Word: skyping
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Last week, eBay CEO Meg Whitman sat down with TIME's Jeffrey Ressner in Los Angeles to talk about the online auction site, its acquisition of Skype, and her favorite (other) online communities. Here are some highlights...
...TIME: eBay recently paid at least $2.6 billion for the Internet phone company Skype, and the two words most frequently used to describe the purchase were "head scratching." Was the price excessive...
...WHITMAN: We obviously think it was fair. We looked at value in Skype in a number of different ways: the amount we paid on a per-user basis, discounted cash flows, etc. We also looked at what we thought Skype could do on its own and with eBay...
...Yahoo and AOL have their own voice-over-instant message services. All these deals have generated as much confusion as excitement. Is eBay just trying to acquire Skype's 54 million users? Maybe GoogleTalk will let you click to dial a phone number of someone you've just Googled. Will Teleo mean yet more software bundled with Windows? None of these questions are likely to be answered any time soon. Making phone calls over the Web (also known by the acronym VOIP, for Voice Over Internet Protocol) is one of those radical new technologies that surely will change our lives...
...Similarly, skeptics thought making calls via PC wouldn't catch on; Skype has 54 million users, and says it is adding 150,000 new ones every day. All that potential, of course, may not be worth the $4.1 billion that eBay has pledged unless the company can use it to truly transform its business. To do that, eBay will have to integrate voice into the fabric of each listings. Bidders on eBay are comfortable emailing sellers with questions about an item; will they use a "Skype me" button just as readily? More importantly, will eBay sellers pay for the privilege...