No iChat on iPhone?

[bbplayer5]

Is that true? If so.. wow.. major issue with this.

[neven]

As far as we've seen, nope... It sucks, I agree.

Perhaps it would have been a little confusing/redundant to have the iChat-like SMS client there, and an IM client. Still, I almost never SMS and I'd prefer it if the SMS icon on the home screen actually took me to iChat. Perhaps there will be some integration of the two, so you use the same client for both? I doubt it, but it would be nice.

I guess we'll have to use web-based IM clients (like Meebo)...

[Thanatoast]

It occurs to me that if you have SMS, and it looks like iChat, and it *acts* like iChat...what do you need "iChat" for? Text messaging is the same regardless of system. The only substantive difference between AIM and MS is the software front end - they both do exactly the same thing. So the only differnce on the iPhone will be entering people's phone numbers instead of their AIM handles. And with Apple working the magic, you can probably just press on their picture, no fuss, no muss.

[bbplayer5]

Guess ill stick with my blackberry for now.

[neven]

It occurs to me that if you have SMS, and it looks like iChat, and it *acts* like iChat...what do you need "iChat" for? Text messaging is the same regardless of system. The only substantive difference between AIM and MS is the software front end - they both do exactly the same thing. So the only differnce on the iPhone will be entering people's phone numbers instead of their AIM handles. And with Apple working the magic, you can probably just press on their picture, no fuss, no muss.

Errr....

SMS costs money unless you have an unlimited texting plan, which most of my friends don't.

SMS is incomparably slower.

It's impossible to carry on a long, quick conversation using SMS if you're using a regular-keypad phone, which is what most people have.

There is no "online status notifier" in SMS. You send messages into a black hole.

Do I even need to go on? SMS is a completely different thing.

[bbplayer5]

How the hell could apple just not put this on the phone? Ive never seen something so stupid.

[neven]

Some possibilities:

1) It's there, it just wasn't finished in time for the demo, and since it will look basically the same as SMS they didn't need to show it off (doubtful, since SMS is prominently featured in the home screen's "dock" and iChat isn't)

2) It was not a high priority so it will not be available at launch, but might be added later

3) Steve decided that we didn't need it :)

[MacBoobsPro]

Er... :confused: ... why do you need 'instant' messaging when you have a phone in your hand?

:confused:

[neven]

Er... :confused: ... why do you need 'instant' messaging when you have a phone in your hand?

:confused:

Ok, how about we turn our brains on...

Why do people use IM at all? Because you can chat with online acquintances whose phone numbers you don't have. Because you can chat with people who can't talk on the phone at the moment (they're at work, duh). Because you can carry on 5 conversations at once. Because you can appear wittier in text than over the phone.

Do you think the main reason millions of people IM is that they don't have a phone nearby?

[MacBoobsPro]

Ok, how about we turn our brains on...

Why do people use IM at all? Because you can chat with online acquintances whose phone numbers you don't have. Because you can chat with people who can't talk on the phone at the moment (they're at work, duh). Because you can carry on 5 conversations at once. Because you can appear wittier in text than over the phone.

Do you think the main reason millions of people IM is that they don't have a phone nearby?

No, its because its free. Except that if it was on the iPhone it would cost you. So for the sake of being charged for Instant messaging when you already have SMS (exactly the same but slower) you may as well call them. Thats why iChat (as we know it) is not on the iPhone. :rolleyes:

[neven]

No, its because its free. Except that if it was on the iPhone it would cost you. So for the sake of being charged for Instant messaging when you already have SMS (exactly the same but slower) you may as well call them. Thats why iChat is not on the iPhone. :rolleyes:

I don't think you could have the situation any more upside-down.

SMS usually costs money. IM would not cost anything if it were simply part of your data plan. Do you have any idea how little information is transmitted when you IM vs. surfing the web? A reasonable-size webpage equals hours of IM. I'm bringing that up because iPhone data plans will either be unlimited, or very generous - otherwise it would be pointless to use the web on it at all (since you're downloading full, desktop-size webpages, not tiny little WAPs). IM would be a drop in the ocean of your data plan usage.

How on earth is SMS the same as IM? I don't even want to waste my time explaining the difference any more - it's like saying email is the same thing as a message board.

[Rhema]

I think its because the feature wasn't finished. its become pretty obvious that a lot of things on the iphone weren't complete when the showed it, the calender being one thing, since all they had was JPEG there. Mabye they didn't want to include it because it was to big of an application to have on there but not talk about. Im still hoping for the "whole screen is a camera" idea to show up in it.

[Gee]

I don't think you could have the situation any more upside-down.

SMS usually costs money. IM would not cost anything if it were simply part of your data plan. Do you have any idea how little information is transmitted when you IM vs. surfing the web? A reasonable-size webpage equals hours of IM. I'm bringing that up because iPhone data plans will either be unlimited, or very generous - otherwise it would be pointless to use the web on it at all (since you're downloading full, desktop-size webpages, not tiny little WAPs). IM would be a drop in the ocean of your data plan usage.

How on earth is SMS the same as IM? I don't even want to waste my time explaining the difference any more - it's like saying email is the same thing as a message board.

I think the point here is that Apple has designed the phone with the carrier in mind, not just the consumer.

Why no ichat? Because it would eat into AT&T's revenues from SMS.

Why no voice over IP? Because it would reduce revenue from standard calls.

Why no mp3 ringtones? Because AT&T want to sell you some.

Etc.

[neven]

I think the point here is that Apple has designed the phone with the carrier in mind, not just the consumer.

Well put. Still, I would've rather had the messaging cost worked into the data plan. Perhaps they would have had to raise the data plan cost by a whole lot to match their typical SMS revenue.

I predict a nice web-based IM client optimized for iPhone. Actually, I predict a number of websites offering just that - iPhone-optimized functionality not available on iPhone itself.

[MacBoobsPro]

I don't think you could have the situation any more upside-down.

SMS usually costs money. IM would not cost anything if it were simply part of your data plan. Do you have any idea how little information is transmitted when you IM vs. surfing the web? A reasonable-size webpage equals hours of IM. I'm bringing that up because iPhone data plans will either be unlimited, or very generous - otherwise it would be pointless to use the web on it at all (since you're downloading full, desktop-size webpages, not tiny little WAPs). IM would be a drop in the ocean of your data plan usage.

How on earth is SMS the same as IM? I don't even want to waste my time explaining the difference any more - it's like saying email is the same thing as a message board.

If its part of your data plan then its costing money :rolleyes: also think about how many msgs you will be sending in one iChat session. Yes the data per msg is small but the total of a session could be quite large.

I'm not saying its not on the iPhone, I'm just giving my opinion why it may not be and you seem to be missing the point entirely.

[neven]

I'm not saying its not on the iPhone, I'm just giving my opinion why it may not be and you seem to be missing the point entirely.

Right... That's what implying that calling is a replacement for IM meant. Do you really think people use IM rather than their phone because it's free? You know, those people who have landline phones right next to their computers?

I'm currently carrying on IM conversations with four people. I only have the phone numbers of two of them, and I can't call those two because they're at work. How would "having a phone in my hand" be helpful in this situation?

[notsofatjames]

i have msn messenger on my phone, which i practically never use, even though its free. the main reason is that all my friends work during the day, and dont have access to IM, so i can text them, and when they do have access, im at home too so i can use my computer! The only rare occasion that its useful is when you dont have someones phone number, you can ask them for it.. but with the iPhone, i think id rather email. Id hate to be always connected to an IM network.

[Chris Bangle]

chat between iphone and imac



why not? Whats stopping them from doing this. NOTHING. so what im saying is that THIS IS ONE OF THE SECRET FEATURES

[Gee]

i have msn messenger on my phone, which i practically never use, even though its free. the main reason is that all my friends work during the day, and dont have access to IM, so i can text them, and when they do have access, im at home too so i can use my computer! The only rare occasion that its useful is when you dont have someones phone number, you can ask them for it.. but with the iPhone, i think id rather email. Id hate to be always connected to an IM network.

Messenger may well be 'free' - but you'll be paying stupid rates for the data when you use it.

It's not unusual to be charged 1p (2 cents) per kilobyte of data or more. That's £10 for a megabyte (isn't it?)!

[neven]

Messenger may well be 'free' - but you'll be paying stupid rates for the data when you use it.

It's not unusual to be charged 1p (2 cents) per kilobyte of data or more. That's £10 for a megabyte (isn't it?)!

If iPhone data plans are priced like that, iChat will be the least of our worries.

The NYTimes.com front page is 113 KB in size (that's including everything that needs to be loaded, included files, images, etc.) Apple.com is 34 KB.

I'm sure AT&T will charge a lot, but if it's that much, I can tell you that a wide-open-wallet iPhone fan like me will not be browsing any websites on it. I expect a fairly pricey unlimited-data plan.

[zap2]

No, its because its free. Except that if it was on the iPhone it would cost you. So for the sake of being charged for Instant messaging when you already have SMS (exactly the same but slower) you may as well call them. Thats why iChat (as we know it) is not on the iPhone. :rolleyes:

:rolleyes:

I don't use AIM because its free, inplace of using my phone. My house phone is one rate per month(so calling people every secound of my life wouldn't change the price!)...I use AIM because its fast, and if IM you, it because your online at the time. And why is AIM going to cost you? If u have the internet yes, but you wouldn't be paying for AIM, you'd be paying for broswering, google maps, AIM etc


Don't tell me what I use iChat/AIM for...you simply don't know

[vga4life]

If its part of your data plan then its costing money :rolleyes: also think about how many msgs you will be sending in one iChat session. Yes the data per msg is small but the total of a session could be quite large.


Messenger may well be 'free' - but you'll be paying stupid rates for the data when you use it.

It's not unusual to be charged 1p (2 cents) per kilobyte of data or more. That's £10 for a megabyte (isn't it?)!

Allow me to demonstrate how basic math is useful in everyday life. Let's look at the very worst possible case for wireless data and the best case for SMS:

Cheapest per-SMS cost offered by Cingular (3000 SMS for $25): $0.00833
Cingular's per-kilobyte rate for pay-as-you-go GPRS data in the US: $0.02

How big is an SMS? 160 bytes max, or 6.4 max-length SMS messages per kilobyte.

SMS cost per kilobyte in the best case: $0.05.

Let's make SMS look even better by accounting for IM data overhead: TCP/IP headers (40 bytes) + TOC2 protocol (~20 bytes for messages) = 60 bytes. So, to send 6.4 160-character instant messages requires about 1408 bytes, costing $0.0275.

No matter how much data you use in a session, even if you're paying per kilobyte, SMS is more expensive for chatting than IM over cellular data. Period. It's not even close.

The math gets even worse if you're paying per SMS - the average price per message in the US: $0.10. SMS cost per KB: $0.64 - about the most expensive data service this side of Iridium.

(Unlimited GPRS data from Cingular costs me $20/mo on my Treo, BTW. Nobody pays $0.02/KB on purpose.)

SMS is a money machine for the carriers, that's all. Apple is just bending you over for AT&T if they don't let you use iChat.

Fanboys need to get over it.

[Thanatoast]

Errr....

SMS costs money unless you have an unlimited texting plan, which most of my friends don't.

SMS is incomparably slower.

It's impossible to carry on a long, quick conversation using SMS if you're using a regular-keypad phone, which is what most people have.

There is no "online status notifier" in SMS. You send messages into a black hole.

Do I even need to go on? SMS is a completely different thing.
Some good points, countered:
SMS costs money, true. I would think that since the iPhone is a "web-enabled internet browsing device" they would have an "unlimited" data plan available. What's the point of Stevenoting a feature that's gonna cost 10 cents every time you use it? As for your friends, do they use iChat on their phones unlimited for free?

SMS is slower. Yes. No argument.

I don't know about you but I wouldn't carry on long conversations with people on chat, either. And how would having iChat solve the 9-key problem?

You're sending messages into a black hole inasmuch as you're assuming someone's not carrying their mobile phone. The entire point of which is it's mobile and can go with you.

Is SMS different? Yes. Is it so strikingly different that it's completely unusable as a text-based communication system as you seem to imply? I think not.

[neven]

I don't know about you but I wouldn't carry on long conversations with people on chat, either. And how would having iChat solve the 9-key problem?

If the other party is using a computer, it's easier for them to type on a keyboard than on their phone. I'm assuming that it's also easier to type on iPhone than on a 9-key keypad, but I admit that's debatable.

You're sending messages into a black hole inasmuch as you're assuming someone's not carrying their mobile phone. The entire point of which is it's mobile and can go with you.

I see... That's why you always reach someone when you call them on their cellphone, right? IM advertises your online status along with a status message such as "busy", "at home", "at work", etc. There is nothing approximating this convenience in SMS or telephony.

Is SMS different? Yes. Is it so strikingly different that it's completely unusable as a text-based communication system as you seem to imply? I think not.

I never said it was unusable. But there is also no denying that IM is much, much better. My point was that if you want to argue along the lines of, "why would you IM when you have a phone", you first need to explain why millions of people with perfectly usable phones and cellphones choose to IM.

[Cormier6083]

Well... nobody said the iPhone was feature complete at Macworld ;)

[milhous]

in my view, having ichat on the iphone will be inevitable as IM and SMS do not directly compete with each other. if ichat isn't available on the iphone by the time it launches, it'll probably be available as a free software update as reported on this 25th april article regarding iphone and appletv updates:

http://www.macnn.com/articles/07/04/25/iphone.apple.tv.upgrades/

for apple not to offer ichat on the iphone would be a SERIOUS mistake.

[sprescott1974]

if IM and SMS were in such competetion then you wouldn't see IM on as many phones as you do. If you browse through the phones on Cingular's website, most of them are pre-loaded with or able to access AIM, Yahoo, and IRC. I see no reason Apple would let this slip by on their own phone. Especially with their new partnership with Yahoo for email (everyone will have a yahoo email address so they'll have a yahoo IM address as well).

[puckhead193]

would AIM express or other online chat clients work using safari on the iphone? i do see why not

[slffl]

Is that true? If so.. wow.. major issue with this.

It's called SMS. I'm sure they'll add iChat later. Don't buy it if it bothers you that much.

[bbplayer5]

Its called SMS? Are you a little... slow?

SMS = you pay per message, and can only have one conversation at a time, and its very slow.

IM = Instant conversation, more than one convo going, and uses DATA. Most people will be getting a data plan with their iphone, why not be able to use AIM for free?


Stupid move apple.

[g7by08believeit]

I must have misunderstood Cingular when I got my texting/data plan.

I was under the impression that AIM on my SLVR used the same texting plan.
each message costs the same as a SMS message would... it's just put together nicely via the AIM software.

i could be completely wrong, though.

[Pathetique]

Its called SMS? Are you a little... slow?

SMS = you pay per message, and can only have one conversation at a time, and its very slow.

IM = Instant conversation, more than one convo going, and uses DATA. Most people will be getting a data plan with their iphone, why not be able to use AIM for free?


Stupid move apple.

Did you not see how the SMS app looked exactly like iChat? And how there's such a thing as unlimited text plans, which may be part of some bundle? And how we don't know what is going to be on the iPhone as of yet?

I can't argue with the speed of IM of SMS, but jesus christ you're very willing to point out the doom of the iPhone before any of us have even used it. I've also never seen a phone fail because it didn't have iChat either...

[Gee]

"- iPhone users will not be able to conduct IM conversations with instant messaging users"

From the AT&T manual.

As was noted earlier in the post, just because it's feasible, doesn't mean it'll get included. AT&T get revenue from sms messages.

[BigEvan23]

As I wrote in an earlier post...

I believe that the document says that there won't be IM'ing available via SMS, ie. using text messaging to communicate with a buddy on your buddy list by texting the appropriate codes. This doesn't mean that there won't be the an iChat widget developed. At least thats how I understand it.

I personally can't see how they wouldnt include iChat for the iPhone (maybe not intially but they will at some point in the near future)

I have a feeling we'll see some more features tomorrow.

[Mammoth]

Maybe it's happening tomorrow? ;)

[suneohair]

Sorry, check this out:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/09/iphone-details-uncovered-in-sales-training-workbook/

Read the part that says:
"iPhone users will not be able to conduct IM conversations with instant messaging users"

[BigEvan23]

Sorry, check this out:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/09/iphone-details-uncovered-in-sales-training-workbook/

Read the part that says:
"iPhone users will not be able to conduct IM conversations with instant messaging users"

Sorry check this out:
If you actually read the section where it came from you'll see as I originally said, its only in reference to SMS and IM.

SMS Text Messaging (scan 1)

- SMS text message button shows how many new messages are waiting
- Threaded conversations
- Hear an audio alert for new messages
- Error correction and prevention in the keyboard. Only displayed when you need it.
- iPhone users will not be able to conduct IM conversations with instant messaging users
- Does not support MMS messaging for photos or videos

[Eric1285]

Hopefully when they open it up to third party software, someone will code up an instant messaging application for it. Who knows, we might even get Adium!