I think it would be very out of character for them to abandon a chat system, though
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Google's New 'iPager' Ad Shames Apple for Using Outdated Messaging Standard
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Most carriers did implement RCS support (aka joyn), so I don’t really see the argument: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Communication_Services#Status
Mac vs PC were very careful to draw lines against making PC look bad (in this case, by making the personification of PC look incompetent).
Steve Jobs's business focus was exploiting how the entire rest of the computing industry treated the home market as an also-run - giving them the same business software and same beige boxes/black plastic laptops as they sold in bulk to companies. The idea of a computer that came with apps to help you organize your family photos, edit home movies or tinker with music was disruptive. As was the idea of including a word processor and spreadsheet for free, rather than requiring spending several hundreds of dollars for what amounted to a single seat license.
I remember being at a friend of a friend's house, selling them my G3 iBook. Their #1 reason for buying it was that they couldn't figure out how to get wifi working with the windows laptop. We had wifi set up on the iBook < 30 seconds later.
The Mac and PC were closest to being personifications of the different approaches to the market. This is why PC often didn't understand and even scoffed at the desire to use a computer for personal and recreational activities. But that did mean they were also close to being personifications of the target demographics, and so there was an effort to tread carefully.
People really gotta stop using Wikipedia to defend their positions. Joyn doesn’t interoperate. Never did. Never will. The carriers walked away from the consortium to enable it, leaving their own joyn hubs standing alone. They’ve since abandoned them, and handed the keys over to Google, and Google Jibe… which is a part of Google RCS. Google RCS ≠ RCS.
I doubt it. RCS will still have a severe subset of the features of iMessage, and will likely not have additional local API for app interaction or integration. So they would not be motivated to either tell users or developers beyond iMessage having "increased compatibility with android users".
They use the exact same colors they used pre-iMessage. iMessage added blue bubbles, it didn't change green bubbles.
The point is I don’t see a dramatic difference in implementation effort. If interoperability was mandated, it wouldn’t be hugely expensive.
Those on iOS that REALLY want RCS, rejoice!
www.gsmarena.com
And, as others have said, Google could have released Messages for iOS (like they have Messages for Android) if they were REEEEEALLY concerned!
RCS messages finally reach iPhones with a third-party app
It is called Beeper, and while in Beta, it is the first to bring Google's SMS alternative to iOS. Apple has been avoiding the adoption of RCS messages ever...
And, as others have said, Google could have released Messages for iOS (like they have Messages for Android) if they were REEEEEALLY concerned!
Last edited:
Just because something exists today and is easily usable by billions doesn’t mean that there was zero effort to create it. SMS was not always the worldwide stable standard it is today. It used to be ONLY on GSM networks, BUT because it became a feature people wanted and were willing to switch carriers for, all of the carriers, even the non-GSM ones, implemented it… to get new users OR to hold on to the ones they had.
This was not an easy 5 minute roll out, this was over years of infrastructure modifications, tests, and implementations and it was done ONLY because the carriers saw a business need to do it. The same kind of effort would need to be undertaken in order for its replacement to be created and implemented. The fact that the GSMA created it, made improvements to it but STILL didn’t get it done worldwide is an indication of just how much the world and the needs of the carriers and users have changed.
sad story. Apple wants to keep iMessage woth its proprietary standard in a connected world. Same bad decision like holding back the USB-C standard for at least 5 years.
But since I don‘t use it, I do not care too much.
This is a significant problem. There has to be some service that says that an email address or phone number has a corresponding private key, and that service can lie and give out its own key.
One big issue for messaging interoperability is that each service likely claims the same email address or phone number, even though none of them actually "own" the email provider or telecom it is authoritatively associated through. So when you want to do messaging interoperability, it isn't just "iMessage and RCS have different features", it is also that they use the same phone number. There is no way to indicate which way you would prefer to be contacted, and they could even be claimed by different people.
Put these two together, and a service I don't even have a relationship with could decide to step in and say I do indeed have an account, and provide an 'encrypted channel' to whomever is actually receiving and sending the messages.
Ah. "This service will be compatible with the Universal Profile." So Apple could implement UP, everyone could be using RCS, and it not be Google's RCS. Bummer. Carriers would still have to implement UP, though, which they're not. For example, even if Apple implemented RCS UP, I would not be able to use it because AT&T only uses Google's version of RCS and not UP.
Not really. RCS was standardized three years before iMessage was released. Carriers went broadly to unlimited texting once iMessage ate their lunch, and at that point there was no motivation for them to improve or deploy RCS.
Carriers are only opting into RCS today because of Google's insistence, and do so by using Google's RCS servers. Features like encryption are proprietary google extensions not built into RCS and (as far as I've ever been able to find) are not documented.
Strangely, Apple doesn't seem excited to help Google increase deployment of their proprietary RCS servers, nor to have unencrypted RCS of their users flow through Google servers.
RCS is more featureful than SMS, but it is arguably not better because of the way it is deployed.
SMS is unencrypted, but it goes through my carrier and not through Google.
I'd rather a contact get pixelated images than find out our conversation is being used to augment my marketing profile.
Meta doesn't really want your data directly; they want to market successfully to you on behalf of their advertising customers, because conversions drive up how much they can sell ad space to.
The goal is to have WhatsApp itself know which things to advertise to you on-device. Same creepy over-contextualized advertising, but via a database within WhatsApp itself.
RCS was originally created by the GSMA, the standards body that defines things like 5G. Carriers are involved.
iMessage was pitched to the carriers as a replacement for SMS, but they didn't want to give up messaging revenue. Except, once messaging systems were available on cellphones that didn't have per-messaging charges, the bottom fell out of that market. Now, carriers have no motivation to invest because they don't see any way to monetize.
It is unlikely to ever make sense. If there is a single messaging standard for 'interoperability' pushed by the EU, vendor-proprietary RCS extensions bouncing off Google servers is very unlikely to be it.
It is more likely to be based on work happening within MLS and MIMI at the IETF.
I worked for an AASP some time back and it was defective iPhones all day long. The refurb replacements (and replacement parts) often came right back due to defects. So no, this isn't only my own personal experience.
So true. One of the only few exceptions that they haven’t killed, is Google Pay (after first being Google Wallet, then Android Pay), & Google Meet (after first being Google Duo).
Yeah, I can’t imagine them happily asking all EU citizens to “use Google’s option”.
Why would they want to lower the standards of their product by allowing things that don’t work as well inside of it? This is not a problem in need of a solution. It’s a solution about to create a problem. Anyone that cares has figured out how to send messages to everyone in their social circles.
Google might buy the app, then, discontinue it.Those on iOS that REALLY want RCS, rejoice!
RCS messages finally reach iPhones with a third-party app
It is called Beeper, and while in Beta, it is the first to bring Google's SMS alternative to iOS. Apple has been avoiding the adoption of RCS messages ever...
And, as others have said, Google could have released Messages for iOS (like they have Messages for Android) if they were REEEEEALLY concerned!
Google is continuing on with its relentless #GetTheMessage marketing campaign in an attempt to get Apple to adopt the RCS messaging protocol. In its latest ad, Google shows off the "iPager," which Google describes as a device that "uses outdated messaging tech" like Apple uses "when texting with Android."
RCS, or Rich Communication Services, is a communication protocol designed by and adopted by Google. Google has been pushing Apple to implement support for RCS, but Apple devices continue to support the older SMS protocol. Google claims that Apple is responsible for all the issues that Android and iPhone users have texting one another, including lack of encryption, broken group chats, pixelated pictures and videos, and the green bubbles.
"iPager isn't real, but the problems that Apple causes by using SMS are. Let's make texting better for everyone and help Apple #GetTheMessage and upgrade to RCS," read's Google's video.
Major U.S. carriers and other carriers worldwide have adopted support for RCS, but Apple has no plans to do so despite Google's multi-year effort. Google has used billboards, ads, websites, social media campaigns, and more to get Apple's attention and to try to convince iPhone users to request the feature from Apple, but so far, it hasn't worked.
In September 2022, Apple CEO Tim Cook said that RCS is not a priority for Apple. "I don't hear our users asking that we put a lot of energy in on that at this point," he explained. To one reporter who said he was having an issue texting his mother on an Android device, Cook said "Buy your mom an iPhone."
It is not clear if Apple will ever adopt RCS, but so far, it does not sound like the company has any interest in doing so. If Apple did adopt RCS, it would allow for end-to-end encryption for conversations between iPhone and Android users, as well as higher quality media. Apple already offers these features for the iMessage service that works from iPhone to iPhone.
Article Link: Google's New 'iPager' Ad Shames Apple for Using Outdated Messaging Standard
I wouldn’t mind seeing bold, italics and underline in iMessage — but not a lot of crazy crap.
I also wouldn’t mind seeing a longtime Mac OS feature — selecting text with the ability to make it ALL CAPS, all lower case, or Each Word Capitalized — implemented in iOS as well.
But I would urge Apple to NEVER GIVE IN(!) to Google’s self-serving demands (“The Google doth protest too much, methinks”), which would only serve to increase sales of Android phones at the expense of iPhones and rid Android owners of the perceived shame and “degradation” of having their Android texts appear in green text bubbles on iPhones.
“The Green Text Bubble Of Shame and Humiliation.”
Blue text bubbles are a status symbol reflecting well on people who choose and pay for the best mobile phone in the world: iPhone.
Apple also needs to go back to always referring to its native texting app as iMessage, not the generic “Messages.”
Branding is important (still).
A while back, I read an article in a men’s magazine (not porn) about how women tended to refuse a man’s flirtation attempts if he was “sporting” a Digital Audio Player that was NOT an iPod. iPod was an in-style fashion accessory, it was a status symbol. Make it the same for non-iPhone mobile phones. Sure it may seem frivolous, but, hey, whatever works!
btw, isn’t it interesting that the iPhone 15 Pro Max is outselling the other iPhone 15 models in UNIT SALES⁉️
People will pay for quality and premium capabilities. People will pay to get the best. Especially when it comes to Apple products.
Buyers always have the option to buy a lower-end iPhone 15 model, so ”choice” remains, and buyers are exercising their free will in making personal financial decisions when they opt to pay more to get an iPhone 15 Pro Max.
Also, so long as there’s there’s no lag, users can play console-quality AAA game titles on a large screen HDTV (not unlike the Nintendo Switch — which can cost as much as $349 — or $940 for the Pikachu edition) with the iPhone 15 Pro Max’s A17 SiP with its far advanced GPUs plus 8GB RAM vs. 6GB for the other iPhone 15 models.
And have you noticed how much serious gaming enthusiasts are willing to pay these days for a tricked out gaming PC⁉️
To complement their two consoles and a Switch?
I doubt that the developer of the app will allow that to happen. Neither Google (in which they ruined YouTube) or Apple themselves, either (like they mucked up the Shazam app).