Onalaska Life - Printable Version

Story originally printed in the Onalaska Life or online at www.onalaskalife.com

Published - Friday, May 16, 2008

SKOL: With video calls, the future is here

Never before had I felt so out of it, so far behind the curve. We were billions of minutes behind by the time we finally began to catch up last weekend when we had our first Skype connection with our new granddaughter, Ella, who lives in Colorado.

Now weighing about 12 pounds, Ella was in the arms of her father, Jeff, when their image popped up on our computer screen after I had answered the Skype call on our MacBook computer.

Ella had just been fed and she smiled as Jeff held her up so we could get a good look at her chubby cheeks. Her mother ducked into the telephony video image and we wished Nicole a happy Mothers Day. Then Ella’s other grandma, Pat, who was visiting from Staten Island, appeared. It was a family reunion via computers … for free and no need to bring a dish to pass.

Well, it isn’t exactly free. You have to have a broadband Internet connection and a computer with an up-to-date operating system and a camera. But what an astonishing addition this is to a far-flung family’s ability to stay in touch.

We hadn’t seen Ella since we were in Colorado the week she was born. We’ll be seeing her again soon, but, meanwhile, we longed for more than pictures and phone calls. Virtual cuddling isn’t here yet, but who knows when that will happen?

I heard about Skype some time ago but hadn’t pursued what it would take to hook up, which wasn’t much. You download free software and, at least with the Mac, that’s about it.

I was testing the system with a Skype-savvy friend within minutes. I’d always considered myself an early adopter of technology; how could I be so slow to pick up on this?

The Skype Web site tells me that there were about 309 million users who adopted before me and they’ve made more than 100 billion minutes worth of free Skype-to-Skype calls. The system also allows calls to landlines and mobile phones, but there is a charge for that.

Skype was created by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis and a team of software developers in Estonia in 2003 and purchased by eBay in 2005. By 2006, the number of users had reached 100 million and Skype for Mac was released. On April 16, there were 12,5476,006 concurrent users.

On April 21, the company, which is headquartered in Luxembourg, announced it was offering calling subscriptions for a monthly flat rate that will provide international calling to landline numbers in 34 countries.

So what’s the next step for this laggard adopter? I’m checking to see if the Gustavo Malo listed as a Skype user in Ecuador is the Gustavo Malo who is the husband of our AFS daughter Eva Lucia. We’d love to reconnect with them and their three children.

And I can see uses for the videoconference capability as a way to avoid using $4-a-gallon gasoline to attend some meetings.

That’s just for starters. We’ve got some catching up to do. The Shawano grandchildren have just had broadband installed in their home. C’mon, Allie and Ben, Skype your grandpa.