“…Skype has struck a partnership with consumer electronics chain RadioShack. Skype Starter Kit More than 3,000 RadioShack locations nationwide on Monday will begin offering the Skype Starter Kit, which includes the software that enables a customer to use Skype’s free computer-to-computer telephone service, a headset and 30 minutes of Skype’s premium service, with which a user can call a landline or cell phone, company executives said.” [via] Link. See our previous hacks and projects with Skype, like the Skype payphone here.
2 thoughts on “Skype Starter Kits in RadioShacks…”
Comments are closed.
ADVERTISEMENT
Support Make:
Join Make: Community Today
Join Make: Community Today
Phil, Log on AIM, I’ve got a really cool article for you =)
With the announcement of this deal, it appears many, many more people will soon learn that Skype is hardly anything more than hype. In fact, I now invariably refer to it as “Sk-Yikes!” (Skype + Hype – Service & Support = Sk-Yikes!) Skype-In and Skype-Out barely work–if at all, frequently enough.
Customer support for *paying* customers is non-existent. Out of no less than a dozen trouble tickets I’ve submitted, only one has ever generated a support response from Sk-Yikes! (and entirely too late to do any good), with all others not even generating an automated response letting the customer know Sk-Yikes! has received it and are aware of the problem. (What other multi-billion dollar company thinks *paying* customers should have to compete with the hundreds-times more *non-paying* customers for customer and technical support from forum volunteers who have never had a day of customer service training in their entire lives?)
Skype’s VoIP service is so awful that no one I know will now call me on my Skype-In number. (Yes, I’m entirely serious.) I cannot blame them. It is all-but-impossible to conduct a conversation when phone calls drop every 10-20 seconds, or when one person cannot hear the person on the other end–both of which happen the vast majority of the time. Others’ experiences may be different, but those are mine after subscribing to Skype’s fee-based services for two months now. In fact, technical service quality issues and the lack of customer support has rendered Skype entirely useless to me. (I have no need for Sk-Yikes!’s *free* services.)
Please do not take my word for this. Before signing up for any of Skype’s *fee-based* services, first read through the Skype forums and decide for yourselves. (Do you like what you see other *paying* customers are saying?)
My advice regarding Sk-Yikes!’s fee-based services: *Caveat emptor.*