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Skype, the Internet telephony company that is itself currently being acquired by Microsoft, has announced that it will itself acquire GroupMe, a group messaging startup.

Created at a hackathon last year, GroupMe is one of a handful of apps that enable people to have multi-person chats via their mobile devices. Group messaging has become a bit of a phenomenon this year, as a number of solutions have sprung up offering services that enable private group chat conversations from users' phones.

Three months after announcing its acquisition of Skype, Microsoft's plans for the Internet telephony service are beginning to become clear.

One of the first orders of business will be the creation of a Windows Mobile version of Skype, Neil Stevens, the company's vice president and general manager of products and marketing, told Forbes recently.

The newest version of the Skype desktop client for Mac OS X is out today, and it brings with it high-defintion video calling and better support for Lion, the most recent version of Mac's desktop operating system.

Skype 5.3 for Mac also makes a few improvements to the app's user interface, specially around how contacts are displayed. Although the previous version worked fine with OS X Lion, this version improves upon that support. It's also backwards compatible with the previous two versions of OS X, Snow Leopard and Leopard.

The iPad isn't just a hot new consumer device, it's also an increasingly popular tool for business. Each week we take a look at the new or updated business apps for the iPad, and highlight trends in how tablets are being used in the enterprise.

This week we look at the new Workday iPad app, and more.

Updated: After initially removing the Skype for iPad app from the App Store, the company has announced that it is once again available.

Updated: Skype has pulled the app, announcing, via Twitter: "To ensure your best Skype experience, we've temporarily removed Skype for iPad which went live prematurely today."

The official Skype application for iPad has landed in the iTunes App Store and is now available to download.

The app works over both WiFi and 3G and takes advantage of the front-facing camera included on the iPad 2 by offering one-on-one video chat. Until now, iPad owners had to settle for the iPhone version of Skype, which of course operates at a fraction of the screen size (or in a somewhat distorted fullscreen mode).

Tango, a cross-platform mobile video calling startup, is today announcing its first expansion to a non-mobile platform: the Windows desktop. Sometime later this summer, the new PC software will debut, joining Android (phone and tablets) and iOS (iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad) as the third major platform launch for the company over the past nine months.

Once a communication device for futuristic Sci Fi, now it seems as though video calling is ubiquitous. On the heels of the video conferencing component of the new Google Plus comes the announcement today from Facebook headquarters that video calling will now be available on the social networking site as well. Google Plus Hangouts and the new video chat in Facebook join a plethora of other offerings, most notably perhaps Apple Facetime, the video calling feature introduced as part of the iPhone 4 last summer.

As Apple, Google, and now Facebook scramble to offer their users video chat options, it's clear that these companies are looking to meet a huge perceived demand for the functionality. We all want to bypass simple voice messaging for a face-to-face video conversation, right?

Well, maybe.

Facebook announced a partnership with Skype today that enables Facebook friends to engage each other in one-to-one video calling. The feature demands comparison to what some people say is the killer feature of Google's new social network rolled out last week, Google Plus Hangouts. Facebook's announcement felt a little anti-climactic a week after the launch of Plus.

Alexis Madrigal says at The Atlantic that video chat is like cup holders in a car, essential only because of their ubiquity, but "to treat the ability to video chat in any form as tantamount to transforming communication would be reaching too far." Michael Arrington says, in a story headlined to imply that there is a clear winner ("no contest"), that the two products don't in fact overlap and don't really compete. I'm going to argue otherwise; I believe Google Plus Hangouts are clearly superior.

Skype has released a new update of its Android application that will bring video calls to a select batch of devices. Skype video calls will be available on the Google Nexus S, HTC Desire S, Xperia Neo and the Xperia Pro with more devices to be added to the list eventually.

The rollout of video calling on Android for Skype is limited because of the system requirements. A phone must have a front-facing camera (of course) and be running version 2.3 (Gingerbread) or higher. As more devices upgrade to Gingerbread, the more will be able to take advantage of Skype video chat. Can Skype remain relevant in the mobile ecosystem as services like Pinger, Google Plus/Talk, Facebook and others become more prevalent?

The iPad isn't just a hot new consumer device, it's also an increasingly popular tool for business. Each week we take a look at the new or updated business apps for the iPad, and highlight trends in how tablets are being used in the enterprise.

This week we look at a new app for enterprise microblogging, a new RDP client for the iPad and yet another way of building mobile apps. Plus, an advance look at the forthcoming Skype for iPad app.