Digital Integration of Facebook with Skype

he release of Skype 5.0 has seen huge improvements and additional features; most favourably the new Facebook tab. This digital integration sees a progress of usability between the social networking sites, and will definitely increase the popularity of Skype, as appeal will widen and Skype will in time become the place to communicate with friends, family and work colleagues.

The Facebook tab allows users to SMS, chat or call their Facebook friends via Skype right from the News Feed. It is making Skype a much friendlier platform with increased interaction, and has evolved the contact list to include all of your Facebook friends that have their phone numbers on their profiles, as well as the ability to put a face to the name with profile picture integration.

Not only is Skype beckoning new and more users with this digital integration, but it is also allowing free calls to be made to people who are both on your Skype list as well as a Facebook friend. Surely with Skype being accessible from new devices, such as the iPhone 4 with Facetime……this will, in time, eliminate the actual ear to ear telephone call, and a new era of face to face calling through handsets will be the new thing?

This is one of the more major elements of Skype’s new version 5.0, and the most exciting, but there is so much more to it. The new platform provides a much more user friendly and personal area; as well as allowing an enhanced experience of the 10-group video calling. This group video calling aspect has also seen a “dynamic view” option introduced, which automatically positions the person speaking in the larger window. Another great feature is an automatic reconnect attempt when calls are interrupted or cut due to connection failures.

Interestingly, however, Mac users will have to wait for their version to be released at a later date; which is quite surprising, as you would think that a digital integration of this sort would see more interest spur from Mac users as the majority of those are within the digital industry already, so you would think Skype would have pushed this forward quicker.

All in all, definitely a good move I think!

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