I would like to share my recent youtube discovery - Slidebean: Startups 101. The host presents business cases for various companies, typically focusing on why they’ve failed.
I could recommend any video on his channel, but for our English course, I picked something that can be easily relatable - a video about skype. We all know and used it in the past, right? Have you ever wondered why such a VOIP giant failed to startup companies like Zoom?
I hope you will find this material interesting
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzsuYrptwKk
Questions:
How did you use (or are still using) Skype? What do you usually use it for? (in case you actually have never used skype - pick any other VOIP program you used in the past, like TeamSpeak for instance).
What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
Comments
2. Skype is very weak - despite good internet, the connection can be of very poor quality (sound and audio), and even completely cut off.
3. I think that is a good idea. For me, distance learning is a very good idea because I can be at home and study. I don't waste time commuting to university from home or from work
I use Skype from time to time to communicate with my grandparents. We live in different countries and started using this application more than five years ago. And for a year I make calls to my parents, cause I have moved from them.
Also, I used Skype for a conversation before taking to study at university.
For communication with friends, I use Telegram and sometimes Viber or WhatsApp.
2.What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
As I have mentioned in the first answer, I still use Skype. In all cases, it is not my decision. I use it because my grandparents know how to use Skype. :) They are old, and it is not so easy for them to learn new software. Of course, there were sometimes troubles like a bad connection. But, besides, Skype works enough good for us.
3.What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
If to talk about universities it is a great idea. As for me, I like online lessons. E-learning saves a lot of time. And if you have a job, it makes your life easier. But, there are specialities where it would be more useful to be in the classroom. For example, biologists need to be present in laboratories and use special equipment during classes.
And if to talk about schools, I do not think it is useful and have sense. It is not so easy to concentrate at self-studying while you are a child. Pupils need discipline and a teacher in real life.
I’ve grown to hate Skype for being laggy, the connection quality was poor, it needed so strong Internet connection (I was using a poor signal from a mobile modem in the middle of the woods, so you can imagine how it made using Skype unbelievably hard), and overall I didn’t like the interface, and the performance of the app. To me, Discord was the dealbreaker – it had been smooth in performance, had great UI/UX design, quickly introduced video calls, had servers that could act as group chats and had music bots and a lot to customize. I’m still using Discord sometimes, especially for gaming with a bigger group of people. Right now I’m rather using Messenger and calling people on the phone, and sometimes when I’m playing games or something, I’m talking with people on Steam.
I love e-learning, but I do have some issues with it – or rather not with the idea, but with the people that are missing it’s potential. I’ve made my BA diploma under COVID quarantine, e-learning and it couldn’t end up better for me. I love the flexibility it gives me to work whenever I want, do whatever I want during lectures for example, without being rude to the lecturer (like eating, drinking, drawing, etc.) or disturbing the lecture. But there’s one huge problem – I think our academics and teachers aren’t qualified enough for this form of teaching sometimes, or are doing everything like it was still normal classes at school. Those people are the ones that refuse to go with the flow, they will stop in place and try to move the Earth in the opposite direction. It’s not going to happen anyway, but they’re an obstacle and they’re making things harder not only for themselves, but also for the students. I’m really seeing a lot of potential in e-learning, especially in hybrid learning, where you attend only the classes that absolutely need you to attend them at school or campus; but with on-line lectures and theoretical classes. I love lectures via Teams, ‘cause if I am interested in them, nothing is distracting me, no one is talking out loud, and if not, I can do some other things or talk without disturbing it. I think it gives me an opportunity to learn more and loose less of my time for things I’m not really keen on. Besides, it's a great way to avoid going to school when you've got cold or something similar, but still being able to attend classes and have less trouble with catching up with the syllabus.
I am not very big when it coes to video calls so I've used to use it rarely mainly when I needed to talk to my friends when gaming, talk to some family relatives or do a group project in high school. These were however times when skype was massively popular and I stopped using it because it's popularity declined heavily.
2.
I didn't need to use it so I've stopped using it.
3.
It's a tought question. I think it makes it easier to combine working and studying, that's for sure, because I don't need to waste time commuting. I also believe it depends heavily on the university degree one tries to learn remotely. Computer Science is quite easy, but other ones which require access to special laboratories are tricky to teach remotely.
Oh, hi Igor, how are you doing, buddy?
If you haven't used skype before, you might not have spotted, that Microsoft Teams' video-chat is using Skype under the hood :D I assume you haven't used much of VOIP or video-chats in 2000' (but who used webcams in 2000'?), as both MS Teams and Zoom are relatively new. I agree with you, that reducing the commute time is the biggest win for remote education. It was never an issue for me, as I live very close to the university, but I always felt so sorry for people visiting PJATK daily from Lódź.
Oh, it's great to have technology-friendly grandparents! My grandma is still afraid of using smartphones, and she never owned a computer in her life. I hope it helps you both to go through this tough time.
Regarding e-learning, can't agree more that working and studying at the same time became incredibly easier. Mid-day could commute completely ruin my work-day, because of university things.
Thank you so much for drawing a line between school and universities. I haven't thought about it before, but you are completely right. For kids, it must be extremely hard, but they don't realize it yet. I feel sorry for hopeless teachers, that they just can't do anything about it :(
Thank you for a long, well-thought response. I appreciate that!
I laughed about gadu-gadu, it must be an even sadder story than skype. I promise you, I completely forgot about its existence, but it was the most widely use communicator for all of us. Poor gadu-gadu :(
We must be having a very similar story, I also "naturally" shifted from skype to discord without realizing it. I think easy of use and general experience is the selling point there. Also, I always found it confusing to find and connect to new friends on Skype. Their search-bar always behaves in an unexpected manner.
Congratulations on finishing your BA recently! I'm glad it worked for you well.
Unfortunately, I do agree that e-learning and on-site learning requires a different approach from the lecturers, and some of them haven't changed their mindset yet. I believe in their good intention, but I think they just haven't realized yet, it's not working best for students.
I think hybrid learning with a structure that you've proposed is a sweet spot and solution I would support! Generally, I also enjoy myself at university more during pandemic than I had during "old boring days". Speaking, of course, learning-wise, but as you haven't mentioned it at all, I assume socializing wasn't a big deal for you also (or you kept it remote-friendly from the beginning!) I sometimes miss lunching with my peers.
I think that's a huge bummer for companies like skype or discord, that their usage is strictly connected to a social network of their users. That's said - even if someone created the most incredible UX/UI for video-app you won't use it until your friends move there with you. So, as in your case, even if you didn't mind using skype, your friends vanished and you had to move along with them.
I'm glad e-learning helped you to combine both working and studying. I also find it easier now :) Best luck!
I had been using Skype for many, many years in the past. Mostly to communicate with my colleagues playing video games or to just contact my family which is abroad. I was really pleased with Skype services, and had nothing to complain about in these days. Comparing to the current VOIP services I would even say it was more reliable than all of current solutions, despite the fact that it offers less functions.
What made me stop using Skype? Mainly most of my friends switched to other platforms these days like Teamspeak or Discord. I was still using Skype for a long time in case of its reliability, and I simply didn't need to switch to another application. But when most of my collegues deleted it and did not use it anymore, I need to switch too. Answering your second part of question - for me, there are no any dealbrakers - there tons of functionality in modern voice communicators, but for me most of them are obsolete. I just need to have a reliable, good quality voice comunicator without tons of emojis, and other stuff.
It's hard question - I would asy it makes academic life easier and harder both. Of course it's more convenient for us to have e-lessons but it also brings some problems for some people. Not everyone have fast enough internet connection to use it for e-learning (especially if there are more people sharing same internet connection), also the contact with some teachers is sometimes not that easy.
To be honest I used Skype for talking with friends mostly while gaming with them. I did not use it much as I thought there were better alternatives like discord or TeamSpeak, I remember that we used to have a lot of problems with Skype, mostly regarding quality of calls.
2. What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
I switched because of quality of conversations, the voice was laggy, sometimes robotic and group conversations tend to disconnect. That is why me and my friends switched to discord which was also imperfect at the moment but right now is great (I still use it). For communication at work I use MS Teams and it is so much better than Skype.
3. What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
It is certainly making my education harder, it is harder to learn anything because the quality of lessons is worse than in person. Also it is harder for teachers and you can feel it during classes. On the other hand it is much more convenient to learn online, you do not have to get up early and go to college which is really nice regarding winter season.
I used Skype mostly for a job, it was very popular and convenient to have a group calls, sharing a screen or making a presentation
What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
I stopped using it because I don't really need it anymore. Now we have google hangout, zoom and others for communication and group calls.
Using a skype was very tough because of micro. I used Linux and Skype for Linux but it had some problems with sound, but now I don't have this kind of problems. Earlier I was testing and restarting my laptop before calls.
What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
I think it becomes a lot easier to study online. There are pros and cons here. The main plus is that everything you need for study is near you all the time, for example, a phone. You don't have to spend a lot of time on the road or at the university. The main disadvantage for me is that it is not always possible to reach the teacher, they cannot always answer. Probably because they have a blockage of messages from all students
In the past, skype was the main program I used to chat with my friends through. We used it while playing together and for regular chat with the webcam.
2.What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
At one point, I stopped using skype completely and I can't remember why. I suspect that I abandoned it at the moment the messenger allowed direct conversations through their applications.
3.What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
It definitely makes it easier. This allows me to spend more time working. However, if I started my studies in this mode, it seems to me that it would be more difficult for me to complete all the courses.
Skype was also a communication tool for me and my school peers to play games together. As they weren't as heavy into gaming as I had, they didn't use teamspeak or mumble. As teamspeak even nowadays is quirky to use, I didn't bother convincing my friends to install and use teamspeak.
Sorry to hear that your experience with e-learning isn't as pleasant as we all have initially imagined. I must agree on email communication to resolve your issue is sometimes too lengthy.
I also used Skype mainly for gaming. I do recall audio to be less stable than other VOIP programs, I imagine the p2p connection must be the main reason.
My main tool for gaming communication is also discord now. You can just feel that it was created by gamers, for gamers.
I must agree that staying at home during winter is the best quality of life improvement. Arriving cold and freezing at the University made me irritated for the first lecture, which does not help to stay focused.
Interesting! You are the first person mentioning here it was a professional tool for them. I wonder if it's industry-specific insight or you just used it many years ago before Zoom and alternatives software appeared.
I am not a strong Linux user, but I imagine it can be completely true, that Skype wasn't up to date with new Linux distributions and simply didn't work correctly there. Shame on you, Microsoft!
I have a similar experience with contacting our lecturers. Sometimes the answer comes after weeks, but at least none of the email is lost (at least in my experience!) I hope it gets improved in the upcoming semsters if we will stay online - of course.
2. I think Skype is only suitable for social gatherings. The functions of sharing the screen or showing something to other users is a drama. This application is not suitable for business use. I've heard that Skype for Business exists, but I've never used it. I use Team Viewer for occasional quick contacts. It probably offers all the basic functions and is very easy to use. However, after configuration, I use Teams for contacts with co-workers. It has a significant disadvantage. Namely, it is very difficult to connect with any users from another domain.
3. Personally, I think it significantly reduces the quality of the learning I receive. I'm not happy with that. Ours this semester is not doing any important subjects. But if I had such interesting items as MAS or ASD, I would rather not like it.
Thank you for your reply. Doing webcam chat back in old days was a very niche thing, hah! I'm glad it worked for you and your friends.
I have a similar experience of abandoning skype without a specific point of time of reason. It just gradually became a dead software, with no of my friends using it anymore
Regarding e-learning, I also think it must be hard and confusing for new-comers. The combination of gakko, sftp, edux - which still is confusing for me after 5 years of studying here. Very limited access to the dean's office this year... Yeah, I feel sorry for them, but I hope they stick around PJATK!
2. The Facebook user base was constantly expanding and that platform was more intuitive to use compared to heavy and buggy Skype.
3. MT is very good in my opinion. The only downside is that the browser version sometimes suddenly kicks me out of the session and I have to log in again. Also, it's sometimes struggling when too many people are in the lecture. The assignments tab is well thought out. It would be nice to add something like a total sum of assignment points.
I think the main killer for Skype was Facebook. When you have all of your friends in one place and you can communicate with them by this portal why you want to use anything else? To games I use Discord and TeamSpeak because it is less aggravating for computer hardware. In my opinion the main reason why Skype die is Facebook and no new options. I remember in 2010 Skype have the same options like it have nowadays.
I think is the best idea for specific learning. In our case - PJATK we have a lot of subjects that is perfect for e-learning and very bad for full-time learning. In my case when all of the subject is based on showing your progress on projects e-learning is the game changer. I don't need to go to school for this and spend a lot of time for traveling, I can do it everywhere - in job, in house. So for me e-learning make my entire life more easy. And I want this situation will stay for end of my education.
On daily basis I use Slack as a chat, as well as for video conferencing with my co-workers. When communicating with friends or friends is usually opt for WhatsApp or FaceTime. I also use Microsoft Teams to join classes.
I’ve never stopped using Skype, because I’ve never really started to, but from what I’ve heard it’s super laggy, non-intuitive and not very pleasant to use in general.
I honestly love the idea of e-learning and secretly hope, that next semester we will also have the ability to study fully remote. However, it has its downsides - I don’t think that I’m performing to the best of my abilities, but on the other hand, I don’t have to spend time participating in classes I don’t find useful in my work. The greatest advantage of remote classes is for sure the fact that I can finally work full time.
I used Skype to chat with my colleagues when we played online games. It was about 2010 or even earlier. I was never convinced by TeamSpeak messaging, which was popular at the time and still is. I also used Skype to chat on webcams with friends I met in various games so we would know what we look like.
What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
I stopped using Skype when TeamSpeak version 3 appeared. It allows you to create your own servers and you do not need to create another conversation to chat in a group. In my opinion, voice messaging has largely been killed by Microsoft. Durable updates finally integrated Skype with Windows, forcing you to log into it. Over time, better solutions have emerged for communicating with others that I need.
What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
I'm not a fan of E-learning. It is very inconvenient. Despite the fact that I do not have to leave the house, I miss contact with my friends. IT systems, such as MS Teams or the university's gakko, do not always work properly, which makes completing tasks difficult. I am a supporter of teaching at the university. However, I understand the current pandemic situation that needs to be adjusted to
I used skype from time to time to talk with my friends online, mostly when we were playing video games together.
2. What made you stop using Skype in favor of other software? Do you have any specific dealbreaker (that was or wasn’t mentioned in the video above)?
I stopped using skype when I've found Discord, which is a great alternative to Skype and TeamSpeak in my opinion.
3. What’s your opinion on shifting education from schools/universities to e-learning, like we are currently doing at PJATK. Does it make your academic life easier or harder? Why?
It really depents, I think that we could shift to e-learning in terms of lectures. Usually all you do during lectures is just listen and take notes, and I personally find it much easier online, especially since a lot of teachers record their lectures, so if I didn't understand something, I can easily go back to it. In terms of practical classes though I think it's much better to have those in person.
I think that issue with skype was lack of social features made for interactions with friends, it was just a phone with video in an app. Current video calling apps are either focused on some specific use case or integrated into social media platform.
I do not like this approach to e-learning, I do not find lessons on Teams very effective and productive. I think that online education is better when it is asynchronous and allows you to manage your own learning schedule.
Microsoft teams suit me well for turning in assignments, I feel you there :) There is indeed a couple of places that deserve harsh love from the users, but the assignments section is well thought
@Mateusz:
It's interesting point you made about facebook killing skype. Initially I rejected your idea, as for me they both seem to penetrate different market segment, but well, you can video-chat there. I believe the main reason is your social circle, that migrated with you to new place. But, as you admitted, you now use discord extensively. I think that proves there was still a set needs that facebook couldn't/didn't bother to fulfil.
@Agnieszka Duda:
Yay, finally someones mentions slack here. I think overlay slack is the best performer out there. Yes, there will be niche communities that will be served better by, let's say, discord. But as a single service that delivers quality functionality to as many usecases as possible - slack is the clear winner in my eyes.
@Maciej Michalczyk
Teamspeak definitely outperformed Skype on audio quality. Lightweight software for very specific usage scenario. The most memorable moments with friends happened on teamspeak, definitely :D At least for me...
It's refreshing to hear perspective from teacher perspective. It's sad to hear it made your life worse overall, from comments we can read in this thread most people are happy about the shift to remote-oriented programme. Of course, always mentioning about poor reliability of MS Teams :)
@Grzegorz Rostek
I've noticed it changed a bit this semester, but in summer semester last year all recordings were kept in microsoft streaming service. This completely bought me in to love and worship e-learning. We've been observing raise of MOOCs in recent years, I'm wondering if now, when universities act a bit like MOOCs, we will observe a decline in interest of higher education
@Jakub Lukowski:
Humm, your comment brings to arguments to the table! The social feature aspect is interesting, as from what I'm aware of, other popular VOIP services than facebook don't offer any social features. Discord, zoom, slack, google meets - they all seems to be solely focus on handling audio/video conversation, nothing more. But still, they beat skype hard in userbase. It might be a false flag if social features are the real reason of skype failure