14 DAY TRIAL // Skype, one of the most popular instant messaging services for mobile devices, has been on the market for a very long time. The application is available on all mobile platforms that you can think of, including iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Phone and Symbian.
In the meantime, the company has been acquired by Microsoft and started to focus on improving its services for the Windows Phone ecosystem, but support and updates for other mobile platforms continue to be offered.
However, since there are many mobile operating systems that have become obsolete, or are about to be discontinued, Microsoft decided to redistribute the resources allocated to these platforms to other endeavors.
In light of what we wrote above, today’s announcement that Microsoft will seize support for Skype on a few older mobile OSes shouldn’t surprise anyone.
The only thing that should be surprising is why Microsoft did not discontinue Skype on these platforms much earlier. Well, Windows Phone 7 could still be supported, but Symbian is a dead operating system since long ago.
Since Nokia dropped Symbian over Windows Phone, there was not one smartphone launched powered by this platform. The only issue would be that there are still a lot of Symbian smartphones on the market and those who own them are having a hard time switching to a new OS.
All in all, Microsoft has just announced those who still own active Skype accounts for Symbian that it will retire the application and they won’t be able to log in into their accounts anymore.
The change will take effect in the next couple of weeks, so Symbian users can still make use of Skype, but this won’t last too long. Here is the entire email sent by Microsoft to users who own Symbian smartphones, courtesy of DigiPassion:
“We’ve noticed that you are, or previously were, signed into Skype on a Symbian phone, and we’re sorry to inform you that we are now permanently retiring all Skype apps for Symbian phones. As a result, within the next few weeks, you’ll no longer be able to sign in and use Skype on any Symbian phone.
“You can still stay in touch with friends and family using Skype on an Android device, Nokia Lumia phone or desktop computer. You can sign into them all using the same Skype account.”
As time goes by, it will be harder for Symbian users to remain faithful to this platform due to the functionality loss. Perhaps now is the perfect time to switch to another operating system. Share your thoughts about this in the comments section below.