Skype Yanks Windows Mobile App From Site
For some unknown reason, Skype is no longer making Skype and Skype Lite available to the Windows Mobile platform. Skype's support page says, “We felt that Skype Lite and Skype for Windows Mobile were not offering the best possible Skype experience.”
Context & Ripple Effects
Two years after Skype laid out its mobile ambitions in January 2008, the footprint has narrowed sharply: an iPhone client that arrived in April 2009 with free Wi-Fi calling, a 3G-ready iPhone version promised 'really soon' earlier this month, and a Verizon smartphone partnership confirmed on February 20 — four days before this withdrawal. Pulling both the full client and Skype Lite off Windows Mobile leaves Microsoft's platform with no official Skype download at all.
The stated rationale — that the Windows Mobile apps were 'not offering the best possible Skype experience' — lands amid a broader refocusing: Skype is preparing its spin-off from eBay, carries unresolved IP litigation from September 2009, and has reportedly been circling a roughly $50 million acquisition of peer-to-peer rival Gizmo5 (unconfirmed). Concentrating scarce engineering on two channels, Apple devices and carrier-embedded distribution, reads less like a quality decision than a resource-allocation one.
First-order effects
- Windows Mobile users lose their only sanctioned path to install Skype, pushing existing installs toward abandonment and new users toward unofficial workarounds.
- The February 20 Verizon deal becomes Skype's primary route onto US smartphones, making carrier bundling rather than open downloads the default way consumers get mobile Skype.
Second-order effects
- Handset makers and carriers shipping Windows Mobile lose a marquee application from their pitch against iPhone and Verizon-branded rivals, weakening the platform's app story at retail.
- Carriers elsewhere gain leverage: if Skype will trade direct distribution for embedded placement, operators can demand similar exclusivity or revenue terms before granting the same access on their networks.
Third-order effects
- If carrier-embedded deals become the template, mobile VoIP access shifts from Skype's PC-era model of universal open distribution to per-carrier negotiation — a structural change in who controls the last mile to the handset.
- A spin-off-era Skype that supports fewer platforms concentrates its moat around owned clients on iOS and operator partnerships, leaving open platforms dependent on whatever terms Skype negotiates next.
The trend: Mobile VoIP is moving from write-once, distribute-everywhere clients toward carrier-embedded deals on a handful of chosen platforms, with the operator becoming the gatekeeper Skype once bypassed on the desktop.