A $3.2 Trillion-Dollar Monopoly Just Killed A Company Loved by Hundreds of Millions of Customers
Monopolies get rich by killing competition and customer choice
I’m a bit sad today.
As many of you know, I ditched my cell phone fifteen years ago, and being cell-free has been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
It’s…
saved me close to $10,000
saved me probably 20,000 hours of wasted screen time
prevented a porn and social media addiction
allowed me to maintain my ability to deep focus for long periods
enabled me to retain the ability to be present when I’m with people
My work has taken me to 40 countries and hundreds of cities, and I can honestly say that I’ve only ever wanted a cell phone on two occasions.
But I’ve never genuinely needed a cell phone in fifteen years, during which time I’ve published six books and 700+ articles and directed five documentaries.
To be able to call people all over the world, I’ve relied on Skype.
Skype was awesome.
For $52.26/year, I got a phone number and voicemail that anyone could call or text.
I could also call or text from it anywhere in the world for cheaply, on a pay-as-you-go basis.
No contracts, no lock-ins, no nonsense.
(Pope Francis’s assistant left a voicemail on my Skype phone to invite us to the Vatican for lunch.)
I wasn’t the only one who loved Skype.
Skype had 300 million monthly active users.
Skype had 40 million daily active users.
In other words: Skype was a billion-dollar business.
Microsoft bought the Estonian company in May 2011 for $8.5 billion in cash, and it was still gushing profits when they shut it down.
So the question is…
Why did Microsoft kill Skype?
The answer, like all things involving Bill Gates, boils down to one word:
Money.
Microsoft shareholders love money.
They literally cannot get enough.
They love money so much that they spent $8.5 billion to buy a company just so they could kill it.
You’re probably thinking:
Wait, what? How does killing a company make you money?
Silly you.
You’re not thinking like a $3.24 trillion monopoly.
$8.5 billion is one-fifth of 1% of Microsoft’s value.
It’s a rounding error.
You spend that kind of money so you can murder your competition so that you can try to force people to use a similar service you already offer.
In this case, it’s a piece of garbage called Microsoft Teams.
Check out the price tag:
But that’s not all.
Oh no.
Why charge customers one monthly payment when you can charge them two?
To use your new Microsoft phone number, you’ll also need to lock yourself into a Microsoft Teams subscription:
In other words:
Skype was $52.26/year, and Microsoft wants to charge you a minimum of $240/year for a crappier version.
Classic Microsoft.
Classic Bill Gates.
Classic money-worshipping monopolists.
Charge 4.6+X the price on a locked-in contract versus <21% of the price and the freedom to come and go as you please.
A $3.24 trillion monopoly just killed a service that 300 million people loved and 40 million people used every single day.
How is that in the best interest of consumers?
How did the country’s competition bureau not stop the acquisition in the first place?
(Answer: Because the corporatocracy is stocked with corrupt corporatists who almost never block mergers and acquisitions.)
So, today, 300 million Skype customers woke up without a helpful app that they’ve been using for decades.
I can’t even export my contacts because, surprise surprise…
Microsoft’s game plan is obvious: With its competition dead, if just 1 in 5 former Skype customers jumps over to Teams because they have no other choice, Microsoft wins.
Does this mean I’ll get Microsoft Teams?
Over my dead body.
Bill Gates gets zero dollars for trying to stiff-arm me.
My book publishers all use Microsoft Word, but when Bill Gates’s team forced Word customers to lock into a sky-high monthly subscription instead of paying a one-time download fee, I switched to the (free) OpenOffice and never looked back.
As my Skype replacement, at least for now, I’ve cobbled together an ugly softphone called Zoiper paired with voip.ms.
It’s not nearly as elegant as Skype, but I can send and receive calls and texts and my phone number only costs 85 cents a month. No contract.
I’m also going to reach out to the original creators of Skype to see if they want to build a new one.
If you have the tech skills and experience, or know anyone who does, feel free to send them this article and get them to message me through jaredbrock.com.
There are 300 million people who want a Skype replacement that isn’t owned by a multi-trillion-dollar money-worshipping cult that doesn’t care about people.
So what’s the moral of the story, here?
We need to stop giant companies from murdering their competition.
We need to help rich people overcome their love of money.
Ecclesiastes 5:10 says, “Whoever loves money never has enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income.”
Truer words have never been spoken.
Our whole world is falling apart because people refuse to accept the reality that our infinite desires can only be fulfilled by an infinite entity.
And money ain’t it.
P.S. My wife Michelle just launched a free, once-in-a-while newsletter called Encourage & Endure. It’s simple, beautiful, and moving. Subscribe here.
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This past week, I was on GB News for the first time. Check it out: