February 2007

It’s easy to record Skype calls with the help of utilities such as Pamela and Ecamm’s Call Recorder for Mac, but before you get carried away, it’s worth being aware of the legal implications of recording conversations.

In the UK, phone call recording is covered by a patchwork of different legislation, and while trying to read through all of it is a task you’ll probably want to leave to a solicitor, here are a few basics:

Please not that this doesn’t constitute legal advice, so get in touch with a solicitor if you need to make decisions based on this information.

Can I record Skype conversations?

Yes. You’re allowed to record calls so long as the recording is for your own use. If you plan to give the recording to a third party — someone who wasn’t on the call — then you need to take a look at the next question.

Do I have to let people know that I’m recording a Skype call?

No, so long as you’re not going to make the recording available to a third party. If you are going to make the recording available to others, you’ll need the consent of the people on the call.

What happens if I unlawfully record a call?

It’s a civil offence, which means that the people you’ve recorded have the right to take action against you in court.

Where can I find out more?

Ofcom have some answers to common questions on their website, but if you want the full details, you’ll need to dive in to the various bits and pieces of legislation:

• Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000
• Telecommunications (Lawful Business Practice) (Interception of Communications) Regulations 2000
• Data Protection Act 1998
• Telecommunications (Data Protection and Privacy) Regulations 1999
• Human Rights Act 1998

As promised, Skype Pro is here — you can now pay £1.50 a month and get free per minute SkypeOut calls to UK landlines; all you pay is the 3.3p (or equivalent) connection fee and you can talk for as long as you like.

If you’re really quick, you can get an extra special deal and pay £8 for five whole months, which also includes £4 SkypeOut credit absolutely free.

As a Skype Pro user, you also get various other cool features:

• Free Skype Voicemail (normally £10 per year)
• £16 discount on SkypeIn numbers
• A £21 discount on a Philips VoIP 841 cordless phone.
• A £7 discount on an SMC WiFi phone.
• Money off a series of Skype Extras.

As a bonus, 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.

What’s there to wait for? Upgrade to Pro today!

London-based Lars Plougmann illustrates exactly why video is better than voice.

The story of how Skype got its name is an intiguing one — and if you haven’t already heard it, just follow the link.

One thing which always interests me is the variety of ways people pronounce the word ‘Skype’. The correct pronunciation rhymes with ‘type’ — you can listen to that one below — but I’ve heard plenty of people say ‘Skypee’.

Surely a Skypee is one who is Skyped? As an aside, Skype is a perfectly good verb, much the same fashion as Google. Indeed, any noun can be verbed if you try hard enough — and if you disagree, head to Urban Dictionary or Jyte to cast your vote.

Jeremy Wagstaff has a good theory about why Skype gets mispronounced:

Usually everyone knows what to call something because it spreads via the media — TV, radio, newspapers — so people are likely to hear the name before they start adopting it. Here people heard about Skype from friends, long before they heard about it from more formal channels, and started using it right then and there.

Still, I’m glad that I can clear this one up. Skype has one syllable.

Of course, Skype isn’t the only brand to suffer from a bit of linguistic mangling. The Nintendo Wii was initially ridiculed for its seemingly unfortunate name, and Yay Hooray! has a whole thread devoted to making fun of people who mispronounce things. (I had almost as much fun laughing at the phoneticisations of French into American English — and look, there’s a nouned verb.)

Readers — now’s your opportunity to admit your embarrassing mistakes. Leave me a message and who knows; there might just be something in it for the best (or worst) effort…

Today, we’ve just released a very exciting deal in the Skype Store — you can now get:

• The DUALphone 3088 cordless 2 in 1 phone
• Up to 300 minutes SkypeOut credit

… for only £99 — you save £15 off the normal price.

The 2 in 1 phone does normal phone calls as well as Skype calls, meaning that you can use it for emergency dialling. This makes it a perfect replacement for your existing landline handset.

Steve over at the Skype Gear blog has written a pretty comprehensive review of the phone — he particularly likes the automatically recharging batteries, the quick startup and the great call quality.

Why not head over to the store to buy the bundle?

Alternatively, if you already use the DUALphone 3088, let me know what you think — do you agree with Steve’s review? Is there anything else worth pointing out to someone interested in buying the phone?

I popped over to Lewis and Hickey Architects in Marylebone yesterday afternoon to have a chat with Ben Mareschal (he’s the bloke on the right), who’s reponsible for bringing Skype to their 40 strong London team.

Lewis and Hickey now use Skype for internal calls as well as phoning their clients. Instead of expensive land line calls to their Japanese client, for example, they use SkypeOut; if their clients are at their desks, they can transfer files without having to interrupt their conversations.

Interestingly, despite other employers’ views to the contrary, Ben quite likes instant messaging:

People used to rely on email, but with Skype you can get an immediate response to a query without disturbing the whole office — especially if you are using the instant chat feature.

And loves the conference call features:

It gets used much more than our specialist system ever did, plus it’s free.

The third big selling point is cost — Lewis and Hickey have saved 7.6% on their total phone bill over the last six months, and over the next 3 years plan to reduce their costs by 50% by using Skype.

Of course, all of this came with very little risk — the team at Lewis and Hickey just had to download it, plug in a few headsets and give it a try. No contractey nonsense to sort out, no waiting to get set up, and no commitment.

Do you run a small business? Or do you use Skype at work? If so, I’d love to hear from you, whether your experiences are good or bad — your company could feature in a future blog post.

Hello!

I’m the new Skype blogger for the UK, charged with collecting and communicating news, thoughts and opinions about Skype to the British audience, as well as gathering your feedback on Skype’s products and services.

Whether you’re in England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, this blog is for you — I’ll keep you up to date on what’s happening with Skype in the UK, whether it’s news, special offers, or other stories of interest.

Before I get down and dirty, it’d be great to hear what sort of stuff you’d like to see on this blog. Are we getting it right at the moment? Is there something you’d like to see more of? Something you’d like to see less of? Information you’d like to have, but don’t at the moment?

Three ways to get in touch:

• Get on the banana phone — and have a nice conversation about what’s good and what’s not
• Chat me up — a less noisy option, especially if you’re at work
• Leave a comment on this blog post — so that everyone will see it and be able to join in the discussion

Don’t forget that you can get little updates every time something new appears on this blog — just have a look over to the right hand side of the page.

p.s. You can find out more about me on my personal website: Peter Parkes.

Consumer mag Web User has published a round-up of tips to get the best out of Skype, which it reckons to be “the world’s number one internet calling service”. And who are we to argue? Here’s a quick pick of the tips:

Call forwarding Have any incoming calls transferred to a phone of your choice; your caller will be charged at the standard SkypeOut rate. To set it up, open Skype and click on Tools, then Call Forwarding.

Video calling Kit yourself out with a webcam, then open Skype and go to Tools, Options, Video (beta). You can choose who to receive video from and even decide whether your video output should begin automatically whenever you start a call.

Create call-specific ringtones The free Ringjacker add-on for Skype 3.0 allows you to set a ringtone that your friends will hear when you call them – but they’ll need to have the plug-in installed as well.

Check out the Web User website for more tips.

While we’re on the subject, I’ve also spotted a list of 25 Skype-hacks on the Voip News website. Ingenious tips include using Skype as a home-monitoring system and even setting a wake-up call.

So the over-45s are technophobes who don’t know their RSS from their elbow, are they? Not according to a new report from Birmingham Midshires, which has found that mature surfers are an extremely net-savvy bunch.

Fifteen per cent of Brits over 45 use Skype, the same number that indulge in a spot of MySpacing and YouTubery. Canny older web users are also driving the boom in online price comparison sites and online finance management, found the first quarterly Life 2 report.

A hardcore of 14% of over-45s are termed “Micropreneurs”. These are the people for whom the internet is everything: they harness it to trade, network and build business relationships, and do the majority of their work online. Another group, the “Knowledge Traders”, account for 36% of over-45s and use internet services like Skype to broaden their horizons and share their beliefs and passions with net users around the world.

Jason Robinson, director of savings operations at Birmingham Midshires, said: “We have noticed an increasing number of customers in the over-45 age category logging on, and this report has shattered the myth of the traditional Silver Surfer. Mature internet users are online activists, and they know exactly what they want and will use the internet to get it, be it saving money or keeping in touch with family.”

Mac fans, rejoice: Skype for Mac 2.5 has gone public.

The beta version has been available since mid-November, and Skype’s worker bees have since worked hard to iron out any wrinkles. They’ve even added nifty tweaks like a birthday reminder feature.

Skype for Mac 2.5 also includes tools for sending SMS messages to any mobile phone in the world or holding conference calls of up to 10 people.

To find out more, check out the Skype for Mac FAQ.