New advertising will appear in the home page in Skype, according to the company's blog. Chief marketing officer Doug Bewsher says Skype has already run some test ads via online music service Rdio "in the last month or two."
In the post, Bewsher says the ads are designed to be unobtrusive and "won't interrupt your Skype experience." The company also plans to target the ads based on "non-personally identifiable" demographic data, though users can opt out of sharing such information.
Skype offered the following example of what the ads will look like.
Skype's move comes after the company mulled over advertising for some time. In May, then-CEO Josh Silverman told The Telegraph the company is challenged to keep Skype-to-Skype calls free and maintain quality of service. That led the Skype team to "seriously consider" including ads from third parties.