Google's decision not to buy Skype from eBay suggests that it is -- for now, at least -- more committed to maintaining its relationships with mobile carriers than it is to disrupting them.

This has important implications for Google Voice, Google's would-be Skype-killer.

Namely, it suggests that Google will be content for Google Voice to remain a call-forwarding service that chews up cellphone minutes (and boosts or maintains your cellphone bill) rather than a VoIP service that circumvents your wireless carrier.

Google negotiated with eBay to buy Skype last month, but walked away from the deal, the New York Times reported yesterday. Why? In part, because Google worried that owning Skype "might alienate wireless carriers," which Google is trying to get to sell phones based on its Android operating system, the Times' Brad Stone and Claire Cain Miller wrote.

So what does that say about Google Voice? Perhaps that Google is still hesitant to make it more disruptive to carriers -- and therefore is still hesitant to make it more valuable to consumers.

For instance, it seems unlikely that Google will open up Google Voice in the near future as a free-for-all Internet phone service that operates over mobile data networks, offering free, unlimited calling.

Instead, it seems Google Voice will continue for to be mostly a service designed to forward calls from one Google Voice number to all your existing phones -- including your cellphone. The latter uses up your mobile calling minutes, so it won't threaten the current carrier business models. Even Google's dialer app for Android and BlackBerry phones uses your phone's voice channel, instead of routing free calls over the Internet. This means that calls still cost minutes, which cost money.

So while carriers are upset that Google Voice is designed to be your primary point of contact, and that it enables free SMS and voicemail features, they at least can't say that Google Voice is costing them any serious money yet. And if Google actually cares about its relationships to sell Android phones, it looks like Google won't dare change that soon.

Buying Skype, meanwhile, would have immediately set Google into a different direction -- one that is more disruptive to carriers. This could have easily have put Android lower on their list of priorities -- or, worse for Google, persuaded carriers not to use it at all.

Skype has been all about disrupting carriers from the beginning, offering free Internet calls and long distance calls that are much cheaper than telcos offer. Skype's mobile software, for example, encourages people to use their mobile data plans to skirt their voice minutes, which still represent the majority of carriers' revenue. (Unlike Google Voice.)

And, for obvious reasons, carriers are still very defensive about this. AT&T, for instance, has required Apple to prevent iPhone apps from running VoIP calls over its cellular network. As a result, Skype's iPhone app only works over wi-fi -- a substantial limitation. Earlier this year, MocoNews reported that U.K. carriers were "furious" with Nokia's plans to ship phones with pre-installed copies of Skype. So it's still a stigma.

Longer-term, of course, things could change. If Android becomes a huge hit that carriers have to carry it no matter what, Google will have more leverage and may shift its priorities, pushing the gas on Google Voice. If it flops, same story. And perhaps the plan is to wait a little longer and then kill Skype by itself, more cheaply than buying it.

But for now, it seems that Google's priority is keeping carriers close, rather than pushing them away.