Jordan Joins The Axis Of Skype-Banners
from the just-say-no dept
What is it about Skype that causes so many different institutions from universities to developing nations to worry? Actually, that’s not a real tough question to answer. It’s peer-to-peer telephony system is disruptive to established competitors, and its usage is difficult to monitor. The latest to jump on board this bandwagon is the country of Jordan, which has been informing ISPs that they must block the service. The reason here seems pretty clear; Skype is threatening the profits of the incumbent carrier, Jordan Telecom. Naturally, this is upsetting many of Skype’s users in the country. Amusingly, the above article (from a Jordanian news site) criticizes the government’s actions, but not for blocking the service, but for failing to explain its rationale. The writer apparently feels that if they’d explained that they were doing it for the protection of telecom investors then all would be forgiven. Somehow we’re guessing that the pissed off users wouldn’t be satisfied with that explanation.
Comments on “Jordan Joins The Axis Of Skype-Banners”
You know what? Paying more than you have to for long distance just ain’t the biggest violation of freedom in the muslim countries.
Always happy...
See, I’m always happy if the government tells me my rights to use the competition’s services are being taken away so I can give more money to my local telecom. Telecoms are in drastic need of money now-a-days, and are faced with enough competition as it is. And who doesn’t enjoy spending alot of money on things they could have gotten for a lot cheaper.
Hmm… Wait a second…
isnt freedom in the world great?
I’m with Matt Bennett. There are worse things than skype-blocking in these countries.
Use Skype, get Beheaded
OK, maybe I exaggerate, but I’m glad to see people questioning their government. Especially in a Middle Eastern country.
Re: Use Skype, get Beheaded
hey hey,, wat r u talking bout
we question our governments and we even fuck them over. am not talking bout skype. am talking bout other more important stuff which will actually affect people’s lives,, NOT CHAT!!!!!
Skype is GREAT !!!!!!
Gime a break, day-after-day, we are seeing some kind of similar about skype, inside USA. Citys/companies tring to block the service or Voip indeed.
Midlle est or far on west when the question is the “…protection of telecom investors then all would be forgiven…”
Jordan unbanned Skype a week ago
Where was everyone last week? This ban went into effect on Sept. 13 and the decision was reversed over a week ago. You can read about it on The VoIP Service Blog.
The Issue of SuperNodes
The post by Joe is combines two points. Money and technology, but what i’m really seeing on the part of the banishers is ignorance about technology being combined with greed.
Money/greed causes telcos and now countries to take a serious look at banning the use of not only Skype, but other communications software too. Didn’t we all see, until recently in the UK the Term Of Servic clause on T-Mobile in the UK that sought to ban the use of all VoIP and IM software on their 3G network?
Haven’t we seen in the learned institutions in California the network technology staff members claim that their networks would be harmed?
Granted the concept of SuperNoding is something to reckon with, but all communications software doesn’t use the Skype/Kazaa SuperNode approach while still using safe and secure Peer2Peer technologyl.
The issue with Skype for years has been how it’s SuperNode approach threatens the integrity of the networks. What’s more users don’t even have the ability to turn off being a SuperNode. It just happens.
If you look around the web you will see that this is not a new story. The real story that needs to written again is that you can have Safe Peer2Peer communications, while not being a supernode.
Client SightSpeed is one example of communications software that doesn’t supernode, using their own servers for the SIP signaling while the media path goes P2P.
http://www.sightspeed.com/safe
My guess is that Skype will take the bull by the horns and find a way out of this mess that makes security folks feel comfortable. They have the money and now eBay has too much to lose. While that story can and will be spun in many directions, it won’t as easy as waving a magic wand and making it go away. It will take lots of time and resources.
Sadly other technologies from companies that respect the network’s intergrity, like the aformentioned SightSpeed, Yahoo Messenger, AOL’s Aim Phone Line, Peerio from Popular Telephony, MindSpring from EarthLink won’t get the notoriety they deserve for being “network friendly.”
You see, just like the idea of some women who love a “bad boy,” and men who love a “bad girl” for a host of reasons, the media is in love with rogues and pirates, while the good guys don’t make the headlines nor get given fair consideration.
The fear I have is lots of other “good” technology will get caught up in this greed and FUD game when already there is safe and sane technology that can be endorsed.
Instead of saying what not to use, wouldn’t it be better if these gatekeepers told people what the could use? That would solve the technical.
As for the greed issue, any of these companies, carriers, service providers and companies can easily strike site licenses, and deals with the companies that are able to provide “good” technology and make money off of it. Instead they choose to cast all as bad, not deliver what the market wants. That’s called monopoly where the board never changes and just money passes between the monopolists hands.
Follow-up: Bloggers pressure telecom to reverse Sk
Zeid Nasser, the author of the article in the Jordanian newspaper has confirmed that Skype is back on, and credits bloggers and journalists!