VOIP and Skype

Well, I just finished my first Skypecast “Using Technology in Education” and boy oh boy was it an adventure being the moderator of a discussion like that. Right after I finished I received a review of the skypecast from James Fadden at Allegheny College. A couple of things to add to his review form the host’s perspective.  Original article from EduTechie.com.

First Impressions

It was EXTREMELY hard to moderate a discussion like this. At first it was total chaos because I tried to allow everyone to speak that wanted to speak, but I soon found out that there were people (literally dozens) just coming into the conversation to practice their English. Eventually I just began moving people to listening right away and if they wanted to talk they would move themselves to waiting where I would then promote them to talking. That seemed to work pretty well, but it did take an extraordinary amount of concentration to keep up with the conversation going on at the same time while people were chatting with me as well.

Skype is now offering real-time voice translation services for Skype calls.  Language Line Personal Interpreter offers SkypeOut customers near-instantaneous access to professional voice translation. Note: this is access to live interpreters, not machine translation! The cost is $2.99 per minute, which is relatively high, but with this type of service you are paying for the convenience first and foremost.

However, for academic users, issues like quality of service, effective liaison, good marketing (dare I say it...) of your institutional "brand" and preventing reputational risk will also be very important considerations when choosing a translation service. So perhaps try using the Skype service before you recommend it widely (according to TechCrunch, it works fine on PCs, but not on Macs). If you need non-urgent access to a translator, you may be able to save a considerable amount of money by getting a referral through an appropriate professional association. Try checking rates with the ATA in the USA, or the Institute of Translation and Interpreting in the UK.

I've previously, and approvingly, cited Skype as a neat VoIP tool for teaching and learning. Now, security concerns focussing on the program's technical underpinnings could throw a (temporary?) spanner in the works.

Today, the Department of Physics at Cambridge issued a memo to all staff and students, blocking the use of Skype on the University data network (CUDN). Users were alerted to recent security compromises and back-door intrusion attempts on machines running Skype.

Breaches involved Skype's underlying P2P technology: essentially, the connection sharing permitted by Skype "makes the host computer and the CUDN available for the world at large to use for relaying purposes; indeed, the licence for such software can require the end-user to make them available even though the end-user has no power to make that commitment regarding use of the network" (Cambridge IT Syndicate policy statement on "Use and Misuse of Computing Facilities").

This event shows that an increase in network traffic is not the only reason to keep a close eye on P2P services. Users of the CUDN must be authorised, whereas P2P services allow access to unauthorised third parties. In fact, using Skype requires the granting of third-party access. Section 4.1 of Skype's End User License Agreement (EULA) states: