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AT&T to Expand FaceTime Over Cellular to All Customers by Year End

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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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In a statement to The Verge on the future of pre-loaded apps, AT&T today revealed that it is planning to offer FaceTime over cellular to all of its customers on any data plan by the end of 2013.
For video chat apps that come pre-loaded on devices, we currently give all OS and device makers the ability for those apps to work over cellular for our customers who are on Mobile Share or Tiered plans. Apple, Samsung and BlackBerry have chosen to enable this for their pre-loaded video chat apps. And by mid-June, we'll have enabled those apps over cellular for our unlimited plan customers who have LTE devices from those three manufacturers.

Throughout the second half of this year, we plan to enable pre-loaded video chat apps over cellular for all our customers, regardless of data plan or device; that work is expected to be complete by year end.
Click to expand...
When FaceTime over cellular was announced alongside iOS 6, AT&T initially restricted the service to its customers that subscribed to a Mobile Share data plan. AT&T soon expanded access, first to customers on a tiered data plan with an LTE device, and then to all customers with a tiered data plan regardless of device. Only customers with a grandfathered unlimited data plan were restricted from using the service.

AT&T plans to allow its unlimited customers with LTE devices access to FaceTime over cellular beginning in June, with full access to all customers becoming available by the end of the year.

Article Link: AT&T to Expand FaceTime Over Cellular to All Customers by Year End
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2013/05/20/att-to-expand-facetime-over-cellular-to-all-customers-by-year-end/
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pketelaar

macrumors newbie
Jul 25, 2007
5
0
But they'll still throttle you down to 2g speeds if you use more than 3GB on 3G or 5gb on LTE. AT&T is garbage. Unlimited my ass
 
naeS1Sean

naeS1Sean

macrumors 6502a
Oct 14, 2011
762
1,230
Scranton, PA
Idk...I don't use it anyway. I'm more about the texts. And even thats pushing it. I just want to be left alone, honestly...:eek:
 
pnoyblazed

pnoyblazed

macrumors 6502a
Mar 1, 2008
986
403
better to have this feature than to not have it at all, even if it's barely used outside of wi-fi
 
S

seble

macrumors 6502a
Sep 6, 2010
972
163
Basically, they realised it wasn't taking up as much bandwidth or traffic on their network as they thought, and so they're receding on their original plans...
 
LimeiBook86

LimeiBook86

macrumors G3
May 4, 2002
8,001
45
Go Vegan
I'm still grandfathered in on their unlimited data plan. Doesn't look like this will change anything for me. :rolleyes: Although I'm not surprised.
 
Apple TarHeel

Apple TarHeel

macrumors member
Mar 23, 2012
99
142
My iPad mini Facetime over cellular was activated about three weeks ago. I have a grandfathered unlimited plan from the original ipad, but don't use Facetime much at all, especially enough to see how much I might get throttled if I use too much data.
 
KeepCalmPeople

KeepCalmPeople

macrumors 65816
Sep 5, 2012
1,457
659
Los Angeles, California
The damage has already been done for AT&T - the bad press they received when FaceTime over cellular first was enabled by iOS 5(?) will far outweigh the limited positive press they get from this announcement.
 
Joe-Diver

Joe-Diver

macrumors 6502
Aug 2, 2009
265
0
So,,,they're going to allow my device to work as it's designed and capable of.

Thanks.

I'm grandfathered Unlimited...on an iPhone4.....so, by the end of the year I'll finally be able to FT over cell...not just wireless. About damn time.
 
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