They're not charging 99¢ to "get paid". They have to charge it due to accounting regulations.
If they could have given it away for free, they would have.
See here:
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Apple's $0.99 FaceTime Charge Due to Accounting Requirements
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They're not charging 99¢ to "get paid". They have to charge it due to accounting regulations.
If they could have given it away for free, they would have.
See here:
With FaceTime being on the Mac, iPod touch and iPhone, everyone in my family (and extended family) uses it multiple times on a daily basis one way or another.
LOL- you have me mixed up with someone else, bud. I never said I expected the software to be free- I'm not mad about anything. I was asking what are the new features of the Facetime that was released today that are not in the Beta. If there were new features, I was ready to pay $0.99 and buy it. It doesn't seem like there are any, so I will happily stick with my Beta version.
Some people are telling me that this Beta version of Facetime will expire so, no asking if it will or not and whether I should buy the $0.99 version released today is not a stupid question because no one seems to know the answer for sure.
I NEVER said anything about the $0.99 version being "wrong" - where are you coming up with this stuff?
Nice trick Apple... They forced user to create an account to use iTunes and App Store, even for free music/apps, in purpose to get credit card number to allow user for compulsive buying with one-click.
However, there was always a way to skip the credit card info during iTunes account creation.
So now, they'll charge customers for a feature they promote such Facetime. Tomorrow in Lion, we'll only get Finder and App Store for free, then if you want safari you'll pay, you want mail you'll pay, you want the address book you'll pay, $0.99 here, $0.99 there, etc...
Accounting reason is mainly Apple's bank account!!
I'm still using the beta and if it stops to work, I will just keep using Skype anyway, which is better and cross-platform.
Not this time Apple, not this time...
Spid
However, there was always a way to skip the credit card info during iTunes account creation.
So now, they'll charge customers for a feature they promote such Facetime. Tomorrow in Lion, we'll only get Finder and App Store for free, then if you want safari you'll pay, you want mail you'll pay, you want the address book you'll pay, $0.99 here, $0.99 there, etc...
Accounting reason is mainly Apple's bank account!!
I'm still using the beta and if it stops to work, I will just keep using Skype anyway, which is better and cross-platform.
Not this time Apple, not this time...
Spid
Spid: you should really educate yourself. It really is an accounting issue.
Do you think Apple wants to piss off their loyal customers over a measly 99¢?
Do you think Apple wants to piss off their loyal customers over a measly 99¢?
I understood what you are asking. But in the context of this thread, your question could have been interpreted to be asking for justification of $.99 for the new version when the beta version was free. I assume that is how jctune interpreted it. It was unclear if you didn't read the whole post carefully.
I understand that all you are asking for is a changelog.
I'm sure Apple understands the legalities of this far better than the hoards of "lawyer want-to-bes" posting here. Come on people, 99 cents. You spend that by turning your car's ignition to "start" and backing down your driveway.
Yup! And someone answered on the other thread- there are NO NEW FEATURES that the Beta doesn't have.
That answered my question.
https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=11984058&posted=1#post11984058
Sorry if I misinterpreted your postings (I'm always happy to admit when that happens - rarely of course). Reading through these negative postings where people truly aren't understanding that they are bitching about paying for something that they were getting for free before just set me over the edge.
Yeah, no, see I would be happy to spend $0.99 on FaceTime if I didn't already have the Beta. I'm pretty sure I could find that amount of bank somewhere.
I take it that the new "Facetime HD" camera is better than 1280x1024, and not simply a rebranding of the 1280x1024 iSight version? Maybe Apple is more stringent of what it calls "HD."
I would be very surprised if the FaceTime app artificially limited the quality of the video that's possible on the hardware.
I'm pretty sure it's a limitation of the processor or GPU. Seems like there was something about it on Apple's site.
Here you go:
http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/features.html#graphics
I did read the link. The Intel HD 3000 is roughly the equivalent of an ATI 2600 Pro from 2008. The 320m in last year's MBPs is a bit faster than it.
Graphics capability is not the issue.
iChat has been limiting the quality of the video for two or three years now, why not Facetime "HD"? Plus, Facetime won't accept external, third-party HD cameras, so I don't think "artificial limitations" are outside the realm of possibility.
I'm not saying that there aren't new and improved cameras in the new Macbook Pros. However, why not simply crop the existing cameras into a proper aspect ratio and activate "HD" calls for everyone else? Doesn't make sense at all.
The maximum chat resolution on the new MBPs is 720p. The existing cameras are higher resolution than 720p... Am I missing something here?
And the CPU/GPU is more than able to handle HD chats. Hell, my mom's Windows XP Dell POS from three years ago works with Logitech HD cameras-- she uses it every day. I don't buy the marketing. If that was the case, why not enable it for the Mac Pros with 8 cores and spec'ed out video cards?
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Do you really think they are lying on the feature page? The general specs of the GPU are not the issue. It's pretty obvious from Apple's description that the GPU supports hardware encoding of video (I assume h.264.)
http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/performance.html
"An integrated video encoder enables HD video calls with FaceTime"
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