By Scott Moritz, writer

Ebay (EBAY) rolled out Skype’s unlimited calling plan in a bid to keep up with rivals and – let’s face it – to finally land some paying customers.

For $2.95 a month. U.S. Skype customers can make unlimited calls anywhere in the United States. Calling plans from the United States to Europe cost $9.95 a month.

The move comes amid speculation that eBay might be considering a carve-out option for the voice-over-Internet-protocol, or VOIP, service that counts 309 million registered users.

eBay’s $4 billion Skype bet hasn’t paid off as the company hoped when the deal was signed in 2005. Last year, the online auction shop took a $1.4 billion charge to write down some of the unrealized value of that deal. This year, some eBay investors are hoping for a different sort of transaction – a sale.

“This is something that belongs with another entity,” says Darren Chervitz with the Jacob Internet Fund, an eBay investor. “Skype makes more sense at a place like Google (GOOG).”

Skype software allows PC users with microphones and cameras to make free calls to other Skype users or cheap calls to conventional phones. The service was expected to enhance communication between buyers and sellers in eBay’s auction market.

Big tech companies that generate a lot of cash are justifiably wise to make bold bets on innovative acquisitions, says Chervitz. Sometimes it works, like eBay’s purchase of PayPal, and other times it doesn’t, like with Skype, he says.

Chervitz would like to see eBay get some value back from Skype while it still can. “They should sell it now, says Chervitz, “before the technology changes.”

By Scott Moritz, writer

The pinch on consumer spending continues to cause big hangups at phone companies where their core businesses — landline telephone service — is eroding faster than ever.

The latest round in the alarming decline in phone lines will come Tuesday morning, when AT&T (T) presents its first-quarter earnings. Analysts are expecting AT&T — No.10 on the Fortune 500 list — to report that the rate of line losses in Q1 exceeded the 8% hit it took last year. No. 2 telco Verizon (VZ) has an even higher cancellation rate, losing 8.1% of its lines last year compared with a 7.6% decline in 2006.

The news signals an acceleration of a troubling trend for the sector as consumers, already hit by higher gas and grocery prices, look to their phone bills as a place to trim expenses. AT&T was the first telco to ring the warning bell when it said in January that there was “softness” in some regions of the consumer market.

This sluggish economic backdrop has made a tough competitive market even tougher, as cable companies such as Comcast (CMCSA) and Time Warner Cable (TWC) grab market share with their triple play offerings — video, Net and phone services.

If there’s one area that may help offset the landline defections, it’s wireless. But even AT&T’s high-revving mobile unit — the Apple (AAPL) iPhone’s only U.S. carrier –  is feeling the slowdown as the market becomes saturated. AT&T is expected to have added about 2 million net new mobile phone customers in the first quarter, a number that is down seasonally from the 2.7 million user it picked up in the busy holiday quarter that ended in December. Verizon Wireless — a joint venture of Verizon and Vodafone (VOD) — is expected to post a retail post-paid net subscriber gain of 1.5 million, down from 1.9 million in the fourth quarter. Verizon is scheduled to post earnings next Monday.

No.3 wireless player Sprint (S) has already indicated that it may lose as many as 1.2 million subscribers in the first quarter as users continue to flee its ailing service in mass.

AT&T’s so-called landline business accounts for about 59% of total revenue and about 55% of its profits. With the number of lines falling, AT&T has had to trim costs to keep in pace. Last week AT&T said it was cutting about 4,650 employees, or 1.5% of its staff in a “streamlining” effort.

Analysts expect AT&T on Tuesday to post a pro forma profit of 74 cents a share, up from 65 cents in the year-ago quarter. Sales for the first quarter are expected to be $30.7 billion, an increase over the $29 billion a year ago.

By Scott Moritz, writer

Packeteer’s white knight arrived in a Blue Coat. Network security shop Blue Coat (BSCI) says it will pay $268 million in cash for Packeteer (PKTR).

The deal calls for Blue Coat to pay $7.10 a share for the Internet traffic management outfit — a 15% premium over the closing price Friday.

As part of the deal, Blue Coat will buy the 10%  Packeteer stake held by private-equity firm Elliot Associates. Packeteer had rejected a $200.8 million takeover offer from Elliott earlier this year. In the new deal, Blue Coat will issue $80 million in convertible notes to Francisco Partners, a unit of Elliot Associates.

Packeteer, known as a wide-area-network optimization shop, uses software and hardware to speed up transmission of data communications. Packeteer and rival Riverbed (RVBD) have seen a steady decline in sales growth in the last year as tech spending slows.

Riverbed is down 58% in the past year. And prior to the deal, shares of Packeteer were down 36% since last year. Packeteer rose 12%, to $6.96, in premarket trading Monday.