I think this is accurate as Google’s RCS IS different from the RCS adopted by China and elsewhere. In China, it’s just like SMS, supported by the carriers and any phone from smart to dumb can send RCS messages without any connection to any other party. In the US, since RCS requires google (because the carriers haven’t adopted it like SMS/MMS) if a data connection isn’t available, RCS will always fall back to SMS.
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Google Adds RCS Feature for Texting 911
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There’s likely a style guide for saying things just slightly wrong enough so that it doesn’t look intentional!So, just googling this, I get:
This seems to indicate that there will still be a difference between having a data plan and NOT having a data plan. Those carriers that have updated their infrastructure (like the ones in China), will of course support RCS without a data plan like they support SMS today. For those that don’t?…
Have you ever actually called 911/your emergency number? I have. I have had them incredibly inaccurately take down what I’m telling them. Wrong location/wrong situation. It’s basically a literally implementation of the children’s game telephone. Text is far more efficient and accurate.I don't know why you are getting downvoted - rcs is terrible and despite claimed being open it's owned by Google...
I was somewhat confused by how / when it would be useful but that sheds some light on it, and also explain why it's mostly a thing in the US
In my case when I need to contact emergency its EMERGENCY (someone is dying, I had an accidend) and most of the time call is more convenient to speak even barely then try to type.
Granted, it could be convenient to automatically send / signal my location somehow but still - call with voice - mooore convenient.
ah, yes... let's do nothing and allow Google shove their lacking propriety tech down our throats so they get even more control... Google should be highly regulated and split - not enabled even more!
The UK are switching off their 3G network in the next 12 months.
EE have said they will switch off their 2G network by end of decade.
So SMS/MMS is definitely coming to an end.
The UK are also saying “all mobiles will NOT have access to cellular data”. RCS requires cellular data. I mean, it’s entirely possible that the UK are saying “no messaging unless you have a data plan”, but that will piss off all their big corporate companies that are sending hundreds of millions of SMS messages.
There’s no information anywhere that defines how switching off 2G and 3G networks have anything to do with SMS. SMS hasn’t depended on GSM networks for quite some time.
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That is essentially what they are saying about 3G is you will need to buy a 4g mobile. So in turn that means by a certain point all mobiles will have access to mobile data & then in turn phase out the need for 2G because the majority of people will have mobile data phones.
features are available depending on which RCS protocol is adopted, what carriers decided to adopt, what Google will adopt as a fallback, whether Apple support these features. example: group audio calls. video calls, group text.
group text example: when a person leaves, certain carriers do send a notification that someone has left the chat.
rcs video call example: certain carriers support this natively and can only call certain other users.
confusing.
RCS protocol supports new features like leaving group text, video calling, etc...
carriers adopt certain features differently. one person might leave a group text and only some carriers will send out a notification that someone leaves a group. it's not standard
uh what?
because it's carrier dependent. makes everything confusing about it to the user.
if you thought SMS's attachment limitations (some carriers allow 2MB, some allow 1MB) was confusing, then RCS is 100x more confusing.
When contact is established, the clients on either end should perform a handshake to establish what features are available, then transact on the lowest common denominator. If they do not support, for example, video calls, the button to initiate should be disabled in that conversation. The UX examples are outlined in section R3-3 of the Universal Profile Service Definition Document. This capability-establishing handshake is conducted with every message sent.
If Google Messages is not doing that, then that's a Google issue, not an RCS issue. The spec itself is capable of accommodating inconsistencies in capability.
SMS is not going anywhere in the next 5-10 year at minimum. And highly unlikely to ever go away.
SMS is still a fall back for both RCS AND IMESSAGE. It’s why when the network is overloaded with congestion, I can still text.
It’s why when there is no data I can still send sms.
I know you rcs fanboys want to sing praises but not everyone wants it or cares.
And like I said I use iMessage so in the end I still won’t be using rcs.
And then we have this nice tidbit:
> Google has added support for end-to-end encryption for all chats using RCS in their own app, Google Messages. End-to-end encryption is not a feature of RCS specified by GSMA, instead deferring to the individual messaging clients to establish encryption.
It's the same story with taking over HTML specs and pushing their agenda and then making everything not their own just slightly less "compatible".
Ages ago they adopted XMPP, siphoned userbase, started adding incompatible extensions and when the remaining ecosystem was dried out they decided to close their XMPP server and move users to (one of) theirs IM attemps (which failed).
So yeah... quite weary here...
Darn! I do love living on this side of the pond, it's so nice, chill and quiet ;-)
The nice thing is interoperability. When initiating a conversation, the clients will handshake and negotiate availability of features.
Google's position is one of offering their services to carriers that are interested, and making their hubs interoperable with those that are not.
Moreover, it is very much in Google's interest to continue this trend of operability now that Apple is entering the picture.
As for E2E encryption, it's not like RCS messages are sent as plaintext. Everything is SSL encrypted between devices and deleted from the hub server upon delivery to the recipient, making it much more secure than SMS at least.
We already had/have XMPP which was interoperable and clients could negotiate features but now... we need(ed) another standard tied to mobile operators instead of relying just on data that would offer independence and ability to use the device that you want…
Besides... almost noone is using SMS anymore (apart from just one silly country) so the whole thing is just moot 🤷♂️
While looking for the stats I mostly found texts along the lines of: "Consumers have fully embraced SMS messaging from businesses – when used properly. 90% want to receive useful, promotional messages via text instead of only email. [6]" so yeah... RCS looks like glorified marketing tube more than a communication tool. EUs push to make IMs platform interoperable (fingers crossed for settling down on XMPP) is the right move. We don't need RCS and being tied to mobile operators…
Besides... almost noone is using SMS anymore (apart from just one silly country) so the whole thing is just moot 🤷♂️
While looking for the stats I mostly found texts along the lines of: "Consumers have fully embraced SMS messaging from businesses – when used properly. 90% want to receive useful, promotional messages via text instead of only email. [6]" so yeah... RCS looks like glorified marketing tube more than a communication tool. EUs push to make IMs platform interoperable (fingers crossed for settling down on XMPP) is the right move. We don't need RCS and being tied to mobile operators…
I'll wait to hear about platforms that use XMPP for interoperability. RCS has accomplished to build a larger customer base, largely thanks to Google's backing.
Sundar Pichai lives in that silly country. I wonder why he'd care so much about an issue that only exists where he lives.
Doesn't your quote indicate that people like and prefer SMS for that? RCS would enable that stuff to reach consumers faster, more reliably, and in higher quality. I like to think it would allow faster delivery of 2FA codes if nothing else.
RCS is interoperable by design, just like XMPP. While I'd like XMPP to win out as much as you would, one must consider that RCS has a much larger install base already.
One uncomfortable thought would be RCS interoperability requiring I give, for example, Twitter my phone number. Meta already requires it for their services (which I refuse to use). The upside would be the ability to contact people or businesses on social media that I don't use.
It's just an extension to RCS. RCS is made so you can add features to them on the client side. Both devices negotiate what features they support and use that as basis to communicate. Google has adopted 2 open protocols, Signal and Messaging Layer Security (MLS) for encryption so anyone who uses those open protocols can support E2EE with RCS on Android.
Google did not kill XMPP, it was doomed from the start with how fast the social media and messaging platforms were advancing. It was a temporary jump off point. Sure, features could have been adopted and added over time but that would be adding bloat to a legacy protocol akin to trying to add modern features to SMS and MMS. While XMPP is an instant messaging protocol, its functionality is outdated in today's messaging landscape. Modern messaging prioritizes message persistence, allowing retrieval even if the recipient is offline. XMPP did not support media as part of the protocol, it used an extension to establish a separate connection for the media transfer.
and it's not clear to the user *why* it's disabled. hence the confusion. who exactly is the person that is disabling the video call button for everyone?
similarly, do you show the UI for "no messages will be shown if a person leaves the text group" since one person on a particular carrier does not support leave messages? where do you put that UI to make it clear? every time a new group happens? will a 50 year old understand this?
if a group originally had video calls enabled, and suddenly one person that's added to the group disables video call, do you show UI that it's disabled? if not, won't that be confusing to the group as to why video group was disabled?
there is a ton of new states because it's up to the carrier to optin on these features.
it's bad enough a user already has to deal with SMS vs iMessage capabilities. Now you're throwing in RCS with their many different flavors of spec.
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RCS is currently being used by over 1 billion users, whatever confusion you think is happening is in your mind.
Google and Facebook and Skype back in the day, but corporate, capitalist greed took over
Do you know why Google is pushing so hard with RCS? Because in one country there is a battle for the souls... between green and blue fractions xD This is the sole and only reason Google is pushing it so hard. If it weren't for it (Android users are frowned upon) Google wouldn't give a flying F about interoperability, as it was shown time and time before.
As for platforms that (will have) to be interoperable, and may use XMPP for that - I was referring to EU's Digital Markets Act that will force big IMs to be interoperable. And XMPP seems like a natural fit. Alternatively Matrix could be adopted as protocol…
I don't live in that country and its silly problems are only cause for more 🍿 for me
Btw. Sudar Pichai cares only about Google bottom-line, but it's so cute that you think it's about "the issue" and interoperability xD
Yes, and it's from marketing company. In general (data pulled out of my arse): people HATE any form of marketing, unsolicited texts/mails and ads. Fortunately on this side of the pond it's become illegal to do that so any unsolicited messages/calls can be reported, so one is not bombarded with rubbish
[citation_needed]?
You are aware that XMPP is used in A LOT of places, even if you are not using it explicitly (game chats for example)? Darn, even Google and Apple used it for their PUSH notifications for a veeeery long time.
So... instead of trying to use interoperable protocol we cherish companies building their walled garden for profit and now somehow semi-open interoperable (but controlled completely by single entity virtually) is somehow different?
Google tried to do "good thing" back in the day and adopted XMPP and pushed hard but FB won the social media wars and once they got the traction and huge user-base they simply closed off XMPP bridge showing Google middle finger. Google tried their own IMs and constantly failed to get any traction (which became a meme at this point) so at one point they approached the issue of being cut off from messaging game from different angle…
Erm... hypocrisy? "XMPP is bad because requires extensions and negotiation" but "RCS is awesome because it has extensions that have to be negotiated"? xD
BS. Granted that it took time but for a long time already (more than a decade) those are solved issues - and there is protocol extension for all of them. Offline messages were never a problem and it was baked into protocol since the start... and then there were servers message archives and synchronising it to multiple devices (which RCS doesn't seem to have?)… Yes, media transfer is an extension but then again you can have either a solid base with extensions or a bloatware called Matrix that has just single spec that includes "the sink"...
[citation_needed]?
But please show explicit numbers that it's actually being used and not "being available".
4g mobile does NOT mean mobile data. In fact, the website I found defines there as being a difference between a 4g phone WITH data and a 4g phone WITHOUT data. And, as the carrier in question doesn’t support RCS, that 4g phone WITHOUT data will NOT have RCS enabled. And it certainly doesn’t say anything about that 4g without data phone being able to use RCS. I think you’ve connected some things in order to lead to a conclusion when a review of the data indicates there’s no connection at all.
Still doing some searching to see if I’m missing anything, but if you already have a link that says, in effect, “disabling 2g and 3g means ALL cellular phone plans will include data in the future”, it would save some time
What the regulator ofcom says if YOU want to continue to use mobile data you would need to buy a 4g mobile device.4g mobile does NOT mean mobile data. In fact, the website I found defines there as being a difference between a 4g phone WITH data and a 4g phone WITHOUT data. And, as the carrier in question doesn’t support RCS, that 4g phone WITHOUT data will NOT have RCS enabled. And it certainly doesn’t say anything about that 4g without data phone being able to use RCS. I think you’ve connected some things in order to lead to a conclusion when a review of the data indicates there’s no connection at all.
Still doing some searching to see if I’m missing anything, but if you already have a link that says, in effect, “disabling 2g and 3g means ALL cellular phone plans will include data in the future”, it would save some time
As I’ve already said previously the way the market is going more people won’t have basic button phones & they will become the minority & more people will have RCS on by default.
It’s quite simple really even 8 year olds have smartphones now a days it’s just the normal thing & most come with a data plan.
Right. While many individuals are getting SMS free, businesses have to pay to send messages to carrier customers. SMS is one cost and RCS is a higher cost. Since read receipts, typing indicators and group messaging isn’t required for “your pizza is ready” or “please confirm your appointment”, there aren’t any businesses willing to pay to send those messages and, as a result, carriers aren’t paying to update their infrastructure to support RCS.
ANY of the carriers using Google’s RCS means those customers require a data plan. Since businesses can’t depend on their customers having paid for a data plan, that’s just one more reason why businesses aren’t going to move from SMS which allows them to contact ALL customers with cellular phones, whether smartphones or dumb phones.