you'll just need to sign in to Your Account and click a button to claim it. You can then use the credit for SkypeOut — or if you don't feel like talking, you can also send an SMS. Watch this blog and skype.com for updates about dates and countries.

Do you know about the Skype Affiliate Program? Maybe you've heard that you can earn money promoting Skype. Just put a piece of code on your site and every time someone signs up for SkypeOut, SkypeIn, Voicemail or any other of the involved products, you get a cut out of the sale.

Now... the big news here is that just a few days ago, we increased the commissions to a whopping 25%. This means that every time someone buys 10 € of Skype Credit, you get more than 2 € out of that. This is a permanent change so it doesn't have an expiry date.

Also, as a limited-time deal, we offer a 15 $ commission on the Skype WiFi phone package.

For more info and links for signing up, see our Partner blog.

Today, we launched a package with SMC and FON to everyone in Europe and the US where you can get a WiFi Skype phone, the FON router and other goodies (Skype Credit and voicemail) for £99/ €139 / $159.99. See the press release and read more details on the Skype Gear blog.

An immediate question I had when seeing this was, "Can you use your WiFi phone in other FON hotspots". The answer at this time is "no". You can't use the WiFi phone in any hotspot that requires browser authentication, but you CAN use it in hotspots secured with WEP or WPA. So while you can't use the device in other FON hotspots when trying to access them as Linus or Alien, you CAN use it at your home FON hotspot (the secure part), as well as any other open or secured WiFi hotspots, such as your home or office.

Today we launched a campaign to let expats know how useful Skype is for keeping in touch with friends and family back home. (Expats are people who live away from their "home country".) The campaign is for Polish expats in the UK and Ireland, and UK expats in Spain. See below for free calls weekends.

We have seen from our research has shown that Skype and our paid services are of particular benefit to those living away from their friends and family and those with friends and family abroad. With an estimated 750,000 Poles currently living in the UK and up to 200,000 Poles living in Ireland, Polish communities represent a significant part of the UK's expatriate population. There is also a large community of UK expats living on the Spanish coast who can benefit from using Skype to keep in contact.

We'll be running various activities to highlight the benefits of using Skype, ranging from a promotional bus demonstrating Skype and a radio show live from the bus in Spain, adverts in newspapers, banners on websites and to posters and flyers in major Polish cultural centres and locations.

We'll also be offering free calls to landlines in the UK from Spain on 2nd and 3rd December and to Poland from the UK and Ireland on the 9th and 10th December. Polish expats can find out more at skype.com/go/polski and UK expats at skype.com/go/uk.

Last week, we announced this Talk for Britain campaign for the UK. In short, buy £10 of Skype Credit before the end of the year, and get free calls to UK landlines for the 6 months after your purchase.

Now... what we also did in connection with this campaign was a survey of the Brits' talking habits. See the full release. Some highlights below are pretty... er... interesting. Then again, I'm not sure that the results would be so different if we did this in any other country. I've been on the phone from all sorts of funny places too, but toilet... hmm.

According to the research, almost three quarters of respondents admitted talking to friends and family while on the toilet and 17 percent have actually fallen asleep while chatting on the phone to someone else.

The research revealed that respondents admitted that their worst phone nightmare was being told what they did the night before because they were too drunk to remember. Also, it appears that women like chatting on the phone while soaking in the bath and almost a quarter said that they had been caught talking to someone they shouldn’t have.

So really. Go talk for Britain.

This is one of those cool posts where it's so fulfilling to click "publish" Do you still remember the North American free calls announcement? Free SkypeOut calls within North America and Canada until the end of 2006. Still ongoing.

Many thought "why only America"? Well fear not Europe, because Skype is with you. As of right now and until the end of 2006, all SkypeOut calls to landlines within France are free. Unlimited. Zero price. No catches.

If you're from France or just speak French, check out our French site and the French blog for more ongoing coverage.

A couple of things to point out...

• in France, this applies to landlines only. In North America, it covers both landlines and mobiles.
• you can call for free within the individual "islands", that is, within North America and France. You cannot call North America from France for free or vice versa — in this case, the regular SkypeOut rates continue to apply.
• in both North America and France, if you use Call Forwarding then it costs you the standard SkypeOut rate.

What's next? Can we expect more "free countries"? What happens in 2007? I don't have the info to post here just yet, but 2007 is not that far away any more, so we'll have to come up with the answers soon, so stay tuned for that. And until then, enjoy the free calls in USA, Canada and France.

There's a little promo we're running through August, which gives you yet again some free Skype Credit. It's a bit similar to the previous Gift Days. You could say that it's the same thing. At least the idea is similar -- on a certain day, if you're in one of the included countries, you go to your account and claim your free minutes (in the form of some free Skype Credit that we add to your account). The dates are as follows. On all the dates, the campaign starts 8 AM GMT+1 and ends 24 hours later.

### Italy, Spain, Sweden

Every Tuesday in August (Aug 1, 8, 15, 22, 29)

### France, Germany

Every Wednesday in August (Aug 2, 9, 16, 23, 30)

### United Kingdom, Poland

Every Thursday in August (Aug 3, 10, 17, 24, 31)

[Full release here.](http://about.skype.com/2006/07/skype_announces_free_internati.html) Note that this applies only to the US and Canada.

> Free SkypeOut calling to the United Kingdom, Mexico and Japan is available weekends July 15-16, July 22-23 and July 29-30, respectively. The free international SkypeOut calling offer to each country runs 48 hours from 12:01 a.m. EDT Saturdays through Sundays at midnight EDT, when international calling is at a peak.

Many of our recent "free calls" initiatives have been circling around North America recently. This leaves the rest of you worried, as we've seen it in comments. Fear not, for we are working on expanding the scope of these activities, as you can also see with the [Gift Days](http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2006/07/skype_gift_days_july_schedule.html). I know that Henry Gomez who assumed the "chief marketer" position in Skype just last week is very keen on this and will post his own updates here shortly.

If Skype had existed when Jack Kerouac began his famous literary bounce across the United States, you can be sure that the Beat icon would've had a laptop in tow, eager to share his poetic exploits with friends and family around the world. These days, many people find themselves on the road for a different reason--more work, less play. We like to call them "Road Warriors," those noble business folk who spend an extraordinary amount of time in airports and hotels, jetting from Los Angeles to Paris, London, and Milan in what is increasingly becoming a truly globalized economy. Anyone who does this often knows that you can get an international cell phone. Anyone who's gotten an international cell phone also knows that the calling rates per minute are roughly equivalent to the price of dinner for two at a nice Italian restaurant.

Can you sense a theme here? SUPPOSEDLY INSURMOUNTABLE PROBLEM PLUS SKYPE = RIDICULIOUSLY SIMPLE SOLUTION TO ALL THE WORLD'S ILLS.

Or something like that.

In any case, if you, dear Reader, happen to be one of these fabled Road Warriors--using video Skype to tutor your kids in their schoolwork while you're in Denmark, for instance--we want to hear your brave battle cries and your Skype "war" stories. As usual, drop an email to scott.indrisek@skype.net. Please put ROAD WARRIOR in the title, and also kindly include a bit of relevant information: your city/state, Skype ID, and perhaps your favorite flavor of soft-serve ice cream.

As in [June](http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2006/06/skype_gift_days_schedule_in_ju.html), we also have some Skype Gift Days for certain countries in July. A Gift Day means if you’re from one of the indicated countries and it’s one of these dates, you can log on to [Your Account](http://www.skype.com/go/myaccount) and claim your 10 minutes of free SkypeOut calling. (It will be a small amount of Skype Credit that you will get on your account.)

The date means that the Skype Gift Day starts on the indicated date at 8 AM Central European Time (7 AM London time, or 9 AM Eastern European time), and ends 8 AM on the following day. So it runs for 24 hours every time. Note that Japan and Brazil have a different starting timezone.

### Sweden

July 10, July 13 (UPDATED: new July 10 date added)

### Estonia

July 25

### Germany

July 10, July 13 (UPDATED: new July 10 date added)

### United Kingdom

July 5, July 18

### Spain

July 5, July 18

### France

July 6, July 20

### Italy

July 6, July 20

### Brazil

July 11, July 27. Start time 08:00 GMT-5

### Japan

July 4, July 19. Start time 08:00 GMT+9

Bonus trivia: the internal codename for these days is SOGD. So if you want to sound cool and like you know what you're talking about, you could ask us how is SOGD going SOGD means "SkypeOut Gift Days" because this is what they were originally called when we started experimenting with the Gift Days last year.

UPDATE: the calendar is now also [on Google Calendar](http://www.google.com/calendar/embed?src=27q71bloflmcoc9uvl7usscrp0%40group.calendar.google.com).

We have a joint demonstration area with Sony & Intel at Heathrow Airport. The stand will be at departure area of Heathrow Terminal 1 until the 3rd of August this year. If you’re passing through, please drop by the stand. It’s right by where all the shops are, so you have to go through security first. The departure gates are further past this area.

At the demo area, you can use Skype on Sony Vaio laptops and can make SkypeOut calls to friends and family far and wide. One morning, we had passengers calling their family as far as Australia, Dubai and Russia. We also hand out Skype starter packs to new callers.

We use some Skype USB phones and headsets for demoing. If you need more high-end hardware than what you can find in the free starter pack, there's a Dixons Airport Shop nearby where you can pick up some more Skype gadgets.

Continue reading "Skype corner at Heathrow Airport" »

Being away from your family is tough. But with Skype it can be a little easier. You can talk to people the otherside of the world for as long as you like, for free.

Listen to our famous dads’ messages of support and then leave a message of your own (for free, of course).

The World Cup is just kicking off. [See what Skype is doing around this.](http://www.skype.com/share/football/) Go see what the [Trinidad and Tobago](http://tnt.ebay.de/index.php?lang=uk) is up to (our friends at eBay are supporting them), get a [WeeMee](http://skype.weeworld.com/?wc=tandt&setlang=GB) or [Klonie](http://skype.klonies.com/). Last but not least, there are some excellent [Skypecasts](http://www.skype.com/go/skypecasts) around football oncoming. Sharing a game experience with a Skypecast or conference call is a great way to hook up with your long-lost friends or make new ones.

We will have a whole series of Gift Days this summer. A Gift Day means if you're from one of the indicated countries and it's one of these dates, you can log on to [Your Account](http://www.skype.com/go/myaccount) and claim your 10 minutes of free SkypeOut calling. (It will be a small amount of Skype Credit that you will get on your account.)

Here are the remaining dates for June. We'll publish July dates in early July. Note that the date means that the Skype Gift Day starts at 8 AM Central European Time (7 AM London time, or 9 AM Eastern European time), and ends 8 AM on the following day. So it runs for 24 hours every time. (UPDATED: Korea, Brazil and Japan have different timezones, so they start 8 AM according to their local timezone... see below. Sorry for the confusion.)

### Sweden

June 7, June 15, June 28

### Germany

June 7, June 15, June 28

### United Kingdom

June 21

### Spain

June 7, June 21

### France

June 8, June 20

### Italy

June 8, June 20

### Korea

June 27, starts 8:00 GMT+9, goes for 24 hours

### Brazil

June 27, starts 8:00 GMT-5, goes for 24 hours

### Japan

June 22, starts 8:00 GMT+9, goes for 24 hours

We kick off the summer with SkypeOut Gift Day for United Kingdom today (Tuesday, 6th of June). It runs until tomorrow early morning. If you're in the UK, head straight over to [skype.com](http://www.skype.com) where you see more info, and then to [My Account](http://www.skype.com/go/myaccount) where you can claim your free 10 minutes of SkypeOut calling.

Thanks to everyone for your comments. Keep 'em coming. We are already [story of the month on Digg](http://digg.com/technology/SkypeOut_now_FREE_for_US_Canada_) -- please go digg it and help us become story of the year

Two updates that were brought on since last night and that we have been working on...

The most pressing issue was of course many people in the US and Canada not being able to use the free calls. You may have got a message like "You need Skype Credit to call to ordinary phones" or something along those lines. We updated our detection engine earlier today and have confirmation that this is now resolved for many users. So if it didn't work for you before, chances are good that it does now, so please retry. Note that there may be some locations where it still doesn't work -- in this case, please [report your public IP address and location to our Customer Service](http://support.skype.com/?_a=tickets&_m=submit). We continue to work on this.

Secondly, there have been questions about what happens to your Skype Credit now that you got free calls. The answer is that Skype Credit remains on your account and its validity extends the same way as it did before -- your Skype Credit is valid for 180 days from your last call or purchase. This includes also the free North American calls. So the credit won't expire as long you keep using SkypeOut, be it paid or free.

Update: This offer has now ended, unfortunately. However, you can still make cheap calls to the USA, or check out our subscriptions for even better value for regular callers.

We just announced that SkypeOut is now free within the US and Canada to all landlines and mobiles, until at least the end of 2006.

How does this work?

If you're in the US or Canada, you can use SkypeOut to call any landline or mobile number in both the USA and Canada for free.

If you're in the US or Canada and calling any other country, OR if you're in any other country and calling landline or mobile numbers in the US or Canada, the standard SkypeOut rates apply.

Of course, Skype-to-Skype calls continue to be globally free, so no changes there.

See also the campaign FAQ.

Continue reading "Free calls to all landlines and mobile phones within the US and Canada" »

Last night, Skype announced license agreements with major music publishing companies that allow us to distribute music from Warner Music Group as [Skype ringtones](http://www.skype.com/go/shop.personal). From certain countries (currently, that includes the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland, France, The Netherlands, Belgium, and Poland), you can already download a Madonna ringtone. All other countries will follow some time in May. So if you're from one of those countries, this is what you see in our [Personalize Skype Store](http://www.skype.com/go/shop.personal?store).

Now... some people have speculated that this will mean that Skype will take over iTunes, or that this is the new definitive platform for user-to-user music distribution, or all sorts of other crazy fun wild stuff. Let's be clear that we're only talking about downloading licensed music from content providers as Skype ringtones here. Nothing more, nothing less. While we welcome the discussion and can also ourselves come up with all sorts of cool ideas about how to grow and extend the content platform, these are definitely not in our short- or mid-term plans. (And long-term plans are too vague to speculate about anyway.)

So, [go get that Madonna ringtone.](http://www.skype.com/go/shop.personal?end)

With Mother’s Day approaching, Skype is eager to hear from moms who have been using the service to keep in touch with their loved ones, grandmothers who Skype with the grandkids, and children who are Skyping with their moms. Are you a businesswoman on the road who Skypes to her children back home? A mother who has used Skype with webcam to show off your brand new baby to distant relatives? Whatever the case may be, we know that Skype has been helping mothers, sons, and daughters maintain vital emotional connections regardless of where they live. Now’s your chance to share how Skype has made it happen for you.

If you have a story to share about this, please contact Scott Indrisek (Skype Name "[indrisek](skype:indrisek?chat)" or e-mail: ) and use “Skype Your Mom” as the subject.

More info on [skype.com](http://www.skype.com). If you're currently in Korea, click on the Gift Day banner to learn more.

As it says. Head over to [skype.com](http://www.skype.com) and click on the Gift Day banner to learn more and get your gift from the My Account area.

Saint Patrick lived in the years 386-493 and is the patron saint of Ireland. March 17 celebrates Saint Patrick and is a national holiday in Ireland. See Wikipedia for more about [the day](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Patrick%27s_Day) and about [Saint Patrick](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Patrick).

Skype is celebrating Saint Patrick's Day by offering SkypeOut calls to regular home and office phones in Ireland at half price. When you call a landline in Ireland on March 17 between 00:00 and 23:59 GMT (or simply put, for the whole day), the call is charged at $0.01 or £ 0.006 or € 0.008 (depending on your currency) which is half the regular Global Rate of €0.017. Happy calling.

As the title says. If you're in those countries, head over to [skype.com](http://www.skype.com) and click the banner to learn more.

Today is a SkypeOut Gift Day for UK and US. I happen to be in the UK today myself, so I went ahead and claimed my gift -- got it credited to my account pretty much immediately, so everything works fine. And when trying to approach it the second time, this is what it tells you. One gift per day per user.

Today is a SkypeOut Gift Day for all of you in the USA and UK. Gifting is a nice way to end the week. Go see the [skype.com front page](http://www.skype.com/) and click on the Gift Day banner to learn more. For the UK, it already started in the morning, USA will kick in a bit later when morning arrives there (And when you miss the Gift Day, there's the ongoing offer of getting free SkypeOut minutes and Skype Voicemail when you buy stuff and pay with PayPal.)

If you're in one of those countries, head over to [skype.com](http://www.skype.com/) and click on the banner to learn more and claim your SkypeOut Gift before midnight today (Thursday).

UPDATE: Oops! We had to end the campaign a bit sooner (several hours before midnight) in Italy, Germany and Denmark. This was again more popular than anticipated and we "ran out of stock" for those countries, so to speak. Sorry. This wasn't the last Gift Day for these countries this winter/spring, though, so keep watching the news.

As the title says, we kick off today's Valentine Day celebration by handing out some free Skype credit. Today's SkypeOut Gift Day is limited to USA and United Kingdom. [Read more here](http://www.skype.com/campaigns/freeskypedays/index_freeday.html) and [go claim your gift credit](http://www.skype.com/go/myaccount) if you're from US or UK. Other countries will follow over the next weeks, so keep checking back.