We've started using skype to chat with friends and family, mainly ones in Turkey, the US, and Switzerland. I think the coolest thing is not just that it's free, but rather the open nature of the experience.

We put the call on with the PC speakers a desktop microphone, and usually a camera, and we sit around the living room. So the call isn't a person to person call, but group to group. The fact that it's free adds to the relaxed, leisurely experience of the call.

Technically it's a bit fiddly. Setting up Skype is a snap, but the production aspects of the call, especially with video, take a bit of effort to get nice. It's too easy to have echoing, since most people don't know how to position the speakers and microphone to avoid it. Lighting and positioning can be a problem for the video. The quality of the voice and video connections are also an issue, it's quite choppy.

But these don't really slow people down. The thing that strikes me is the non-techie people in my circle love it, and are enthusiastic about taking it up as a regular habit. As open-room audio/video sessions like this become more widespread, people will become more sophisticated about

I think as this type of thing becomes more popular, whether via skype or other services, people will get more sophisticated about production values. If end-to-end network capacity continues to grow, the audio and video quality will improve with it.

I wonder how long it will be before we're routinely plugging these calls into our wide-screen, HD televisions, gathering people together from multiple locations to share family events.