A simple search yielded this:
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Apple Puts a Stop to Beeper Mini's iMessage for Android Feature
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I am of an age (82) when I remember that we Apple folk were trying to take down the big guy (Microsoft) when Apple was I. The doldrums. What goes around comes around—and I an an Apple developer with an exclusively Apple family (including my kids in Germany and Japan). As the French say, the more things change, the more they remain the same.
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That used to be the case, but it’s no longer.
Now, when you try to activate iMessage, it’ll prompt you to log into your Apple ID or create one.
They’ve changed this because of spam concerns, there are still a few exceptions possible but those mainly revolve around MDM certificates combined with some other factors.
Don’t take my word for it though, here it is from Apple themselves:
What you referenced is not applicable.A simple search yielded this:
I would think any jury would find that using made-up serial numbers to prentent to be an authorized client would fall under at least one of those statues in the US.18 U.S. Code § 1030 - Fraud and related activity in connection with computers
www.law.cornell.edu
Oh wow. I guess I completely missed that change. I suppose it makes sense. Does raise some eyebrows for me about what beeper was doing in this case.
What are you on about?
The other messaging apps were widely adopted due to a lack of unlimited SMS/MMS plans by non-US carriers. iMessage was relatively late to the game.
Android users who want a blue bubble, simply purchase an iPhone. Problem solved.
But they can’t change the ugly layout of android and icons and flash roms to make their Os better if they switch to iOS lmao.
The beeper fans are like a cult. It’s actually almost scary how these guys have a ha**on for trying to be beat apple just for a blue bubble.
It’s not even google. It’s the android fanboys lol. It’s cultish
Android users (a,k,a iPhone haters) want you to think they are using iPhone. xàxàxà!
What are you talking about? This service didn't enable two non iPhone users to communicate through iMessage. It only enabled a non iPhone user to communicate with an iPhone user through iMessage. That means an Apple user was always in the equation as intended.
Android users do not see these bubbles, why should they care? What's missing in this discussion is the fact that by disablin Beeper Minis Apple deprives its customers of being able to send/receive high quality media to/from their walled garden (at least with iMessage). In the end, this move hurts iPhone owners.
First, there is no "we" because your experience is not the same as everyone's experience.
To answer your question, the reason people reference lock-in is because many people do in fact feel locked in. This is something Apple has done by design as they themselves have directly said so.
The Epic Apple lawsuit lead to a lot of emails being released including this 2011 email from Steve Jobs when he indicated the cloud should be used to “tie all of our products together, so we further lock customers into our ecosystem.” That's a directive straight from the top.
Apple considered bringing iMessage to Android in 2013 but again. They identified lock-in as more advantageous than interoperability.
You may not feel locked in but many do because that is how the system was designed.
The reason why people feel "locked in" is because that is a superior experience that can't be readily exported outside of the Apple ecosystem. You all make it sound like users are being caged against their will, but the reality is, if a service or feature wasn't any good, people wouldn't be staying in the first place.
The secret to the Apple ecosystem is that Apple isn't selling me a product or a service. It's selling me an experience made possible by their control over hardware, software and services. And as a user moves deeper into the ecosystem, and as they interact with more Apple hardware, software and services, the number of these unique experiences increases. An experience that one can't really find elsewhere, and that's why we stay.
Because it's no longer enough for the competition to simply come up with a smartphone that takes slightly better photos or a tablet with a slightly better screen, or headphones with better noise cancellation. Instead, they have to come up with a better experience than those found in the Apple ecosystem, and the implication is that you need your own ecosystem. I won't say it's impossible, but it would be an insurmountable feat for pretty much every other company today.
the person you're defending claimed it was -impossible- for android and iphone users to communicate. no one has ever actually had this problem. i can send a message, picture, link, voice recording, phone call, google chat, facetime, skype, discord, slack, everything you could imagine. how is that 'impossible to communicate?'
no one is talking about 'the world moving to IM'. here nor there, get lost.
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Entire world uses WhatsApp. They must be doing something right.
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Yet Apple is so insecure it needs iMessage aa a system seller.
That is exactly my point. I like Android more than iOS and if the other person has a contrarian choice, than due to Apple's shenanigans, it's virtually impossible to communicate.
Apple locking down iMessage to their own users is not going to get me to go out and buy an iPhone. I like Android specific reasons which iOS does not have and a messaging app is not going to change that
Group chats completely break down when iOS and Android users try to communicate. All images are sent as blurry photos from the 1990s. No typing indicators. No ability to leave chat.
iPhone users can't send messages over WiFi.
On top of this, Apple purposely has Android messages displayed as white text on a green background as they know it makes them harder to read
Apple is actively disrupting the experience here.
We shouldn’t be asking for Apple to dumb-down to the way Android works, we should be asking for Android phone manufacturers to unskill to Apple’s level (a proper bespoke ecosystem with a range of devices that all work well together). None of them seem to want to do it.
