Facebook has unveiled a group chat tool, a new design for its overall chat interface, and, yes, a video calling service based on Skype. From the screens and the demo, video chat on Facebook looks great and very easy to use.
Facebook Video Chat May Impact Skype Usage
Its simplicity was emphasized repeatedly by Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and by Skype CEO Tony Bates who was on hand at the event. In fact it seems so elegant and simple that I think it will negatively impact conventional PC-based Skype usage.
Skype probably couldn't not do this deal. And Bates said that premium (paid) Skype options will probably come to Facebook; Zuckerberg seemed more uncertain ("We'll have to see"). If it wasn't Skype it would have been someone else or an acquisition.
Explaining the rationale behind the deal, Bates said it increases Skype's reach, which it does. Zuckerberg also said that video calling would come to mobile devices in the future.
Video Chat to Be a Hit
If you're a regular consumer, there are now fewer reasons to use the branded Skype service. Although, depending on your specific needs, there are still a number of reasons to use Skype after today: Skype out, mobile, conference calling, presentations and group video chat.
Clearly one-on-one video chat on Facebook will be a hit. And it steals some of the thunder of Hangout, the well-reviewed group chat feature on Google+. Zuckerberg implied that group video chat would be coming soon but for now that capability still differentiates Hangout from Facebook video chat.
Google+ the Subtext
It's clear that the Facebook-Skype deal was in the works for many months, before Google+ launched, this event seemed hastily put together almost as a response or to blunt the positive response to Hangout and Google+.
Overall Zuckerberg said that Facebook would work with developers and entrepreneurs who could build on top of its graph rather than Facebook "trying to do everything" itself — as Google is impliedly trying to do. He also seemed to be saying that while there was room for social media outside the Facebook solar system, Facebook was like Jupiter to everyone else's Mercury or Mars (the two smallest planets).
