Goodbye Skype – Another Zune Moment

The product I loved to hate is going away....and I’m sad and mad. Skype is set to retire in May 2025. Goodbye and good riddance I guess. Sad because it means change and saying goodbye to some data (read on) and mad because of the way it was communicated.

An email arrived the other day saying goodbye and go find another solution! Great, thanks. Some communication annoyances:

• The title of the email was “Important Updates to Skype Paid Services”. Huh? Why not just say clearly, we are killing the service? I guess killing the service is a radical update.
• The email uses “retiring”. The service was tired of working and is now in pension? The word choice of retiring doesn’t make my scramble to find a replacement any better. An unnecessary softening of the message.
• The mail continues “As part of this change, we want to keep you informed about important updates to your Skype paid services and how these changes may affect you.” I’m sorry, when you read the service is being killed, this sentence following it means nothing. At this point as a reader, you are like what is going on!? Affect me? Yes, I’m kind of screwed.
• The email link leads to this official communication that talks glowingly about Microsoft Teams, “our modern communications and collaboration hub.” Leaving aside our use case, which we are not sure is supported, we are supposed to all jump on the Teams train. "Sashay away Skype and Shantay, you stay Teams". "Sure, Jan."

In fairness, the links from the email go to decent info about what to do. But the email is your first notice of what’s going to happen and it could have be better written. If the Skype offering must close for business reasons, so be it, but why can’t the communication at least be more sincere and honest about what people are feeling? It’s strange in this day and age that corporate communication style can miss the mark and be so stilted. Let AI write it I say with the prompt "please be empathetic".

After years of using a virtual phone number from Skype and passing it out as a valid contact to banks and other institutions, I’m left with no good options. I use the virtual phone number from Skype a few times a month and it works well.

The email suggested finding other VoIP providers and just switching over your existing number. It doesn’t work that smoothly or at all without significant money outlay. "That the tea." (Been watching too many recaps of Rupaul’s Drag Race.)

Microsoft dropped the ball again. The retiring of Skype is bringing back bitter memories all the time I spent on Zune and then the Adios! from them. Ooh how could I forget Microsoft Band, Windows Phone, Microsoft Money, and Microsoft Encarta to name a few we also invested time and money in. When will I learn? I guess never. Btw, we still use Microsoft Money because someone wrote a hack for it to keep it working even though it was “killed” long ago.

Technology comes and goes, and we shouldn’t rely on it too heavily. But we do. And it’s annoying when you invest time and money into one and then it goes the way of the dodo. But as a minimal consolation, companies could communicate with a little more empathy.

And finally, it stings a bit because for better or worse Skype was the conduit of different key moments of my life. The last phone call with a loved one who is now gone. We keep these reminders in the recent chat list even if you can’t hear the messages that appear to be there (typical Skype). Just opening the Skype app, reminds us of the time and day and length of past calls that maybe we are not ready to let go of but should. 

Of course, we went to the export page and hoped for the best and were disappointed with what seem likes fragmented images and messages in the export.