Ask HN: How will Microsoft-Skype deal affect the Linux client?

5 points by jagtesh ↗ HN

7 comments

[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 30.2 ms ] thread
If they focus on market share coverage, I think they will maintain Skype for Linux the same way there is skype for other OSs (including mobile). At the end of the day, revenues are made through the paid subscriptions. The software is more a mean to get the service.
They'll neglect/break/kill it.

Ubuntu scares them. Less than web apps or OSX, but it still scares them.

No, Microsoft is not king to kill/neglect/break it. Ubuntu does not scare us one little teeny tiny little bit. Linux desktop client is just a non-starter, still, after years and years of effort. Yes, you can use it. But its not anywhere near ready for several hundred million users. The only ohter credible desktop OS besides Windows is OSX.
Maybe Miguel will take it over.
Depends on how many supernodes are Linux machines, which I would guess is quite a lot.
They're going to ruin it and turn it into a piece of shit, along with the Windows and OS X clients, like everything else Microsoft touches.

So pissed to read this today. Skype was really, really useful, and then they had to go and sell out. What a shame.

The better question is: how will it affect the Windows client? Don Marti writes: Really, this is good news. While users are trying to figure out whether to download "Skype Live Small Business Edition" or "Skype For Windows Professional Platinum 7.0", some startup will eat their lunch.

http://zgp.org/~dmarti/business/msft-skype-news/