Skype 5.8 was released last week. There was a buzz of activity as Microsoft released an update to the Windows version of Skype. This bodes well for the direction that their partnership is taking.  If you had enabled  the option to check for the latest version enabled (under Help > Check for Updates), then you will  receive notifications about the latest version.

You can download the latest version here.

HD video calling

A wonderful new world of clear video chat is open for all those who have atleast 2 Mbps download speeds. They have also specified that you would need to own an HD camera like the Logitech C920 webcam.

 Group screen sharing

You can share your screen or a single application window with other members in a conference call. Check this option under “+” > Share my screen. Unfortunately, group video conference is still not free. I prefer google+ hangout over this. However, there is no question that Skype rules if quality matters.

Audio and video calling for Facebook friends

My favorite new feature that allows you to call your friends on Facebook even if they are not on Skype.

Push to Talk

It has hot keys that enable the microphone. Check out this option under Tools > Options > Advanced > Hotkeys. This feature is supposed to be useful for gamers who can use it to mute or unmute the microphone.

Bing Bar Integration

This is the fruit of the set up between Microsoft and Skype. This feature has not been elaborated in their release notes.

End Note

As usual, Skype has the “automatically sign into skype option” enabled. This can be removed under under Tools > Options > General Settings.

Do not forget the upcoming Windows Phone 8 (aka Apollo) that will include great new features like NFC (Near Field Communication), Data Smart (to prioritize Wifi connections), will no doubt have Skype strongly wrapped up in the package too. The new Windows Phone OS is quite amazing already. Having arrived late into the mobile industry, it is very important that Microsoft differentiates its products very definately.

It is a well known fact that “Comic Sans” is the most hated font on the internet. In fact, there are several websites such as bancomicsans.com and more which show their hatred towards it. Why? Read here.

However, I haven’t seen any application or website as such dissing the use of the font. However, it looks like Skype has a hidden Easter egg which disses the usage of the Comic Sans font.

What’s the Easter Egg? Well, Skype gives users an option to change the font of the IM & SMS window through the “Options” menu. If you change the font to Comic Sans, it changes the smiley available in the message area to a frowning face.

Changing the font back to anything else changes the smiley back smiling face. That is very sneaky Skype, guess they have a lot of Comic Sans haters in their programming department. What do you think? Do you hate Comic Sans too?

(via 9gag)

I have been using Windows Phone virtually from launch day, and have been patient with the team about so many things that have been missing from the OS. Windows Phone 7.5, aka Mango, addressed a lot of my complaints, but now I have another, deeper set of functionality (and wishes!) I’d like to see implemented.

The following is my wish list for Windows Phone for the year 2012. Given that one of the wishes is for more frequent updates, I am hoping some of the functionality gaps are filled sooner than later.

Ecosystem

1. Market share: First and foremost, I’d like to see Windows Phone get to a decent market share. The stars have aligned nicely with RIM dying a slow death, and webOS being killed by HP for Windows Phone to be easily positioned as the #3 platform. However, it would be a pity if the 3rd-biggest  platform is at 5% with iOS and Android making up 95% of the market. It would be better if Windows Phone could get to 10-15% or above to really make it relevant. Education at carrier stores, more incentives for carrier salespeople, Nokia’s Rolling Thunder campaign, expansion to new markets, etc. should help.
2. More Silicon Valley startup involvement: Most startups are not going to devote time to building Windows Phone apps with its market share around 1.5%. It simply does not make financial sense. I would like to see the Microsoft developer relations/evangelism folks to embed themselves in such startups and help them build the next cool appfor Windows Phone in addition to iOS/Android. For that, this evangelist team will have to work closely in Silicon Valley (and perhaps New York) to identify the companies which are doing great things in the mobile space and help them as early as possible in their lifecycle.
3. Get existing marquee apps at par with iOS/Android counterparts: Microsoft would like us to believe that 90% of the top iOS/Android apps are available for Windows Phone. That may be arguable, but even existing apps like Facebook and Twitter have not seen updates to bring features at par with iOS/Android versions. For example, Facebook app does not support updating Groups or Twitter app (still) does not provide notifications. Also, given that some of these apps have been built by Microsoft, or even worse, by a third party, it is hard to understand who is to blame for the lack of functionality updates.
4. Abandon the annual minor and major update cycle: Windows Phone has settled into a cycle where they have minor releases once a year and major updates once a year, each separated by about 6 months. While this is great for larger, non-mobile programs, it is absolutely slow in the mobile industry, especially for bug fixes and security updates. Until Windows Phone is  at  par with iOS and Android in terms of overall functionality, I don’t think they should settle down into a 6-month update cycle. Till then, the updates should be rapid, incremental and extremely frequent.

Microsoft has finally completed the Skype acquisition, 5 months after it first announced it. While the boards of both Skype and Microsoft approved the acquisition right away, there was the risk of regulatory authorities playing spoilsport.

Eventually, the deal was approved by regulatory authorities in both the U.S. and Europe. It is still pending regulatory approval in a few small countries.

Skype is a phenomenal product and brand that is loved by hundreds of millions of people around the world. We look forward to working with the Skype team to create new ways for people to stay connected to family, friends, clients and colleagues — anytime, anywhere,said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer.

Skype will be absorbed into a new division, and will continue to offer Skype in its current form to consumers worldwide. Going forward, Microsoft plans to integrate Skype’s VOIP and video capabilities into various products like Microsoft Windows, Office, Xbox and Windows Phone.

It may also enter the enterprise VOIP and video conferencing market, which is currently dominated by Cisco.

With the Skype acquisition, Microsoft is also in a better position to compete with Apple’s Facetime and Google’s Google Voice.

Check out the official press release by Microsoft: Microsoft Officially Welcomes Skype

Skype has just updated its Android app to add support for certain new devices, along with adding certain other enhancements.

The new version of Skype (v2.5) brings support for video-calling for 14 additional Android devices, bringing the tally to a total of 41.

Below is the list of all the supported devices :

• Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1
• HTC Nexus One
• HTC Shooter
• Sony Ericsson Xperia Live with Walkman
• Sony Ericsson Xperia neo V
• LG Optimus Black
• LG Optimus 3D
• LG Optimus 2x
• Motorola Photon
• Motorola Droid 3
• Motorola Bionic
• Motorola Xoom
• Motorola Atrix
• Acer Iconia

It’s nice to see Skype adding support for Android devices, which lack a front facing camera. Other new features in this update include improved support for Bluetooth headsets, quite a few bug fixes and performance improvements. Skype users can now also switch between portrait and landscape call whilst on a video call, and can also zoom in on the screen via double tapping.

The new update will also not show advertisements to users who have Skype credits in their account. Hopefully, the new version of Skype will also be light on battery usage.

Android users can head over to Android Market to download the latest version of Skype. Alternatively, they can scan the QR Code below-

Skype users on iOS devices should be on the look out for malicious users who intend on stealing their address book.

A vulnerability affecting Skype 3.01 on iOS devices, including the iPod Touch and iPhone, gives an attacker the ability to secretly upload the entire contents of your address book. The hole is due to a non-validated input field in the client, instead of the contents being displayed to the user, they are executed. Coupling XSS with sandbox permissions that do not allow for fine-tuned access control within apps, provides a way for an attacker to steal the contents of an unsuspecting user’s address book.

Skype has been criticised numerous times over identical vulnerabilities in their desktop software, that allowed for remote code to be executed on a victim’s computer. The flaw is one that Skype has had reported numerous times, fixed numerous times, yet they have not completely audited the applications before release.

Phil has detailed the attack performed against an iPhone 4 running iOS 4.3.5 and has indicated that the vulnerability was reported to Skype over a month ago. Hopefully a fix is in the works, but more importantly, hopefully Skype will perform a full check instead of simply throwing input sanitising on the vulnerable text field.

Microsoft buys Skype and Skype buys GroupMe. Using a=b and b=c; Microsoft effectively bought GroupMe. Which sounds plausible and fine. As the news spread Windows Phone 7 integration possibilities were being thought. I decided to wait it out hoping either companies would explain their strategy. Unfortunately, neither have. So here’s my theory…

Windows Phone 7 has a lot of thought and focus on what phones are for—communication. Clubbing contacts into groups and sending group emails or texts is a Windows Phone 7 Mango feature. In this scenario, GroupMe’s purchase looks out of place for Windows Phone (and Microsoft). Secondly, Microsoft’s cozy relationship with Facebook and the tight Windows Phone 7 integration would suggest Facebook Messenger on WP7 to come out soon.

GroupMe has a Windows Phone 7 client, as a result, any immediate platform integration or even Skype integration for the phone won’t be happening. Reading Michael Arrington’s article on TechCrunch, it is clear that Skype was already eyeing GroupMe while talks of acquisition with Microsoft were happening. Skype introduced group video chats not long ago and has phone calling. It makes a lot of sense for Skype as a platform to add text messaging in addition to voice communication. Putting all of this together it suggests:

• Skype bought GroupMe for the Skype platform (and it doesn’t have anything to do with WP7)
• It’s a good old talent acquisition

It looks like our dreams are coming true. The official Skype app for iPad has begun its rollout to users. While it is currently only available to users in New Zealand, it is expected to make its way to other time zones during the next 24 hours. Many apps have come out this way in the past, according to TUAW.

We first covered the Skype iPad app back in June, when it was originally confirmed to TUAW. It is unclear as to why the app has been delayed till now. This new iPad version of Skype supports all the features of its iPhone brother. It looks like all features short of two-way video calling are supported on the original iPad, with that being a feature of the iPad 2.

TUAW reports that the iPad app is separate from the iPhone app, but will keep the same free price tag. It will also be capable of making calls over both 3G and Wi-Fi.According to previous reports, the iPad app will not be capable of file sharing.

Update:  It looks like Apple has decided to skip all that timezone non-sense and give the app to every user at once. You can pick it up in the App Store now. I have it downloaded, and will update with my impressions after I test it out. Stay tuned!

If you already have the Skype app for iPad, let us know what you think about it. If not, then let us know if you are excited about video calling coming to the iPad. Leave a comment below to share your thoughts.

In what Mark Zuckerberg called the start to “Launching Season 2011″, Facebook has announced that they are launching a number of products over the coming months. Zuckerberg said that the goal of Social Networking has shifted from connecting people to building apps for people to use. He claimed that the future of internet use is based on social infrastructure.

During his announcement, Zuckerberg confirmed that Facebook has reached 750 million users. At the same time, he emphasized that this is not the metric that Facebook wants to watch. Their goal now is to improve the way that people share.

To that end, Facebook is launching a handful of new products today. The first major announcement was a new form group chat. If you use Facebook groups, then you know you can already chat with whole groups. You can create an ad-hoc group by adding more than one Facebook friend in the Facebook chat interface. They claim that ‘a lot of people requested’ this service.

The next feature announced was the ability to find people to chat with easier. Given that you have the available screen space, you can now see a ‘buddy list’ of Facebook friends. This will allow you more easily find the people you want to chat with. The new sidebar will adjust to fit the size of your screen.

The last announcement was Skype integration. This was rumored to be the most likely announcement, and it came true. If you want to initiate a Video chat on Facebook, you simply click the video call button in your Facebook chat window. If the person who you are trying to call doesn’t have the plugin installed, they will be automatically prompted to do so. There is also a video call button on profile pages.

All three of these features will be rolling out automatically over the next few weeks. If you don’t want to wait for these products, you can get it now.

The ever popular text and video chatting service Skype has released an update for their OS X client. Version 5.2 brings a few new features to the main silent that have been part of the beta version since 5.0. These include group screen sharing as well as group video calling. Unfortunately, in order to take advantage of either, you will need to be a Skype Premium subscriber.

For the non-premium users, there are a few improvements that make the upgrade from 5.1 seem like a good idea. For instinct, the new client seems to have fewer bugs than its predecessor. There are also small changes to the UI, like the ability to hide the sidebar to focus on your conversation. You also have the ability to pop-out the cider controls for video calls.

The changes in version 5.2 should appeal to power-users, especially the Premium users who use Skype for video conferencing. The new screen-sharing options (which are Mac exclusive for the time being) will make the Skype a better productivity tool. It is good to see that, in the wake of Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype, the other platforms aren’t being totally ignored.

The downside to 5.2 is that the UI that Skype introduced in 5.0 is largely unchanged. The popular opinion is that it is too bulky of an app. A simple Google search will result in a downloadable copy of Skype 2.8, that last “good” version of Skype for the Mac. If you aren’t a premium user, then the upgrade isn’t really worth your time. However, the new feature sonly require one premium user to activate, you may want to pick up 5.2 incase a request comes your way.