Let's Skype: The world's favourite VoIP service turns 10

Happy birthday Skype, you’re 10-years-old today! The path-breaking VoIP service that was born out of the efforts by Janus Friis of Denmark and Niklas Zennström of Sweden is celebrating its birthday today.

The company hit it big when eBay acquired the service creator for $2.5 billion in 2005. Even as cheap broadband connection became widely available across the world, the need to connect with loved ones sitting in other cities became more important and Skype filled this gap perfectly.  Between 2005 and 2009, Skype’s international call market share jumped from 2.9 percent to 12 percent. Currently a total of 300 million users make two billion minutes of online video calls a day using Skype.

Part of this success of the VoIP service can be attributed to its acquisition by Microsoft in 2011. A popular joke at that point of time said, “Microsoft bought Skype for $8.5 billion? Why, it could have downloaded Skype for free!”

Earlier in July the company announced a massive redesign for its Android application after celebrating the 100 million downloads mark. Not just the service, but also its applications on iOS, Android and even Windows Phone seem to be doing great.

The company has spawned many competitors with its simple, yet effective calling philosophy. While Apple’s FaceTime and Google’s Hangouts are catering to a whole niche of audiences themselves, they’ll probably never be immortalised in popular-speak like 'Let’s Skype!' is.

Volunteering could lengthen life

People who volunteer report having lower levels of depression and higher levels of well-being than average, while some research suggests it promotes a longer and healthier life.

A review of 40 academic papers on the subject by University of Exeter researchers found that volunteers are a fifth less likely to die within the next four to seven years than average.

Across the studies volunteers had lower self-rated levels of depression and higher levels of well-being and life satisfaction, although this has not been confirmed in trials.

It is thought that volunteering can be good for the physical health of older people in particular, by encouraging them to stay active and spend more time out of the house.

Volunteers often explain their motives in terms of wanting to "give something back" to their community, but without receiving anything in return the reported improvements in quality of life are harder to explain, experts said.

An estimated 22.5 per cent of people in Europe devote part of their spare time to volunteering, compared with 27 per cent in America and 36 per cent in Australia.

Dr Suzanne Richards, who published her systematic review in the BMC Public Health journal, said: "Our systematic review shows that volunteering is associated with improvements in mental health, but more work is needed to establish whether volunteering is actually the cause.

"It is still unclear whether biological and cultural factors and social resources that are often associated with better health and survival are also associated with a willingness to volunteer in the first place."

source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10259949/Volunteering-could-lengthen-life.html

Masked hero helps carry bags, babies up and down Tokyo subway stairs

Tadahiro Kanemasu aka the "Carry-Your-Pram-Ranger" carries a woman's shopping cart at the station in Tokyo. Reuters

TOKYO —

In a green outfit with silver trim and matching mask, a superhero waits by the stairs of a Tokyo subway station, lending his strength to the elderly, passengers lugging heavy packages and mothers with baby strollers.

“Japanese people find it hard to accept help, they feel obligated to the other person, so the mask really helps me out,” said Tadahiro Kanemasu.

The slender 27-year-old has spent three months being a good Samaritan at the station on Tokyo’s western side. Like many in the city, it has neither elevators nor escalators and a long flight of dimly lit stairs.

Inspiration came from the children he met at his job at an organic greengrocer, which also prompted the color of his costume. He picked up the green Power Rangers suit and two spares at a discount store for 4,000 yen each.

Since Kanemasu can set aside only a couple of hours each day for his good deeds, he hopes to recruit others in different colored suits. Already he has inquiries about pink and red.

Hayato Ito, who works alongside Kanemasu at the greengrocer, said his kindness to others over the years meant his alter ego did not come as a complete surprise.

“There were hints of this from a long time ago but finally he flowered as a hero,” Ito said.

Kanemasu admitted he got off to a bit of a rocky start.

“When I first began, people basically said ‘Get away from me, you weirdo’,” he said. “Now they still think I’m weird but in a good way.”  

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2013. 

 

source: http://www.japantoday.com/category/lifestyle/view/masked-hero-helps-carry-bags-babies-up-and-down-tokyo-subway-stairs