A few years ago, I tried Skype and the experience was terrible. The voice quality was dreadful and the connection constantly failed. People now tell me Skype has changed. Is it really better? Will it save me money? Is it safe?
Joanna, Wan Chai
DQ: In the past, I would have agreed with you about Skype. But a little over a year ago, a good friend moved back to Britain and asked me to try the peer-to-peer internet telephony service again. I was surprised to find it worked wonderfully - most of the time.
Skype can actually rival the voice quality of standard telephone lines, bar a few problems such as internet traffic. Conference calls are extremely easy to set up, even using video. I have used it on Windows and Mac, but it also works on Linux.
Add-ons for Skype have started to become available. Recording conversations, for example, is
an excellent business application if you need to keep records. There continues to be plenty of debate about Skype's security. Its software does encrypt calls and I have not heard of anybody's conversation being hacked - yet.