Peer-to-peer VoIP service Skype has suffered a service outage lasting days, which according to one analyst highlights the flaws with such networks.

The internet-based communications network has been sporadically rejecting the sign-ins of its users since midday on August 16th and its service is reportedly still "intermittent".

Mark Main, writing for telecoms technology website Ovum, suggested that the service disruption indicated "free on-net services" suffer from reliability issues, which would likely make them unsuitable for a company to rely on for their communications.

"There is still a danger that services designed to be highly disruptive to traditional telecoms business models have been developed without sufficient regard for resilience," he said.

"Perhaps we should still consider some VoIP services as being like a short-cut over rocky ground instead of the smoother, but longer and well-trodden path. You still broadly get what you pay for in telecoms and there is a compromise users must accept, especially [with] the free on-net services."