Hands-On With Digital Touch, Bubble Effects, Apps and More in iOS 10's Messages

[SvP]

There is a big reason whatsapp is the #1 messages app globally and its not because of stickers and special effects.

True, it's momentum and marketshare. Don't let survivors bias cloud your mind; resistance to change keeps a lot of people in their current behaviour (using whatsapp) imho it's the main reason whatsapp is so sow to adapt new features: they don't want to upset their demographic. everyone insisting on only using whatsapp in my environment is above 50...
Now, what is the reason Snappchat is so popular in spite of that? And why is the owner of facebook pouring resources in a seperate app, wich does include all of this bloat?

 

[ra.skill]

I use iMessage many times a day

So did I till I moved to Asia...
iMessage is big in the west where people don't mind paying for SMS to android (or their plans include free SMS)... But here people are cheap or don't have good plans and don't wana pay for SMS so they simply use 3rd party Apps.

 

[SvP]

really?

I think the chinese would be very surprised to learn we think it's weird to take of our shoes. Or not eat rice for as many as 7 days in a row 🙂
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You're simply wrong. It's deliberate mediocritization designed by people who understand mass marketing. Moreover, it's pandering to China with its billion drones.
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Yes, and that is un-Apple-like.
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Yes, and that is why I have lost faith in Apple. They go mass market and they abandon quality products and they lose quality customers - simple.
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Wrong. Apple has gone mass market. Quality suffers. Apple without quality is no longer Apple. Goodbye.

you're wrong, because it's un-apple like. It's the downfall of apple, and bye /s

 

[ra.skill]

eat rice for as many as 7 days in a row

Well if apple wanna crack the Chinese and India market, which appears to be their main goal right now, they're gona have to take their shoes off and learn to eat rice.

 

[Wando64]

Where I live whatsapp is omnipresent. Without a android version iMessage isn't going anywhere.

One hundred per cent this.
This train has passed a long time ago.

Clearly they haven't learnt anything from the News app fiasco.
Once a competitor is well established, you need to do something truly amazing and innovative to take their place.

Also, the great majority of people out there are using Windows and Android.
Do people at Apple really think we are all so much up our own backside that we only want to communicate with other Apple customers?

Honestly, how many iPods do they think they would have sold without a Windows version of iTunes?
Answer: not many at all...

 

[SvP]

OMG. How about fixing the most basic stuff first? Standard sms receipt is still not working (unless you manually type a specific string in front of every sms. Moreover, the string differs according to the carrier network). Even the most basic archaic phones can do this properly!

Regarding these new rich messages: If you are not connected to the internet, a message is sent as a sms (or mms in case of an image). What happens now? If I am not mistaken mms does not support this (quite useless) "enhancements"...

sms does not support receipt. It's not working because it's technically not possible, just like sending images.
MMS is just data sold at a huge markup. And "wifi" or "4G" is a network for data, and your voice is also data. The difference between the two is much they charge you.

 

[Popeye206]

Seems I have a very different view than many here.... I think these are nice additions and will help make iOS more popular with the younger crowd. I see nothing wrong with these enhancements. They're fun and with developer support Messages will continue to get more fun. Nothing wrong with that and I think Apple is dead on here with these enhancements. It's going to enhance sales.

 

[SvP]

Three things:

So much time wasted in development...

Spam professionals now will be even more annoying (yes you will be able to block telephone numbers, but you'll have to create these filters activelly and after you've received the Spam-SMS)

I can't wait to see a 20 minutes demonstration of the emojis beiing displayed on the gimmicky OLED strip on new MacBook Pros

Why aren't you -en-mass complaining to your providers? In my country the problem is nonexistent and a scammy stuff gets huge media coverage.

 

[n-evo]

iMessage has become, what we call in Dutch, a "carnival attraction"

What a flashy mess.

 

[VulchR]

OK - so thee are flashy iMessages now. I do not prefer them, but I can see the reasoning behind their development. What I do not understand is that there has been no substantial increase in functionality along with these stylistic changes. I presume Apple will release a new iPhone soon, and none of these new features of iOS look like the kind of thing that would take advantage of new hardware. I am just hoping that more substantial changes will be announce when the new iPhone is announced.

 

[Porco]

Spam professionals now will be even more annoying (yes you will be able to block telephone numbers, but you'll have to create these filters activelly and after you've received the Spam-SMS)

Rich links bother me a bit if they could be used by spammers in the same way automatically loading images in email can be. There are good security reasons you can turn off automatically loading images from arbitrary servers in email, there should be here too.

 

[SvP]

Interpersonal contact is about emotions.

The reason we don't understand what they're doing is because we forget or deny we are all about emotions, and driven and controlled by them.

Not "features" but what they enable us to do that drives iOS, and it should. Serving what we think we want is catering to an afterthought. Catering to rationalisation isn't going to cut it in an age where personal choices (and not mass choices as it was in the IBM age) become the norm. Being able to cause emotions in others is.

Its a huge deal...
skip to 1h27

 

[atrevers]

People should be grateful Apple is making emojis, bubble effects and stickers a priority
and putting unimportant stuff in cold storage.

Because as we all know, the software development teams that work on iMessage features are the same engineering teams that work on updates to hardware such as the Mac Pro...

 

[Thunderhawks]

(automatically converted when I type)

Rich links bother me a bit if they could be used by spammers in the same way automatically loading images in email can be. There are good security reasons you can turn off automatically loading images from arbitrary servers in email, there should be here too.

If it is not in there , the first outcry will cause this obviously necessary change.

As for all this eye candy, I see a divide between old farts like me and the young users.

Short of typing the characters for a smiley 🙂 or frowny :-( , I have no use for emoji.
I can still say what I want in words just fine.

But, for todays attention deficit , me first new generation, it is probably the hottest thing.

 

[DNichter]

I likely won't use a lot of this stuff often, but I can see why Apple is making this move. People like this crap and Apple needs to bring some of the features of other chat apps to iMessage in order to stay competitive. Although as a first beta, the features do work surprisingly well, something about the UI doesn't feel right to me. Hopefully it improves by September.

 

[Vaga8ond]

The only reason why I'm not bothered by how ugly this is, is because it's pointless - EVERYONE here uses WhatsApp, so changes to iMessage won't even be noticed. 😉

I don't use it. Tried it, didn't like it. /hyperbole

 

[echo44]

🙂😉😡😕😎😀😀😱😳🙄😵

 

[anubis72]

I was really looking forward to iMessage for Android and sending money via Apple Pay as rumored, but got 3x bigger emojis 🙁

Thanks, Millennials! Also disappointing is the fact that a lot of the new stuff doesn't work on an iPhone 6 because of no force touch. Disheartening, too, is the realization that we're supposed to upgrade phones every time an iOS update is released. Exactly why I moved away from Android...🙁🙁🙁

 

[bpcookson]

these stickers and effects would have been fine in a separate app or being able to fully turn off the new graphical stuff. Snapchat is only used by certain groups and messages is used by all groups from kids to millennial to baby boomers which have the same quantity of smartphones as the millennials. There is a reason facebook stayed vs myspace, customization that can't be controlled to something standard by the visiting users killed it.

TL;DR: GET OFF MY LAWN!!!

 

[Gabs_]

This is more than likely going to be a feature that I steer far clear of. I'm sure my daughter will think it's fun, but I'll probably pass.
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Thanks, Millennials! Also disappointing is the fact that a lot of the new stuff doesn't work on an iPhone 6 because of no force touch. Disheartening, too, is the realization that we're supposed to upgrade phones every time an iOS update is released. Exactly why I moved away from Android...🙁🙁🙁

Oh, come on. I'm a millennial and will (probably) not be using this feature. Don't be afraid of change or at least trying new and radical things.

 

[Chupa Chupa]

With increased 3D touch functionality it becomes irritating that Apple chose to be so cheap with the very expensive and only 3 months old iPad Pro 9.7 that it left out the 3D touch sensor. That is on top of relegating it to a Gen 1 Touch ID sensor, which now means no wake on lift feature either.

Apple is either being slipshod or nasty here, as the iPP 9.7 and iOS 10 were developed at the same time. Its also odd because at least its flagship 9.7" iPad won't offer the latest iOS features. (Possible a new 13" iPP will be released this fall w/ 3D touch and 2nd gen ID touch). Not the best way to reignite sales in the category. What was that $100 price increase for again? Oh right, for the privilege of spending $100 over that to buy a pencil. This is planned obsolesce to the most obscene degree. But hey, Apple has eco-friendly PR films with funny robots so it's OK if these end up in the scrap heap prematurely. /s

OK - so thee are flashy iMessages now. I do not prefer them, but I can see the reasoning behind their development. What I do not understand is that there has been no substantial increase in functionality along with these stylistic changes.

The ability to write out a message is an additional functionality. Sometimes it's easier/quicker to scrawl out "OK" or make a check mark symbol than to type it out.

 

[geta]

All these new changes will work only when you using iMessage and won’t apply to standard SMS messages, right ?

If so, all these changes are pointless - as long as other OS platforms (mainly Android) won’t have this app it will never compete against the big players in the market, and will stay a small niche for Apple users (same like FaceTime).

 

[jujufreeze]

Do they employ a girl scouts advisory board now? Update your bloody computers before emojis and bubble effects.

 

[Carlanga]

True, it's momentum and marketshare. Don't let survivors bias cloud your mind; resistance to change keeps a lot of people in their current behaviour (using whatsapp) imho it's the main reason whatsapp is so sow to adapt new features: they don't want to upset their demographic. everyone insisting on only using whatsapp in my environment is above 50...
Now, what is the reason Snappchat is so popular in spite of that? And why is the owner of facebook pouring resources in a seperate app, wich does include all of this bloat?

You are forgetting many things:
1) fb bought whatsapp AFTER it grew to the monster it was.
2) fb uses the messenger app now as the experimental messages app where they can go crazy and try whatever they think it's cool but no one really uses
3) you live in the us probably. Whatsapp is used by ALL demographics globally and it's the main app in many countries. It took over blackberry pin and all that it entails. Carriers even let you use it wout consuming your data in it
4) snapchat is used globally but not in the same size/way as the us. And is still not close to other apps like whatsapp in terms of use.
5) it's not survivor bias. It's global bias AND UNIVERSALITY. Even snapchat has it. No matter the OS you can still receive the same thing. Messages is still the most used app for the iPhone because texts are unlimited nowadays and not necessarily because of iMessages. One is an adjunctant by os for increase use.

Apple reunion probably went like this:
Hey let's add all the features of all the IM apps in our messages app and let's call it amazing. It's way too much and no way to turn it off and no way to universalized it. If they really had though it better they could have transformed their videos and other stuff into gifs or something universal for the nonios side and calm down w all the extra tacky stuff or a way to turn off certain features. This is just an attempt to try to seem like it's an innovation in the 'major' release cycle.
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TL;DR: GET OFF MY LAWN!!!

I'm considered a 'millenial' but maybe I'm too hipster for this.

 

[latweek]

This mentality is why the guy who runs snapchat is rolling in mountains of money while you're here complaining about how dumb his type of product is.

Frito: I can't believe you like money too. We should hang out.