'Green Bubbles and Blue Bubbles Want to Be Together' Says Samsung Ad Pushing Apple to Adopt RCS

[ericthered926]

Why is everyone so against rcs on here? All it would do is improve the texting experience with android users… it wouldn’t hurt current user experience in any way. It might get some people to leave iOS if they don’t feel locked in anymore, which I get from apple’s standpoint, but that’s a pretty bad reason from a consumer perspective.

I’d love to be able to send full quality pics and videos in my family and friend group chats. “Just use WhatsApp/telegram/signal/instagram/messenger” nah. I could, but I don’t like my chats living all over the place, and I can’t align my family and friends all on 1 platform.

Editing to add that yeah, google’s implementation is the main one rn, but there’s nothing stopping apple from doing it themselves or working with google/samsung/carriers to implement something universal that doesn’t give google access to chats. That said, pretty sure E2E encryption is already a feature in RCS (ok more research, google has added e2e encryption in their implementation, nothing is stopping anybody else from doing the same, though).

Apple gets to stay out of the conversation because of the iMessage dominance/lock in, but do we really want that? I think more choice is always better. Especially when our messages with android peeps default to sms/mms, protocols that aren’t private or safe. Idk. I think in 2023 we should have a better fallback than sms.

 

[ZMacintosh]

I dont want...I want to know who I'm messaging and if I can share the same things. most of the time green bubbles are coming from scam phone numbers (very few I have seen have iMessage enabled)

 

[cwwilson]

Stop trying to make RCS happen. It isn’t going to happen. 🙄

 

[zach-coleman]

Imagine if the web was divided that way. We’d have blue web pages that only work on WebKit, and green web pages for which WebKit only supports basic text rendering. And Apple wouldn’t allow linking to a green web page from a blue web page.

Don’t worry, Google is working on this as we speak. The chromium backed web vs everything else.

 

[gund1234]

here is what i understand from this saga.
Apple customers use other chat applications when texting people who doesn't own iPhone/Mac.
Google is not getting that data.
So Google is forcing Apple to use RCS so that people will use RCS to text iPhone/Mac/Android users.
then very few people will use third party texting apps and Google can get all the data (or Meta data if it is end to end encrypted).

So what is Apple gaining from this ?

 

[FloatingBones]

Samsung's green bubble riff on Romeo and Juliet:

It is a tale told by an idiot,
full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

 

[zach-coleman]

Why is everyone so against rcs on here? All it would do is improve the texting experience with android users… it wouldn’t hurt current user experience in any way. It might get some people to leave iOS if they don’t feel locked in anymore, which I get from apple’s standpoint, but that’s a pretty bad reason from a consumer perspective.
I’d love to be able to send full quality pics and videos in my family and friend group chats. “Just use WhatsApp/telegram/signal/instagram/messenger” nah. I could, but I don’t like my chats living all over the place, and I can’t align my family and friends all on 1 platform.

RCS as it exists all runs though google’s servers and the encryption extension is a closed proprietary Google library. Even when encrypted, Google can scrape all the message metadata and see attachments. This would increase google’s spying by a lot.

 

[applefan8254]

Google should promote Google Chat (not rcs). Maybe partner with Samsung that as well.

Google Chat is cross platform. It works across iOS, Android, Web, etc.

It uses your existing google account.

It has more/better functions like an edit button, high quality images and high quality video etc.

Fully encrypted + multiple devices with no limits

 

[ratspg]

RCS as it exists all runs though google’s servers and the encryption extension is a closed proprietary Google library. Even when encrypted, Google can scrape all the message metadata and see attachments. This would increase google’s spying by a lot.

Any digital device can be spied on, people act like Apple is way better. sigh.

 

[till]

It would make so much more sense to open up iMessage or really any other internet-based chat protocol, rather than some garbage that works through the carriers.

Everything should just be data. That's why half the world uses WhatsApp.

 

[marzbarz]

Care to elaborate? I'm genuinely curious how RCS support is a worse idea than what we have now?

it's more confusing. Verizon can decide to implement video chat but Tmobile implements a different RCS which doesn't include video chat. and who hosts a group video call (which doesn't even exist in RCS spec last I checked)?

right now you can FaceTime with apple and Android. or they can move to Telegram/WhatsApp. limitations are made clear and solutions are simple. adopting RCS means user must learn if XYZ user supports ABC feature which is dependent on the carrier. Google can provide a fallback option but that gets even more complicated.

 

[Mrkevinfinnerty]

Whatsapp: hey America stop using SMS like it's the 90's

 

[gund1234]

It's so shocking how people here are genuinely opposed to better interactions between iPhones and Androids. I don't understand that. SMS is terribly limited and outdated, and not E2E encrypted. And it's not like Androids are going away, so why keep the experience this bad on iMessages?

Not that I think this ad campaign will have any effect on Apple at all, but that doesn't mean that Apple should do nothing on improving communication standards on iPhone

who said iMessages experience is bad ?
I am perfectly fine with iMessages.
Apple customers are not complaining, Google & Samsung are complaining.
If people want to communicate with people who won Android phones then there are other apps for that.
We don't want Google and Apple as monopoly in messages, we need competition.
If Apple & Google both use RCS then why would any one use any other apps for texting ?

 

[gund1234]

politicians don't know technology, they should stay away from regulating tech.

 

[thisisnotmyname]

It’s like people who buy a massive SUV and then complain about gas prices. You knew what you were signing up for and now are mad that this obvious consequence to your actions exists?

Yes, this! Same with people who buy subcompact electric vehicles and then ask their friend with an SUV to help them move. You knew what you were signing up for and now are mad that this obvious consequence to your actions exists?

 

[kalafalas]

I’ve actually had success introducing my friend group and family to signal, esp as some of them switched to android where we were previously all iPhone. They adopted quickly and are happy to leave the green bubble struggle in the past. I highly recommend it! The app is very well made!

Realistically, especially outside the US, this is a non issue as everyone defaults to WhatsApp

 

[gund1234]

I really don’t understand these ads. Apple isn’t going to care about them at all, and if anything Samsung/Google is just pointing out an annoyance of using their product 🤷‍♂️

Google and Samsung are complaining that Apple customers don't like iMessages and Apple should use RCS, i don't understand, why are Google and Samsung fighting for Apple customers ?
there should be something they are gaining by Apple using RCS ?

 

[zach-coleman]

Any digital device can be spied on, people act like Apple is way better. sigh.

You would think if there was any concrete proof of Apple spying on the level that Google openly admits to doing the Apple haters of the world would be posting this proof everywhere and stirring a huge drama over it considering Apple’s marketing campaigns.

 

[skottichan]

I have an amazingly stupid question, why does Samsung even care? I mean aside from the bubble color, and the occasional group chat in Messages, it's not like Android users can't text Apple users. I mean, half of my friends are on various flavor of Android, and we text just fine.

 

[jimmy_john]

what is a green bubble

 

[tonyr6]

I tell people if they are serious about texting me to use WhatsApp. I love that WhatsApp is crossplatform.

 

[WilliApple]

Please Apple, adopt RCS already!

I know these companies won't stop until they adopt RCS.

 

[fwmireault]

who said iMessages experience is bad ?

I say it. The poor communication between Android and iPhone goes both ways, it's as frustrating for the iPhone user to chat with an Android user than the other way around. I'm not advocating for feature parity, but in 2023 I should be able to have E2E encrypted communications or remove someone from a group with an Android user. Your point about monopoly is fair, but that doesn't mean that the experience *should* stay bad on iMessages

 

[jlc1978]

RCS's problems aside, I don't see any reason for Apple to not incorporate newer messaging technology for their phones. They don't need to necessarily make RCS messages blue, but there's no reason not to at least support it.

Except Google wants Apple to use tehir proprietary implementation and run it through their servers.

I wonder what % of iPhone users regularly exchange texts with non iPhone users via iMessage, vs WhatsApp or some otehr application? Most of my international texting and calls use What’s App as it is pretty widely adopted.

All of our dinosaur politicians would never understand such tech to make a law for it.

The Venn Diagram intersection between makiung a law and understand what you are regulating is often vanishingly small.

 

[maladjustedmusician]

Samsung and Google have a very limited point here. RCS is a good idea. The thing is, any solution to this problem would require Google, Apple, and the networks to work together to create a universal, non-proprietary RCS system.

Even so, I don’t see Apple changing the blue bubble/green bubble situation. iMessage isn’t going away, even if/when Apple gives in and adopts RCS. Guess android users will be stuck with their green bubbles.