Telcos are holding everyone's dingdong pretty tight in markets where they dominate. Again, terrible argument against Nokia buying Skype. Nokia is the most carrier independent manufacturer out there. Not that I think Nokia buying Skype would be good idea.

Big part of Androids success has been that it has allowed same kind of carrier optimization as Symbian. And no, I don't think that Google would do anything to jeopardize their relationship with telcos in telco dominated markets like USA and UK.

Useless to whom? If you ask me a question, do I have any use for the answer I might give you?

Same mistakes done again as with WAP.

You cannot fix it, when it has already been broken, the image.
You need much marketing to fix unpleasant image, and economically noone is willing to do that later.

People would use MMS, if in the start, it would had cost same as SMS.
People would use video call, if it would had cost same as normal call in the start.

WAP mostly because it was useless technology. Web in low-res screen wasn't really good for anything.

Videocalling failed because people, apart from few special use cases, don't need it.

They can, but that would ruin the success of Skype, reduce its user base and therefore be a loss for those who bought it.

You see, the bad thing about Skype is not so much codecs used... It's the mafia-like "closed network" method; the same used by Facebook or Twitter, btw.

The reason why Skype has such a massive user bas is that you cannot communicate with a Skype user without being on Skype yourself. The network's closed. No open protocols, standards, interoperability. So it grows and continues to grow because whenever one of two lovers is on Skype, the other one needs to join. And the more Skype users there are, the more "gravity" it gains... If 9 out of 10 friends use Skype, why wouldn't you?

Now sure a potential buyer could put an end to this, open up the whole network, make the protocols available, document them as RCFs, allow other services to use the Skype protocol for both clients and servers... What would happen? Skype users would switch to services that do one or two things differently than Skype, but are interoperable. They can still phone all their contacts on the (now open) Skype network, but don't have a contract with Skype (the company) any longer.

This would of course be a good thing for the users and the internet. But it would ruin the only value Skype has for a potential buyer: its user base.

So yes, Nokia could open up everything after they bought Skype. But that would be like buying an expensive car and replacing the engine with flower pots in order to make it a nonpolluting object. It's a theoretical possibility but it's not going to happen.

I guess we basically agree that the telcos simply have plenty of ding dongs in their hands Even the most carrier independent manufacturer out there will stand to lose a lot if they take that step toward competing with the telcos.

I'm glad that you take these things into account afterall.

So open-standards-based system do not stand a chance then?
ie: gtalk

That wouldn't be a problem for Nokia. They're in the business of selling phones. Their phones will sell like hotcakes if they can make all Nokia phones can call any other Nokia phones worldwide for free (so long as they have internet connectivity).

If they can afford it...

Nokia would make a greater contribution and have a greater return of investment if they would fund improvements for SIP in general and twinkle in particular (which is stuck at QT 3) or even a new FOSS alternative.

That is, instead of wasting a lot of cash buying Skype.

Benny, understandably opening the network may erode the user base, but one also has to consider the two types of users Skype has; only the ones that use free Skype calls will be likely to jump ship, but they generate no revenue anyway. The paying customers who have Skype-In number, unlimited calling subscription, a Skype2Go number, etc., will stay with Skype as long as they see enough value for their money. Considering the momentum that Skype has and the fact that opening its network will not make it any worse than it is now (au contraire, actually), and with the possible value added by Nokia's support, I would expect the user base of devoted paying customers only to grow.

Ysss, you are right that vexing the telcos sounds like a bad idea, but I do not see how doing so if you own Skype is any worse than putting a third party Skype on all your devices and opening it for use over 3G. If anything, Nokia may have more leverage against the telcos if it owns both the hardware and the software in this situation, like others do. BTW, thanks a lot for planting in my head the image of telcos holding dingdongs... NOT!

In the end, I agree with Texrat and others that Nokia should have bought Gizmo back in the day, it would have cost them much less too, even if they had to bid over Google.

Rauha, I see that you don't believe in the usefulness of video telephony and in most cases you may be right, but having the option is undeniably better than not, and we do have the technology. Let us wait and see what Apple does, I agree with kojacker that the 4G iPhone may change drastically people's opinions, even if it's short lived. The lack of camera in the iPad hints that Apple don't bet much on video either, but you never know.

All in all, there seems to be a consensus that, while buying Skype would be a waste of money, development or acquisition of an (open source) video telephony technology by Nokia is a wise step. So, if my initial question was not featuring Skype but a generic compatible product, my guess is that most would have voted yes. With that, I don't believe this thread was a complete waste of time