9/05/2013
So Apple has somehow screwed the pooch when recognising your region settings on your iPhone:
I have an iPhone from the UK (from Vodafone, to be exact). It is unlocked and I am currently using a T-Mobile (appears as EE) SIM in it--that's a UK carrier.
I have switched my iTunes account from the US to the UK, so that I could download UK-only apps such as BBC iPlayer and 4oD.
My phone thinks it's not in the UK whenever it is on 3G. Wifi, no problem, but when it's on 3G it thinks it's not in the UK and so I can't watch or download iPlayer stuff or anything else that geolocates to the UK.
I took the phone to the Genius Bar today to have them sort it out. I could have sworn I did the restore and continued having this problem, but it would seem not. They restored my phone anew and those apps started working again. Wonderful, right?
Well, a full refresh means I lose everything, at least temporarily--my texts are gone, my contacts are gone, I have nothing. So at some point I'm going to have to link my phone back up to my proper accounts, including iCloud, Photostream and all that fun stuff.
I've just gotten home and restored from the backup I took immediately prior to leaving my flat this morning. Guess what? Two things:
1. My phone now no longer thinks it's in the UK when on 3G--in other words, my original problem has been restored.
2. Since my iTunes account is now/currently associated with the UK store, all of my US-purchased apps don't appear in my library. I own them, sure, and if I try to download/purchase them on the computer or iPhone, I'm pretty sure it recognises that and doesn't charge me. The problem is, when I restored the iPhone, it only restored the 30 or so apps I have from the UK store. It's like the other 100-150 apps I had purchased and installed whilst on the US store have ceased to exist. Brilliant.
I'm really frustrated with this way of doing things. Somehow, within my backup, there is an apparently-critical, core setting that records my region. It's so embedded that even when I'm physically in the UK, with UK phone, on a UK network with a UK SIM, my phone still thinks I'm not in the UK.
Secondly, Apple's decision to split the iTunes Store into different world regions, without implementing a way for accounts that change stores (e.g. someone permanently relocates from one country to another, a.k.a. ME), means that my previous purchases elsewhere are temporarily unavailable and I will have to go through an extremely manual process (as in downloading the missing apps individually) to restore all of those purchases. Otherwise they're invisible, forgotten relics from back when I was in the US.
I will now attempt to delete all apps from my iTunes library and re-add them, but I am not super optimistic it will sort out my problems.
I have an iPhone from the UK (from Vodafone, to be exact). It is unlocked and I am currently using a T-Mobile (appears as EE) SIM in it--that's a UK carrier.
I have switched my iTunes account from the US to the UK, so that I could download UK-only apps such as BBC iPlayer and 4oD.
My phone thinks it's not in the UK whenever it is on 3G. Wifi, no problem, but when it's on 3G it thinks it's not in the UK and so I can't watch or download iPlayer stuff or anything else that geolocates to the UK.
I took the phone to the Genius Bar today to have them sort it out. I could have sworn I did the restore and continued having this problem, but it would seem not. They restored my phone anew and those apps started working again. Wonderful, right?
Well, a full refresh means I lose everything, at least temporarily--my texts are gone, my contacts are gone, I have nothing. So at some point I'm going to have to link my phone back up to my proper accounts, including iCloud, Photostream and all that fun stuff.
I've just gotten home and restored from the backup I took immediately prior to leaving my flat this morning. Guess what? Two things:
1. My phone now no longer thinks it's in the UK when on 3G--in other words, my original problem has been restored.
2. Since my iTunes account is now/currently associated with the UK store, all of my US-purchased apps don't appear in my library. I own them, sure, and if I try to download/purchase them on the computer or iPhone, I'm pretty sure it recognises that and doesn't charge me. The problem is, when I restored the iPhone, it only restored the 30 or so apps I have from the UK store. It's like the other 100-150 apps I had purchased and installed whilst on the US store have ceased to exist. Brilliant.
I'm really frustrated with this way of doing things. Somehow, within my backup, there is an apparently-critical, core setting that records my region. It's so embedded that even when I'm physically in the UK, with UK phone, on a UK network with a UK SIM, my phone still thinks I'm not in the UK.
Secondly, Apple's decision to split the iTunes Store into different world regions, without implementing a way for accounts that change stores (e.g. someone permanently relocates from one country to another, a.k.a. ME), means that my previous purchases elsewhere are temporarily unavailable and I will have to go through an extremely manual process (as in downloading the missing apps individually) to restore all of those purchases. Otherwise they're invisible, forgotten relics from back when I was in the US.
I will now attempt to delete all apps from my iTunes library and re-add them, but I am not super optimistic it will sort out my problems.
