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iPhone apps not available in all countries?
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Dec 1999
Location: Tampa, Florida
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Is it surprising that I find a great application, but I can't recommend it to a friend in South America because she cannot find it in the app store. Is it unthinkable that her ISP is blocking iPhone apps, or that Apple is restricting apps to non-US countries?
The app in question is Textfree with Voice.
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: Where Airbus babies hatch
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AFAIK, the SMS billing model is completely different in the US from the entire rest of the world.
The shared-cost model makes possible apps that cannot work anywhere else.
In other cases, technology licensing agreements and local laws may preclude distribution.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Chicago, Bang! Bang!
Status:
Online
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I wonder what happens if you gift them the app...
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Dec 1999
Location: Tampa, Florida
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S.H.,
I didn't understand your answer at all.
Technologically, an iPhone user outside of the US would get the app, get a US phone number and pay for minutes of voice, and pay for the TXTs by watching ads.
Is Apple's walled garden also guarded by foreign telcos?
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: Where Airbus babies hatch
Status:
Offline
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The SMS billing model works quite differently outside the US, and any company that makes their money working off the US model would need to build a completely different kind of business outside of the US - meaning a completely different app, with a completely different approach.
I'm not sure how you gauge the regional interest of Europeans in an app that sends free SMS to American cellphones, but I assure you that outside of text spamming, it's quite near zero.
P.S.: Such apps *do* exist outside of the US.
(Last edited by Spheric Harlot; Dec 24, 2010 at 03:33 PM.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Calgary
Status:
Offline
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I have found several apps that are only available to customers with US billing addresses ... even free apps such as the Nikon Learn & Explore app.
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Dec 1999
Location: Tampa, Florida
Status:
Offline
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Is this by the will of the developer. Please, anyone who know this as a fact, post it here, unless it goes against NDAs.
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