The EU seems keen to force Apple do what Apple doesn't want to. Maybe they could vote to force Apple to use secure RCS?
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Google Again Criticizes Apple for Not Adopting RCS for Messages App: 'Their Texting is Stuck in the 1990s'
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Whichever has the least impact on my cellular data usage I'll likely stick with. I don't see data plans getting any cheaper in Canada any time soon unfortunately.
Regardless of who makes what, what software is on what has to do with licensing restrictions, not developers' abilities. You've also lost focus on my point. Apple is not implementing or even acknowledging an improved standard for SMS. Instead, it is causing lots of undue stress on those without their products, especially the youth, by locking them into their platform or making them feel ostracized. SMS is outdated, with many limitations, and RCS addresses many shortcomings. Implementing this standard wouldn't cause them any undue burden and have minimal, if any, impact on their bottom line and is hardly akin to Nintendo licensing out Mario to whomever.
Why Apple’s iMessage Is Winning: Teens Dread the Green Text Bubble
The iPhone maker cultivated iMessage as a must-have blue-bubble texting tool for teens. Android users trigger a just-a-little-less-cool green bubble: “Ew, that’s gross.”
www.wsj.com
That isn’t an answer to my question, but if they did make such an app and it was as popular or more popular than iMessage, why wouldn’t they list it on the app store? There are tons of messaging apps there. If you’re suggesting that Apple integrate a Google service into its core iMessage app, then I agree, Apple is not going to do that.
Why would they do that? Is RCS widely supported by EU carriers? And until Google publishes a public API, they can’t do it.
It’s not relevant who is locked into what and how much it costs to do something. What is relevant is the ability for product manufacturers to develop value added functions of their choosing without interference.
I actually have doubts if RCS has much to do with it really, Google wants blue bubbles (which RCS would not do I believe) because young people overwhelmingly prefer Apple products. Google is perfectly able to make a good messaging app (and have) if they want to. Google chat is on the Apple App Store, and there’s no reason that a secure RCS app couldn’t be on the Apple App Store either. But that isn’t what they want, they want Android messages to be blue in iMessage. They won’t get Apple to integrate a Google service into iMessage.
Here’s a quote from C. Scott Brown at Android Authority that‘s worth keeping in mind:
’I will readily concede that iMessage users need to have some sort of signifier that a person in their chat does not use an iPhone. The green bubble feature might not be the most aesthetically pleasing solution, but it’s simple and effective. If it didn’t exist, iPhone users might get frustrated when they repeatedly attempt to use an iMessage feature and find it doesn’t work correctly.’
Here’s a quote from C. Scott Brown at Android Authority that‘s worth keeping in mind:
’I will readily concede that iMessage users need to have some sort of signifier that a person in their chat does not use an iPhone. The green bubble feature might not be the most aesthetically pleasing solution, but it’s simple and effective. If it didn’t exist, iPhone users might get frustrated when they repeatedly attempt to use an iMessage feature and find it doesn’t work correctly.’
Let me explain the actual point …. Cook’s reply was arrogant, snarky, and unresponsive.
I hate to admit it, but when I see a green bubble I kinda get an eye twitch. I know it’s terrible…..but Apple knew what they were doing when they made the bubbles green ( basically the SAME color as the lil android dude. ) 🤣
Googles proprietary messaging efforts have nothing to do with it. RCS is the industry standard protocol that has replaced the 30 year old SMS/MMS default that Apple continues to cling to on iPhones. Jealousy is another straw man argument, Android has always had iMessage like equivalent messaging alternatives that are so popular in fact that even iPhone users choose them over iMessage outside of NA.
Google is simply saying that the industry has moved on from archaic SMS and in doing so the messaging divide in terms of security and features is no longer necessary. Heck, even all those iPhone users in Europe who prefer WhatsApp, Telegram ect could go back to using iMessage if only the iPhone used RCS like everyone else.
I use WhatsApp constantly and that app is terrible. I wish they would just copy iMessage. WhatsApp feels like abandon-ware it’s so behind the times in messaging. But cannot live without it until meta gets even more involved.
It works perfectly, scooping your contacts, images, and image metadata.
Nobody outside of very few countries has used iMesages or SMS in years. There‘s no need for another standard. Signal, Whatsapp, Threema, Discord,… have already won.
Essentially. Everyone blaming Apple have no idea how these things work. It doesn’t matter if Apple implements RCS if the carriers aren’t all supporting it and the same version of it. For that matter, it could already be in iOS but they haven’t turned it on because there’s no return handshake from most carriers.
RCS as a technology came to a dead end prior to Google picking it up. What Google is offering as an alternative is their own tech build on top of the corpse of RCS in an attempt to be relevant. But, they’re only pushing it as a solution in the US. Are there even any EU carriers that support RCS?
SMS is literally the only messaging implementation that works on every platform and carrier.
Someone please explain to me why RCS is so bad? I’m just trying to wrap my head around it. SMS Is terrible and degrades the quality of images/videos beyond recognition. I refuse to download WhatApp? or any Meta product. Email is a hassle. What’s so terrible about getting rid of SMS and improving…
No one is saying it is. Google’s shell of it is. RCS itself is merely a protocol that not all carriers are supporting yet. Yelling at Apple is imbecilic as they can’t implement it until carriers do.
Sorry but this doesn't benefit iPhone in any way and it's not locking iPhone users out of anything so no. As Tim said, Buy your mom an iPhone
Do you see the envelope on the right? That was the messages part of the phone. See the characters on the number keys? Keep tapping. Your phone had the ability to text
Well, they didn’t sell any more than they had already sold as this one was used.
Sometimes, it’s just about finding a solution and going with it. I can kinda understand why some folks might like to stay in the “problem” condition, though… because having that always there to rail and fight against gives them some purpose in their life. It’s like folks that don’t want to take the medicine that helps them NOT feel paranoid because life is SO much more boring when there AREN’T ninja assassins around each corner that they’re outsmarting every day!Except it’s not as much about iMessage features as it is about the underlying costs that may be related to sending the message.
iMessage users , from the beginning, needed to have a signifier that they MAY be paying for sending a message OR that the person they’re sending the message TO may have to pay upon receiving it. In the US, you could send unlimited messages to other iMessage users, but, if you had a cap on free texts (as most plans didn’t allow for unlimited SMS at the time), it was a good indicator of which messages were counting against you cap. Even now, not all carriers offer unlimited SMS messaging on ALL their plans, so it still fulfills the same role.
Why is always the same answer from so many - “if you don’t like don’t use it”?
I do little with iMessage, not because it is good, rather on a global scale it is not used. Reaching out to my contacts, work and personal, I have less issues with Android Message than I do with iOS iMessage, especially on the MMS side. But because Apple won’t allow the evolution of SMS/MMS, I do most of my stuff on Teams, Telegram, Signal, etc…
Would be nice to see the next gen SMS/MMS come about and be usable by all platforms.
No smart person adopts a Google standard. Google kills soooo many things that there are websites devoted to tracking it.
Not on my iPhone it isn’t. And I live in a part of the world it’s supposedly popular.