FaceTime Ads Come to Europe as Feature Disappears in Middle East

According to a pair of reports from MacStories, several European countries have seen the debut of iPhone 4 commercials centered around the device's FaceTime video calling capabilities. The four new commercials are all set to Louis Armstrong's "When You're Smiling" and contain no voice-over text, making them appropriate for airing in multiple countries. The new commercials also close with carrier-specific branding in each of the countries where they have appeared, which include at least the UK, Italy, and Spain.


"Mum's Birthday" ad from 3 Italia

- Lion
- Football
- Wedding Dress
- Mum's Birthday

Meanwhile, users in the Middle East are finding issues with FaceTime in their countries. The controversy began there last week when it was discovered that Apple had removed some FaceTime-related promo materials on its localized sites for several countries in the region, suggesting that the feature may not be making a debut there.

At the present time, there appear to be mixed reports about the status of FaceTime functionality in many countries in the region, with some reports indicating that FaceTime is functional out of the box but that it becomes disabled upon updating to iOS 4.1. Other users have reported mixed results with a variety of methods for trying to get FaceTime working on their phones.

The reason for the apparent lack of FaceTime functionality is unclear at this time, with one rather confusing report claiming that Apple removed the feature based on a mistaken assumption that it wouldn't be permitted due to restrictions on VoIP services common in the region.

Related Forum: iPhone

Popular Stories

google drive for desktop1

Google to Roll Out New 'Drive for Desktop' App in the Coming Weeks, Replacing Backup & Sync and Drive File Stream Clients

Tuesday July 13, 2021 1:18 am PDT by
Earlier this year, Google announced that it planned to unify its Drive File Stream and Backup and Sync apps into a single Google Drive for desktop app. The company now says the new sync client will roll out "in the coming weeks" and has released additional information about what users can expect from the transition. To recap, there are currently two desktop sync solutions for using Google...