Microsoft announced on the last day of February that it would sunset Skype. By the time the death knell tolled, the video chatting software that once revolutionized communications had become a ghost of its former self. Experts chimed in with half-hearted eulogies for the platform that Microsoft spent years neglecting, yet few were surprised, and even fewer shed tears.

“The fact that Skype was never integrated into any other Microsoft platform, nor redesigned to resemble other Microsoft solutions or included in any bundled commercial offerings – despite its loss of users – was a clear indication that Microsoft had long decided to discontinue the service,” said Gianvito Lanzolla, a professor of strategy, at University of London.

But for Skype’s long-suffering users, and those who stopped using it but still thought of it fondly, the coming demise of Skype – which will shut down on 5 May – is a moment worthy of acknowledgment. Skype was a reminder of a bygone era and a source of inspiration for many. It facilitated relationships across oceans when there were few affordable means of making international calls, nothing short of a miracle for those with family members in distant parts of the world.

One nostalgic Guardian reader composed a song based on the familiar Skype ring. Michael Frishkopf, a professor at the University of Albert’s department of music and the director of the Canadian Centre for Ethnomusicology, created a short symphonic work with the Skype theme song in 2020. It was “originally for a film score (though it was never used in that way)”, Frishkopf wrote in an email.

“Skype was always a tool for connecting out of isolation and it struck me that a lot of people probably associate it with being far from loved ones,” Frishkopf said. “That Skype ring tone, I don’t know who made it, but it has a kind of wistfulness to it. It isn’t either major or minor, it could go either way. In the same way, it could sound happy or sad which could represent the sadness of longing for someone and the joy of connecting with them. That [Skype] is fading out for good, it might cause a sense of loss for people.”

Inspired by Frishkopf’s email, the Guardian asked readers to share their own memories of Skype. What they described in touching tributes was a piece of technology that connected parents with their children, enabled start-up founders to communicate across oceans and timezones, and even made two proposals possible.

The stay-at-home mom who found a new career

When I had a mid-career shift, I used Skype extensively as a way to contact clients. That was 2019, and I was on the verge of working again. I spent ten years as a full-time mom, you see. Before I began working online, it felt impossible to be working and stay at home for my kids. You can say that Skype opened up a world of possibilities to me.

– Melany Heger, Manila, Philippines

The couples who dated and proposed on Skype

I proposed to my Swedish husband over Skype using sticky notes. We got married on 5-5-15, the same day Skype will end its service. It’s very sad, I especially liked it since it was from my husband’s homeland of Sweden. Skype played a big part in our lives in keeping us connected while we were dating and it will always be in my heart.

– Holly, Iowa

I think we take for granted how revolutionary Skype was. A futurist utopia always included video calling, and that was ubiquitous by 2005 thanks to Skype. I proposed marriage through it to a long-distance girlfriend in 2008. We never got married, but our ill-fated engagement felt glorious for the weeks after, and memories of our multi-hour sessions still give me a sense of melancholy as strong as any other moments of lost young love.

– Dave, Michigan

My husband and I would never be married if we hadn’t had Skype. We met in 2004 when he was on a year abroad from Colorado School of Mines to the University of Leeds. By the time I moved to the States and we got married in November 2009, we had racked up countless Skype hours at all times of the day and night. Skype allowed us to have a long distance relationship that would not have seemed possible if we were just a few years older. Skype also allowed me to see and chat with my parents after I had moved.

Nowadays my children (11 and seven) cannot imagine a life without FaceTiming their grandparents, but so much of that is owed to mom and dad’s early years of Skype dating!

– Jessica, Colorado

The faraway relatives who Skyped family back home

In 2004, I moved across the world to attend university in the United States. Phone calls were too expensive, so I would spend hours on Skype chatting with my family and friends back home. When we went around the dinner table saying what we were grateful for my first American Thanksgiving, Skype was my answer. Homesickness was my malady, Skype was my medicine.

– Laura, Los Angeles

My great-grandmother said the most important invention during her lifetime was the ability to fly internationally, delighting in the fact that she could journey from Australia by plane for her one and only ‘grand European tour’ in the 1960s, once all her children had grown. For my grandmother, who sadly passed in 2010, it was the invention of Skype. She had spent many years corresponding via a much-cherished weekly letter and annual phone call when her only sister moved to London and then New York during the 60s and 70s. So, you can imagine her delight when I made a similar move abroad in the 2000s that we could still see each other and talk via a video call during her final years. I cherish the memory of those Skype calls as much as the letters she wrote me.

– Felix, Mexico

When first arriving on these Japanese shores, calls to the US were prohibitively expensive. I used to write aerograms (light paper that could be folded into an envelope) to my parents. Then I had two children who dispersed, one to Tokyo, one to the US. We Skype regularly, though we also use Google Chat. As an expat, I have found Skype invaluable. It can be used as a verb – “Let’s Skype!” – and fulfills a sense of joy found on Christmas morning. I will miss it.

– William Baerg, Japan

We are still using Skype on a weekly basis to talk to my husband’s Nanna who is in her 90s. We started doing this in Covid and haven’t stopped – Tuesday evening is family chat time. She gets to see her two great granddaughters this way. We think we can switch to Zoom but it’s more awkward for her to use.

– Alice, Hampshire

Throughout his numerous 12-15 month military deployments that dotted my childhood, Skype (and later Skype-to-Go) was the most reliable way to have any sort of contact with my dad in between receiving hand written letters.

– Veronica, Michigan

The teachers who used Skype to reach their students

I have been teaching Qur’an on Skype for the last nine years. I think there is no better app for teaching, especially because of the clarity of the voice in terms of teaching by sharing the page.

– Ghulam Asghar Awan, Pakistan

During the pandemic, I did online teaching via Skype. One of my students was a single child, alone at home. She was around 10 when I first taught her. Now when all school was online, she was obviously very happy to have a teacher just for herself. She didn’t learn much, because she interrupted me all the time, just wanting to talk to somebody. Bella, you still have a very special place in my heart! I’ll never forget you!

– Friedrich Helmke, Brazil

The friends who connected via Skype

The person with whom I used Skype the most and used it last was my friend Harald. I live in Wisconsin and work at the university in Madison. Harald was from Germany but did a postdoctoral fellowship in Madison in the early 2000s. We became friends while he was here, and interestingly, we grew much closer after he moved back to Germany. We would get together before or after conferences and do bike trips together, and we visited each other many times over the years.

Harald’s preferred way of communicating when we were on opposite sides of the world was by Skype. He’d use it as a verb. “Let’s Skype next Tuesday,” he’d say to me. I would often tease him as new platforms became popular that he was wedded to this outdated mode of communication. He died about two years ago, and I miss him terribly. And anytime I hear about Skype I think of him.

– Matthew, Wisconsin

The startup founders who met every evening on Skype

Our startup, which has helped hundreds of thousands of people access scientific research, only exists because of Skype. We wrote the seeds of the project at an all-night hackathon in 2011, in person, but the two of us lived in different countries and three time zones apart – would this thing fizzle or bloom? Over the next few years we talked on Skype every evening to improve the product, get funded, incorporate and grow. Skype saw our grit, tears and laughter. The result was Unpaywall, OpenAlex, improved open science, and wonderful memories. Thank you, Skype.

– Heather Piwowar, Vancouver, Canada

The man who begrudgingly gives Skype credit

Skype was the first of the video calling services. That said, it was absolutely rubbish, and I dropped it like a stone as soon as anything close to a viable alternative arrived. It’s bloated, resource-hogging, unintuitive interface lives on in Teams and is vastly improved upon by services like Discord. I’m thankful for it breaking new ground, but am more thankful we’ve gone a lot further from where we started.

– Seth, Cambridge, UK