Re Skype: He also suggests just making a normal phone call. Which has pretty much the same problems: It's an opaque, closed system with pretty much the only difference that there are multiple companies controlling it instead of just one.
The complaint about using phone would be much better suited for 1950 where "the phone company" owned the phone. You called, was asked to choose between 3 different colors, and then a few days/weeks later they came and installed a phone with the clear label that said "property of the phone company".