How Skype Can Help Your Business With better quality and features, Skype takes VoIP to a new level.

The math is mind-boggling: Two years plus 200 million downloads of Skype's voice client equals 60 million registered users. Like pre-Google search engines, PC-to-PC phone calling had been around for years, but was headed nowhere in particular before Skype. Today, new features make Skype ready to handle your business calls--and much more.

Version 1.4 of Skype's tiny voice applet achieves better-than-landline call quality and adds free call forwarding--a critical feature for business callers, who make up a quarter of all Skype users. You don't have to be logged in to a computer anymore, either: Just have your incoming Skype calls ring on any three landlines or mobile phones simultaneously.

Of course, off-internet calls aren't free; you'll need a SkypeOut account. This calling card-like service lets you call anyone in North America, Australia or Europe for about 2 cents a minute, and most other countries for less than a quarter a minute.