Skype: Net Telephony as File-Trading

Skype: Net Telephony as File-Trading. "The success of Skype, which debuted only four months ago, raises a question whose answer could define the future of telecom: Can next-generation phone systems take the shape of decentralized, peer-to-peer file-sharing networks that run over the Net and eliminate phone-company middlemen? "What Skype and others like it say is: Screw the phone system.... Let's build a voice app -- software -- that does what the telephone does," says Clay Shirky, a consultant and adjunct professor at New York University who studies peer-to-peer and networking technologies."