Skype to shut down in May

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Tim_Tex
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28 Feb 2025, 8:50 pm

https://techcrunch.com/2025/02/28/microsoft-hangs-up-on-skype-service-to-shut-down-may-5-2025/

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funeralxempire
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28 Feb 2025, 8:59 pm

That's disappointing, even if it was always an inferior replacement for MSN.

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Mountain Goat
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01 Mar 2025, 5:58 am

They only just taken over from MSN?

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Tim_Tex
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01 Mar 2025, 6:47 am

It was like Zoom and OnlyFans rolled into one.

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ToughDiamond
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01 Mar 2025, 1:13 pm

That's a shame. As far as I can see, there's no free alternative that doesn't have time limits on calls. Except Facebook Messenger, which uses tons of CPU and the picture doesn't work very well at all here (Win7 32-bit). Looks like I'm going to be forced into using my Win10 64-bit laptop. Thanks Microsoft. :evil:

funeralxempire
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01 Mar 2025, 6:48 pm

Mountain Goat wrote:

They only just taken over from MSN?

MSN Messenger was retired 12 years ago. I'm not sure that's within most people's definition of just. :nerdy:

ToughDiamond
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08 Mar 2025, 5:07 pm

If it's just simple videocalls you want to make, with no bells and whistles, this might work:

https://talky.io/

No time limits on calls as far as I know, no app to download and run, no sign-up, no demand for your phone number, and they say they don't track you or sell advertising, so that's one up on Skype who log everything and probably sell your data behind your back. Looks like you can also do text messaging, which might be a good alternative to Facebook Messenger. But I haven't tried using it yet. Has anybody else tried it?

Hetzer
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Yesterday, 4:57 am

ToughDiamond wrote:

[...] and they say they don't track you or sell advertising, so that's one up on Skype who log everything and probably sell your data behind your back.

They say... Seems there's no code available, can't really be sure.

-> about.talky.io/privacy
They serve ads and don't specify who's the provider and if these are profiled (likely are) - So even if they really don't by themselves, 3rd party takes care of that. There's mention that client collects info about used browser and OS and tracks usage

ToughDiamond
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Yesterday, 11:26 am

Hetzer wrote:

ToughDiamond wrote:

[...] and they say they don't track you or sell advertising, so that's one up on Skype who log everything and probably sell your data behind your back.

Possibly no worse than Skype then, and as Talky is browser-based, maybe my ad blocker and NoScript would help to reduce the ads. Though Skype ads were fairly non-intrusive - just the occasional banner thing that was so small I couldn't even read it without my glasses, plus some pseudo-notifications that were ads in disguise - I soon learned not to click on those.

It's high time somebody came up with a bit of freeware that simply sends and receives audio and video data streams peer-to-peer. I've collected tons of free programs that do very clever and useful things without ads, tracking, bait-and-switch, or compulsory updates. So why no videocall program that's like that?

Hetzer
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Yesterday, 3:28 pm

ToughDiamond wrote:

Possibly no worse than Skype then, and as Talky is browser-based, maybe my ad blocker and NoScript would help to reduce the ads.

Obviously it depends primarily on how invasive (technically, not visually) these ads were made, but I think it'll work out.

ToughDiamond wrote:

It's high time somebody came up with a bit of freeware that simply sends and receives audio and video data streams peer-to-peer. I've collected tons of free programs that do very clever and useful things without ads, tracking, bait-and-switch, or compulsory updates. So why no videocall program that's like that?

There's Tox, which has chat and both audio & video. But to my knowledge only aTox (Android client) is maintained (albeit uTox, qTox (desktop clients) still worked last time I tried Tox)).
The rest I know (Mumble, XMPP, Jami) are client-server models. There's also Matrix, but it's terribly implemented (ever-crashing python server and similarly broken, bloated clients)

By the way, by "freeware" you mean freeware by dictionary definition or libre software (which is commonly called "free software", same way freeware is called)? I ask since there's a bit of difference between these, and the first usually comes with what you bring up there.

ToughDiamond
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Yesterday, 9:59 pm

Hetzer wrote:

by "freeware" you mean freeware by dictionary definition or libre software (which is commonly called "free software", same way freeware is called)?

I don't mind what it's called as long as it works, doesn't cost money and doesn't have intrusive ads or any tracking. I suppose open source would be better because in theory people can check it for tracking and modify the program for the better, but for the former I'd have to take their word for it, and for the latter it would depend on whether or not anybody bothered to improve it. I certainly wouldn't be able to do either myself.

I guess as long as it initially works, support might not be necessary for it to continue to work, unless I moved to a new version of the operating system.

Hetzer
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27 minutes ago

ToughDiamond wrote:

I suppose open source would be better because in theory people can check it for tracking and modify the program for the better, but for the former I'd have to take their word for it, and for the latter it would depend on whether or not anybody bothered to improve it. I certainly wouldn't be able to do either myself.

Well, it depends on "culture" particular program belongs to. Programs from "developer culture" (developer makes software for him/herself and shares it with others) are virtually always free of tracking / adware code. Open-source made with profit in mind is usually the opposite and may mistreat user similarly as their freeware counterparts (Balena Etcher, Chromium or even Firefox)

Quote:

I guess as long as it initially works, support might not be necessary for it to continue to work, unless I moved to a new version of the operating system.

In case of networked soft it depends if used protocol is mature (like XMPP) or still in alpha/ beta and may change rapidly (like Tox).
Usually OS update doesn't mean breaking unmaintained software (unless we talk about Android...)

Hetzer
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19 minutes ago

Hetzer wrote:

The rest I know (Mumble, XMPP, Jami) are client-server models.

Okay, no, I'm wrong here, Jami is NOT client-server but also P2P messenger - just checked. So yet another option comes in

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