

Just about any Twitch streamer you could find has their own Discord server, as do many podcasts and websites - it is simply the best place to curate and grow a community.ĭiscord appeared on the scene at the perfect time, coinciding with the slow end of the web forum as sites like Digg, Reddit and Twitter became the go-to platforms for group discussions. Whereas Skype only allows peer-to-peer chats or group chats, Discord allows users to create entire servers dedicated to specific topics, events, games, fandoms and communities in general.Īny given Discord server has an enormous range of customization options, allowing users to create digital lived-in space for themselves and their communities. But those same functions are organized and communicated by Discord in such a way that makes it an app specifically for communities. On an extreme surface level, Skype can do everything that Discord can. But with some clever branding and purposeful design, the app has rocketed to a $3.5 billion valuation and asserted a complete chokehold on not just gaming communities, but internet communities at large. First released in 2015, Discord is a messaging app that does video and audio calls, text messaging, and more. That is, until Discord ( $BLOCKCHAIN:DISCORDAPP) came along. For the time being, Skype may have lost the large casual call market, but it at least still had a solid footing for business and gaming calls. It was too little too late for Skype to play catch up. Skype did end up releasing an app that allowed for connections between phones and computers, but their user interface required (and still requires) multiple steps to add someone to your contact list.


#What happened to skype 2019 software#
Facetime, Apple’s ( $AAPL) proprietary video call software for iOS devices, landed with a splash, and when the ability to communicate between iOS devices and Mac computers was added a year later, its immediate usefulness immediately eclipsed Skype’s computer-to-computer connections.Īlmost immediately “Facetiming” became the catch-all term for casual video conversations, and still is to this day. The year before that it was acquired by Microsoft, the first app that would be the undoing of Skype entered the market. Skype was at its peak popularity then, but already a threat was creeping around the corner. Over the next six years, it would be subject to two more major billion dollar acquisitions, ultimately ending up with Microsoft taking control of the company for $8.5 billion in 2011. Two years after launch, eBay ( $EBAY) acquired the company for $2.6 billion. Launched in 2003, it wasn’t long before Skype became an internet staple and every tech company of the era started clawing at the door. Skype, once a catch all for a number of different audio and video chat uses, now has a major competitor eating up every possible use for the app, leaving them old and in the dust. Not only has their crown been claimed - it’s been fractured. But in the years since, Skype has fallen from grace and become synonymous with antiquated social technologies like AOL Instant Messenger and MySpace. You weren’t “video chatting” someone, you were “Skyping” them. Years ago, the company name was synonymous with the video call.
