Microsoft and Skype to axe world's most popular IM client early 2013

[TeMPOraL]

Skype client should be axed instead. It's a pile of ugly looking mess and eats half of computer's resources. I dread to turn it on anywhere else than on my overpowered home PC. And don't even get me started on the Android client. It's completely useless on a high-powered tablet, and equally useless on a low-powered phone.

I remember the times when official IM clients were lightweight and pleasant to use. Now you either have to go to third party / open source stuff (WTW, Pidgin, you name it), or just keep that GMail and Facebook tabs open.

[davedx]

I don't disagree with you. Skype is ugly, bloated and has been crashing frequently since the last couple of updates on my computers.

The problem is: it works.

I tried to do a Google Hangout last night, and the plugin couldn't find my mic. Logged into Skype, it worked perfectly.

It'll be a while yet before someone really takes Skype's business. For now it's my #1 goto communication line as a remote freelancer.

[cabirum]

umm.. Skype certainly has some usability problems, but "half of computer's resources"? Are you trying to use it on a raspberry pi?

[ed_blackburn]

The way they seem to be recruiting in the UK, I would speculate that they are going to re-write it.

[citricsquid]

I'm running Windows 7 and the Skype client is using 132mb of ram, that's with 18 chats open (of which 3 are group chats). Not sure if my usage pattern is typical, but I don't think 132mb ram is much, it's using less than about 6 other programs I have running.

[recursive]

I have never noticed any slowness with it on my Nexus.

[antonioevans]

I think you need to update your skype.

[TorKlingberg]

I think the Messenger client for Android launch as late as August this year, and to very little fanfare. At least Skype has established mobile clients. It's strange how Microsoft let the strong MSN Messenger brand slip.

[Tyrannosaurs]

Yes, but the MS Messenger Service loses money with no sign of an actual workable business model, Skype at least generates revenue.

"Merging" the two gives Microsoft a way out of Messenger without losing too much face.

[plq]

    Skype client should be axed instead.

I'm guessing they're doing this because it'd be much harder to bolt Skype's VoIP engine to Messenger.

[rbn]

Skype has a Win8 App

[jonatron]

Skype also doesn't work on windows on 16 core PCs with hyperthreading enabled.

[citricsquid]

I still use MSN and I guess I don't really mind, MSN has a lot of history but it's a mediocre client and Skype is much better. I used to have 100s of contacts on MSN with ~50 online at any one time, now everyone that used MSN casually uses Facebook chat so I have... 2 people online (both of which are listed as away) and anyone that uses IM seriously seems to use Skype. It was inevitable.

Does anyone here still use MSN? They say it's the most popular client, but that doesn't fit my current experience, I guess China makes up the majority of that usage? Of the people I know that still use MSN they just have it running because why not, they don't actively use it. That's how I use it.

[chollida1]

I used to. Oddly enough in finance AOL instant messenger is still used a lot.

You are legally allowed to issue trade orders via AOL IM.

Bloomberg chat also allows you to put your AOL contacts into it and use it as your chat program.

These two things have helped to keep it alive alot longer than maybe it should have been.

[meaty]

I use it to talk to my other half whilst in the office - that is it.

I'll switch to IRSSI over SSH onto my hosted server (I'll just run a local ircd) and she can use mIRC on her laptop instead. I have no intention of using another hosted service. It would be more reliable as well - Live Messenger reliability has always been crap.

(For ref, I do not use Skype, Facebook or any social tools).

[mailarchis]

MSN is probably big in China next only to QQ. In India, msn messenger never caught up and people started with yahoo and then moved on to gtalk.

[rb12345]

I think the reason China is excluded is probably because China gets its own customised Skype as opposed to using the standard client.

https://support.skype.com/en/faq/FA10910/what-is-tom-online

[nolok]

It is still very popular in western europe, aol and yahoo messenger never made any real entry here and msn took the whole cake. More and more people are moving out to skype and facebook, but I still have a big list of contacts there.

[creatio]

I actively use it to talk to my brother, 1/2 friends and for school group projects. It's super easy when I need to take a screenshot with the snipping tool and send to them. Not sure how easy that is to do in Skype (which I have but don't use).

[jdp23]

Back in 2006, MSN Messenger was one of the world's best-known brands (its logo outscored Mickey Mouse!); in large parts of Asia and Europe it had become a verb -- "I'll MSN you"; and had some clever approaches to ads that got extremely high clickthroughs.

But then MS changed its name to 'Windows Live Messenger' to boost the Windows Live brand; underinvested in development and support; and focused its advertising on trying to compete with Google for search ads.

Ah well. The path not taken.

[marcf]

Can they optimize Skype so that it doesn't require 80MB-130MB just to run in the background? How can it require this much memory to run an instant messenger? Couldn't they delay load some of the features if they aren't yet being used (such as video codecs and audio codecs and other such features?)

[ido]

I guess in a time where 4-8gb ram is the norm, 80-130mb memory consumption is not seen as a priority.

[sinesha]

Performance aside, here is what I hate about Skype compared to MSN / WLM: privacy. (1) Skype logs you in to your last known status / on MSN you could choose before login (for example, "appear offline"/"invisible"). If I just want to check if a contact is online without my aunt start chatting, I can't. (2) There is no easy way to block whole contact groups temporarily. When I'm at work, I don't want my friends to see me online; when I'm at home, I don't want to be contacted by co-workers. (3) Say I'm chatting with Bob, and he goes offline just before I send him a last IM. This IM will be delivered the next time that we are both online. Even if one of us is "appearing offline"/"invisible". So we have a way of knowing when someone is hiding: just send someone a message when they are offline. Bah. (4) Not related, but the delivery of old messages is awful across platforms. What annoys me the most about these bugs (1-3) is that they seem so easy to fix, and yet nothing is done. Meh. Do you have similar frustrations?

[petepete]

(2) surely isn't a bug; if you have two subsets of contacts that you want to keep entirely separate why use a single account?

[mariusmg]

They kill the client or the protocol ? It's not really clear from the article. Don't care about the client itself (most IM clients suck anyway), that's why we have pidgin.

[isani]

They're killing the client. Messenger accounts continue to work, and users can sign in to the Skype client with their existing Messenger credentials. Messenger will be run on the same infrastructure as before, not on the Skype peer-to-peer model. As far as I can tell, third-party clients should continue to work as well.

[belorn]

I thought the protocol used a central server for transferring contact information between users. If they shutdown those severs, then pidgin's msn implementation wont do us any good.

[mileswu]

I sign onto my various IM accounts from a variety of locations simultaneously (e.g. desktop at home, laptop in office, phone) and I find it infuriating that every protocol has a different way of handling that.

MSN: Sends incoming message _only_ to the last active computer (where last active seems to be defined by which computer last sent an IM or updated your status)

AIM: Sends incoming messages to all computers

XMPP (Gtalk): Inconsistent behaviour. I think the priorities set by various clients screw things up.

Skype: Does weird chat/history syncing between all your computers (this raises Privacy issues, as many times if I delete a chat on my desktop, it somehow reappears on my phone when I sign in on it. Also although it syncs the chat text, why not also sync whether the messages have been read or not, because at the moment if I sign in on my phone, it constantly buzzes for about 5 minutes as it 'catches' up on a ton of unread messages (which I've read ages ago on my computer).)

What's worse is status fragmentation. I've set my desktop and laptop to auto-away after 5 minutes, so people know if I'm there or if they can leave a message I'll read later. Run through this situation: 1) Signed in on desktop, go away. Pidgin sets Away on my accounts. 2) Some time later, turn on laptop. Adium sets all my accounts as Online. 3) Turn off laptop to go somewhere. Adium signs out and my accounts get left as Online. Desktop doesn't re-auto-away and so people think I'm there when I'm not.

None of these are ideal, and the only 'solution' I've found is to use a service like http://imo.im where their service only signs on _once_ to the accounts, but you access imo.im on any number of devices so it can make sure that every device has the same chat there. Problem with this is I don't like using web apps and would prefer to use native Pidgin/Adium if possible.

Any suggestions?

[sp332]

According to Ars Technica, the infrastructure will be the same. http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2012/11/micros... This is more of a rebrand than an "axe".

[hejsna]

The best way to spend any extra money saved on retiring MSN: open up the Skype API for devs to use. Adium is still the undisputed king of IM clients and with a proper Skype plugin for it I'd be happy again. Because let's face it, the Skype client is really, really bad.

[DeepDuh]

Goddamnit yes. Waiting years for this.

[dade_]

Google needs to work hard and fast pushing google talk. This will determine Google's place in the future of VoIP / video calling in the Internet.

[gubatron]

google talk was killed too. Now it's all G+

[navs]

Did anyone notice how Skype now shows ads on the their iPhone app? Far as I'm concerned it and live messenger have the same overall experience. I'd do away with Skype if I weren't using it to keep in touch with clients.

[buro9]

A truer description might be that the brand is being axed.

I believe that Skype has been migrated onto a messenger backend... so really this is a unification of the chat tech onto messenger, and the brand onto Skype.

[xutopia]

Surely they know something we don't. I expected them to go the other way by bringing Skype into Messenger.

[Achshar]

Related: Can't seem to find Skype metro in windows store on release preview. Any way of running it here?

[jpswade]

This fixes the "Messenger" branding issue.

[belorn]

Maybe this will help the uptake of xmpp.

[garethadams]

Windows Live Messenger is XMPP - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/live/hh826554.aspx

[pestaa]

I hope you're right and very afraid you are not. Neither Skype nor Microsoft are keen on utilizing open source.