What is "facetime"

n. (alternative form of face time English)

FaceTime is a proprietary videotelephony product developed by Apple Inc. FaceTime Audio is an audio-only version.

Facetime is available on supported mobile devices that run on iOS and Macintosh computers that run 10.6.6 onwards. The video version of FaceTime supports any iOS device with a forward-facing camera and any Macintosh computer equipped with a FaceTime Camera, formerly known as an iSight Camera. FaceTime Audio is available on any iOS device that supports iOS 7 or newer, and any Macintosh with a forward-facing camera running 10.9.2 and later.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced FaceTime on June 7, 2010, in conjunction with the iPhone 4, in a keynote speech at the 2010 Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. Support for the fourth generation iPod Touch (the first model of iPod Touch equipped with cameras) was announced in conjunction with this device's release on September 8, 2010.

Apple bought the "FaceTime" name from FaceTime Communications, who changed their name to Actiance, Inc.

FaceTime for was announced on October 20, 2010 at the "Back to the Mac" Media event on the Apple Campus.

On February 24, 2011, FaceTime left beta and was listed in the Mac App Store for $0.99. Apple claims that it intended to provide the application free of charge, however, a provision of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act (2002) bars companies from providing an unadvertised new feature of an already-sold product without enduring "onerous accounting measures." The free beta is still available for download from the Apple servers. Facetime is included free in OS X from (10.7) onwards.

On March 2, 2011, FaceTime support was announced for the newly introduced iPad 2, which gained forward- and rear-facing cameras.

AT&T allowed customers to use FaceTime as long as they were tiered, but blocked the application from working for customers with unlimited data plans. They were brought before the Federal Communications Commission for net neutrality violations.

On May 2011, it was found that FaceTime would work seamlessly over 3G on all iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch models that supported it. Even though FaceTime worked only over 3G at that time, it now supports 4G LTE calls on networks all over the world, availability being limited to operators' GSM plans.