Facebook Places Silently Launches In Ireland

After numerous suggestions that Facebook Places was to launch in Ireland, the service has silently gone live in the country, allowing Facebook users to start checking-in to businesses and locations added to the social network.

We recently attended a Facebook event where the company announced it would be rolling out Facebook Places Deals to five European countries. At the event, Facebook representatives noted that the company was working on releasing the service to all regions, today it seems is the start of the gradual roll out.

To take advantage of the service, Irish Android and iPhone smartphone owners can access the Places icon within the smartphone application. Utilising its location-based technology, the app will list local businesses and locations added to the app, allowing users to check-in. In the future the service will grow to include Places Deals, which are currently only available in the U.S, the UK, Germany, Spain, France and Italy and now Canada.

We aren’t aware of an official Facebook announcement, simply noticing a flood of Irish Twitter users posting messages of its availability:

Facebook Places will position Facebook alongside other location-based services like Foursquare and Gowalla, services that haven’t enjoyed as much popularity in Europe as they have in North America. Facebook will hope that Places will encourage its millions of users to engage with its location service, potentially increasing revenue for companies that partner with them in the future via its Deals platform.