To Skype or Not to Skype?

To Skype or Not to Skype?

Will the TRA loosen up on the Skype-ban now that Microsoft has acquired the company? Kipp is highly doubtful, but then again who cares? We know people who’ve been Skyping for years now.

May 13, 2011 9:55 by kippreport

So about a day after we slam the TRA for its not exactly modern policies and services, we bring you these hopeful statements from Microsoft’s business manager for the Gulf. “The new unification of Microsoft and Skype will have a positive impact on real-time communications. With this announcement, I’m pleased that together Microsoft and Skype will advance the state of real-time communications” told Gulf News.

So will Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype legitimatise the latter’s service and consequently ease the TRA’s policy concerning VoIP? We are going to venture a guess and say, even though it is a mind boggling debate that needs serious consideration, NO.

The UAE, after all has long been one of the very few countries that block access to Skype and other such VoIP services.

While others wonder when the TRA will get over its greedy self and allow access to Skype, Kipp thinks it is an irrelevant question. Internet users in the UAE have been talking to their loved ones over the internet for years now: first on MSN’s instant messenger then through Google’s g-talk and now through illegally downloaded versions of Skype.