Skype has just fired up its new developer site and stocked it with plenty of goodies for anyone wanting to write apps that interact with Skype. The Skype API is completely free (as in beer) to use, and they’ve done a great job of documenting it thoroughly and providing lots of examples to help you get started. The new Skype Developer Zone also houses a development wiki, a blog, and support forums. Overall, it looks like a well thought-out resource to help enourage developers to build things that will add value to the Skype ecosystem.

I think making it as easy as possible for third-party developers to interact with its software via good APIs, a thorough online reference, technical support and community interaction tools, all for free, is one of the smartest things Skype can be doing now. The more hooks people create into Skype, the harder it will be for the recent spate of “Skype-killers” to knock it out.