All Skype-to-Skype calls are free on both ends. Then, when you arrange an interview, you can ask them whether they prefer to talk by phone or Skype. It costs you nothing to extend this money-saving courtesy to your cell-phone-only, Skype-using sources and contacts. It seems to me that these days every journalist should get a free Skype account and learn how to use it to make and receive voice calls. Which means all those calls end up on my cell phone bill. And when I need to interview people, often those sources don’t have or aren’t comfortable with Skype. But most of the time when I get contacted for interviews, the journalist either doesn’t use Skype or prefers to talk by phone. I’ve used the online “phone” service Skype for a couple of years, but mainly for regular phone meetings people who also are comfortable with Skype. Then I realized I should have been using Skype more. It was about $70 more than I expected - because I’d exceeded my allotted minutes. And also, since I’d gotten known as a source on the role of Twitter in covering the Mumbai terrorist attacks, I was called by several reporters to give interviews on that topic.

I was working on a magazine feature story that required many interviews. This is a better deal for me, since generally I don’t talk on the phone much Recently, like many people, I ditched my landline (which I rarely used).

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