Skype integrating with Facebook!

The new Skype for Windows has a joint collaboration with Facebook and will include a Facebook tab, which means that first-time Skype users can keep up-to-date and interact with their Facebook news feed. The Facebook phonebook, the same one that you find on your mobile if you have Facebook on it, allows users to text and call their Facebook friends directly to mobile phones and landlines. If your Facebook friend is also a Skype user, then you can make free video calls too! Group video calling is also available in Beta as a free trial.

Skype has 560 million registered users, 8.1 million of these pay for the service, whereas Facebook has over 500 million users.

Commentator Ben Popper of business technology blog BNET.com said, "For Skype they are getting built right into the conversation. For Facebook, which has the bulk of its users in the US, this is good in terms of expansion because a chunk of Skype users are in Europe and the rest of the world. The deal makes this space a lot more interesting and indicates a different direction of where communications could go."

The Skype version 5.0 for Windows is available now. It has not yet been announced when the Mac or Linux versions will be released.