Can you imagine the nerd fanboy rage if this case was reversed? But I guess the same could be said about pretty much anything related to Apple.
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Apple Being Sued Over Phone-Switching iMessage Issue
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Can you imagine the nerd fanboy rage if this case was reversed? But I guess the same could be said about pretty much anything related to Apple.
Often, when you send the message to a former-iPhone number from iMessage, it will instantly say "sent". However, it isn't sent. It is in Apple purgatory forever. It is never sent as an SMS. Cleaning the sender's cache sometimes helps; sometimes doesn't.
Now, it's also quite interesting when sending an iMessage from one iPhone to another. If the receiving iPhone is out of data range, iMessage will fail over and send as SMS (if selected). It knows the phone is unreachable via iMessage, and quickly solves the problem. However, if you try the same thing with an unregistered non-iphone number, it will either say "sent" immediately, or eventually appear as a "message failed". You're really lucky if you get "message failed" since at least you're aware your message was never actually sent.
All of this tells me Apple clearly knows when a phone number is reachable as an iMessage -- if it can't deliver it to a registered iPhone or other iMessage device, it defaults to SMS (if selected). That also suggests to me that the code to fix this is already mostly or totally available, and I believe they have chosen to ignore this bug for three years as a way of penalizing switchers. Believe it or not, I'm a fanboy and this "bug" has made me so angry I'm thrilled I no longer use an iPhone.
I spent over a month trying every published solution to this problem. The bottom line is there is no universal solution. If you leave the iPhone, your SMS phone number is hijacked by Apple, and maybe some portion of iPhone users will actually be able to reach you -- many won't. After three months, I finally feel that most or all of my messages are coming through (I'm not about to turn iMessage back on to find out...). The first 3-4 weeks were hell. I'll never go through that again.
Now, it's also quite interesting when sending an iMessage from one iPhone to another. If the receiving iPhone is out of data range, iMessage will fail over and send as SMS (if selected). It knows the phone is unreachable via iMessage, and quickly solves the problem. However, if you try the same thing with an unregistered non-iphone number, it will either say "sent" immediately, or eventually appear as a "message failed". You're really lucky if you get "message failed" since at least you're aware your message was never actually sent.
All of this tells me Apple clearly knows when a phone number is reachable as an iMessage -- if it can't deliver it to a registered iPhone or other iMessage device, it defaults to SMS (if selected). That also suggests to me that the code to fix this is already mostly or totally available, and I believe they have chosen to ignore this bug for three years as a way of penalizing switchers. Believe it or not, I'm a fanboy and this "bug" has made me so angry I'm thrilled I no longer use an iPhone.
I spent over a month trying every published solution to this problem. The bottom line is there is no universal solution. If you leave the iPhone, your SMS phone number is hijacked by Apple, and maybe some portion of iPhone users will actually be able to reach you -- many won't. After three months, I finally feel that most or all of my messages are coming through (I'm not about to turn iMessage back on to find out...). The first 3-4 weeks were hell. I'll never go through that again.
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You and the 19 people who up voted you should try and express yourself better instead of using the word "retarded."
The sheer number of people who lack the ability to comprehensively understand what they have read worries me. This is a simple issue, and yes, it is an issue for both current iPhone owners as well as past iPhone owners.
My friend switched from iPhone to any other phone in existence. I send him a message from my iPhone and by all accounts on my end the message was received. Surprise, he never got it. I now know to make sure it sends to him as sms, and the problem for me texting him goes away. Now, as this is someone I see regularly it isn't a huge issue, but what about everyone else who currently uses an iPhone and attempts to text my friend? The message is sent "successfully" and the sender assumes my friend has ignored it. Maybe the issue is worse for the friend who left Apple, maybe it's worse for the user sending a message through their iPhone. Who cares? The fact is there is an issue and only Apple can solve it as it clearly resides in the iMessage program...
My friend switched from iPhone to any other phone in existence. I send him a message from my iPhone and by all accounts on my end the message was received. Surprise, he never got it. I now know to make sure it sends to him as sms, and the problem for me texting him goes away. Now, as this is someone I see regularly it isn't a huge issue, but what about everyone else who currently uses an iPhone and attempts to text my friend? The message is sent "successfully" and the sender assumes my friend has ignored it. Maybe the issue is worse for the friend who left Apple, maybe it's worse for the user sending a message through their iPhone. Who cares? The fact is there is an issue and only Apple can solve it as it clearly resides in the iMessage program...
Can you even actually use SMS/MMS from an iPad mini somehow? That's not really the issue here.
You're right. My bad. It's not like there's other complaints on MacRumors daily. How could I have possibly missed it?
Oh come on, Steve Jobs' Apple was the one who said 'you're holding it wrong' about the signal issues.
I don't know why this is dragging on for so long but I do know that it's something people have been experiencing for awhile and Apple should be moving faster to get it resolved.
Users use iMessage then switch phones to something that isn't from Apple and then messages from other Apple users that should now be sent as SMS to them are still being sent as iMessage by Apple.
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Sure, but the issue is that messages sent by other Apple users to you should be sent as SMS now instead of iMessage as Apple keeps on trying to do.
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Well, exactly. Then why bring up the point yourself about not seeing any complaints about and how that explains/justifies something? Seems like this statement from you nullifies that other statement that you made.You're right. My bad. It's not like there's other complaints on MacRumors daily. How could I have possibly missed it?
This thread is killing me. For those that still aren't seeing it, let me explain why this is a big deal for not only ex-customers but current customers as well.
I have a friend whose iPhone was recently stolen. It wasn't insured, and he didn't have enough cash to get a new one, so he's back on an old flip phone now.
We usually plan via text to hang out every week or two, so all of a sudden he seemed to drop off the face of the planet, not responding to any of my texts. I had no idea his phone was stolen, so I had absolutely no reason to assume these messages weren't getting through. A week or two later he called and let me know that it appeared as if all texts sent to him were vanishing into thin air if they were sent from people with iPhones who texted with him previously.
This is obviously a problem for me, as well as for my friend – and people lose their phones, have them stolen, broken, and cannot afford to replace them – so they have to switch to a different device. They don't have the opportunity to turn off iMessage, or any of the other phone-specific fixes that people are suggesting. On the other end, even though the iPhone/iMessage people do still have the ability to send as SMS, many casual users don't even know that feature exists. If there were people attempting to contact him that he doesn't talk to regularly, he would have no idea they attempted to get in touch unless they call. As we all know, this doesn't always happen with casual acquaintances or business connections.
Folks rely on texting so heavily these days both in their personal life and business, having your system interfere with their commutation – especially when you have no idea messages are being lost – is a real issue and worth being sued over if Apple has really been aware of it since 2011 and unwilling or unable to provide a suitable fix.
I have a friend whose iPhone was recently stolen. It wasn't insured, and he didn't have enough cash to get a new one, so he's back on an old flip phone now.
We usually plan via text to hang out every week or two, so all of a sudden he seemed to drop off the face of the planet, not responding to any of my texts. I had no idea his phone was stolen, so I had absolutely no reason to assume these messages weren't getting through. A week or two later he called and let me know that it appeared as if all texts sent to him were vanishing into thin air if they were sent from people with iPhones who texted with him previously.
This is obviously a problem for me, as well as for my friend – and people lose their phones, have them stolen, broken, and cannot afford to replace them – so they have to switch to a different device. They don't have the opportunity to turn off iMessage, or any of the other phone-specific fixes that people are suggesting. On the other end, even though the iPhone/iMessage people do still have the ability to send as SMS, many casual users don't even know that feature exists. If there were people attempting to contact him that he doesn't talk to regularly, he would have no idea they attempted to get in touch unless they call. As we all know, this doesn't always happen with casual acquaintances or business connections.
Folks rely on texting so heavily these days both in their personal life and business, having your system interfere with their commutation – especially when you have no idea messages are being lost – is a real issue and worth being sued over if Apple has really been aware of it since 2011 and unwilling or unable to provide a suitable fix.
I have an iPhone 5 and this is the most frustrating problem. My sister lost her job and had to replace her out of warranty iPhone 4 that had had problems picking up a phone signal ever since she first got it. The only thing she could afford based on the monthly rentals for the contract was an HTC One (which also gave her a free tablet pos). Ever since then I have had significant problems texting her.
Apple really needs to fix this; if the Contacts app on the iPhone has an option to mark a phone number as an iPhone or not, why do Apple not use that existing info to control whether the message goes as text or iMessage?? It should be simple to do.
I think the Lawsuit is a good idea.
Apple really needs to fix this; if the Contacts app on the iPhone has an option to mark a phone number as an iPhone or not, why do Apple not use that existing info to control whether the message goes as text or iMessage?? It should be simple to do.
I think the Lawsuit is a good idea.
I too have fallen victim of this when I wanted to give the HTC One M8 a shot. Let's just say the girlfriend was not too pleased that day.
This will be really hard for Apple engineers to fix.
the problem people are having is not stupid and no one is calling people stupid for complaining... The Lawsuit is stupid... why does anyone deserve monetary gain for this issue? everyone wants money for anything... and as others have pointed out, apple is not responsible for you discontinuing use of imessages and not notifying people trying to contact you. If i close my gmail account and open a new email account with yahoo, can i sue google when they dont forward my emails to my new email address?
a few years back a friend of mine who never had an iphone got a new phone (not an iphone) and for some reason my iphone decided to change the label for it to an iphone and started sending imessages... i just simply updated the contact and was able to start sending as text messages... do i deserve compensation? or does he? no....
at that points out what is even further stupid about this lawsuit, the person suing SHOULD be the people still sending messages as imessages incorrectly as it is their devices with the "Bug", but no this lawsuit is by someone who now has no connection to Apple and apple has no responsibility to forward messages for...
As technology gets more complex, people need to pay more attention to settings, i think everyone assumes devices should read their minds and know their preference...
I don't think it should be. They have a fairly straightforward way of disabling Activation Lock via disabling Find My iPhone or removing the phone from your iCloud settings using icloud.com. Something like this really shouldn't be any more complex than that.
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How about a lawsuit primarily as a means to give a bigger/noticeable push to Apple to actually deal with this problem once and for all, since clearly they haven't, and they haven't for years it would seem.
What about the networks?
Shouldn't the carriers play a part in this as well? They know before Apple if a user leaves iOS for Android.
Plus yeah this is annoying but don't think it's "lawsuit worthy". Sorry you know you're switching why don't you call Apple tech support and fix it yourself? Just another classic case of the lack of personal responsibly and the p**sification of Americans.
Shouldn't the carriers play a part in this as well? They know before Apple if a user leaves iOS for Android.
Plus yeah this is annoying but don't think it's "lawsuit worthy". Sorry you know you're switching why don't you call Apple tech support and fix it yourself? Just another classic case of the lack of personal responsibly and the p**sification of Americans.
Personally i dont think this has been willfully done. And i honestly dont believe Apple just "stopped" working on the problem. When you buy a cellphone you agree to the terms and conditions, which does not guarantee 100% reliability obviously, otherwise everyone could sue Apple for any little problem. I guess this is a delicate issue and up to the judges to decide if Apple is to be charged for not fixing the problem "fast enough" or not offering a fix at all. The reason i quoted this as retarded is because the user automatically assumes that Apple's service iMessages MUST have a functioning forwarding mechanism (to SMS). The service runs over the DATA plan and not over the TEXT (SMS plan), therefor, in my opinion, it excludes Apple's liability for failing to deliver a functioning 'trigger' from DATA to SMS. iMessages remains a service just like WhatsApp or KIK messenger etc., that rely on a data plan. If a person sends a TEXT to another person, he must make sure his TEXT is actually an SMS. I really dont see that Apple can be made accountable for failing to forward a DATA text to an SMS text
i never implied it had been willfully done but if it takes 3 years to fix then its certainly not being willfully fixed.
sorry if its not apples to fix or make sure it reverts back to text then whos is it and what means do they have? its apple that changes things to suit their imessage platform for new customers but leaves departing customers hanging.
And there's a few other things I would like to have them fix that they haven't touched in years in OS X. Should I sue them as well to put a match under their butt?
No court would give any monetary value to a person suing Apple over this. Maybe transferring iMessages is not necessarily a priority for Apple, especially since one is leaving the company to go to competitor. Ever thought about that?
I would love to see Samsung help customers migrate from a Samsung phone to an Apple phone.
Depending on the issue an its impact, go for it. Seems like an issue with messages not being sent correctly to people without anyone really realizing it is a rather important one when it comes to fundamental things that the cellular/phone industry provides in general and especially today.
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What can carriers do about something that Apple controls? I mean it would be nice for carriers to put pressure on Apple to get this right once and for all, but beyond that, as far as providing an actual fix, there's not that much they can do about that specifically it would seem.
No one is asking apple to help them migrate their stuff to android. But it would be nice if people could get their messages after switching to android. Not too much to ask. If the shoe were on the other foot you'd be blasting Google for making this mistake and how they are trying to trap android users.
Apple knew of this problem and did nothing to fix it.
They don't need to. It's 1000x easier to migrate your stuff from Android to iOS than vice versa.