[HN Gopher] Eddy Cue wanted to bring iMessage to Android in 2013
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Eddy Cue wanted to bring iMessage to Android in 2013
Author : embit
Score : 90 points
Date : 2021-04-28 11:40 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theverge.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theverge.com)
| krrrh wrote:
| > 'Do we want to lose one of the most important apps in a mobile
| environment to Google?'
|
| Little did Cue know how determined Google was to fumble messaging
| over the next decade.
| exabrial wrote:
| They would have captured 100% of the messaging market.
|
| Reminds me of '90s *Nix companies with sales bros wanting to
| sling around overpriced hardware, preventing expansion of the
| company in other fronts.
| r00fus wrote:
| > They would have captured 100% of the messaging market.
|
| Isn't that against their DNA? Apple doesn't like to capture
| market share - they instead go for high profit share regardless
| of marketshare.
|
| High profit share but median market share helps to avoid
| antitrust regulatory action.
| [deleted]
| vmception wrote:
| Agreed. They could probably monetize that better than hardware
| sales too, most likely via Apple Wallet payments and data.
|
| And the whole blue/green bubble pretentiousness would have
| never happened, which is funny because so many Android users
| still have no idea that's even happening to them or just assume
| they don't need to care about anybody that cares about that.
| (protip: its affecting your life and relationships)
| musingsole wrote:
| I quite literally don't need to care about the blue bubble
| nonsense. It's a great flag for a person I can happily
| ignore.
| patja wrote:
| I feel exactly the same.
|
| But it was a bit infuriating to realize how huge an impact
| it was having on my kids who were being socially excluded
| for the sin of Android. Many children have ipads and hand
| me down iphones with no SIM just for iMessage, which they
| all just refer to as texting.
| orangepanda wrote:
| For 1:1 messages it doesnt matter, but breaks group chats
| when a green bubble is added
| [deleted]
| kop316 wrote:
| uhh...no it doesn't?
|
| I have a lot of group chats as the only Android (soon to
| be Pinephone) user. Group Chats work fine.
| prepend wrote:
| And you likely miss a ton of group chats where there are
| no android (or Pinephone) users because you've been
| excluded because group chats don't work fine.
| kop316 wrote:
| ....what? I am honestly having trouble parsing your
| meaning.
|
| My family mostly has iPhones, and we have several group
| chats with me in it on Group MMS. They work fine.
| rblatz wrote:
| I bet they also have side groups without you in it for
| when they want to share videos/photos or not deal with
| MMS jank. Nothing personal, we had to do the same thing
| to my brother and his fiance. Group MMS is busted it has
| inconsistent delivery, videos and images are compressed
| to the point of being basically worthless. Sometimes I'll
| get 3 of 4 people's messages leaving me with a partial
| conversation, then hours later I'll get the 4th person's
| messages. Sometimes they never come through. Sometimes I
| just don't get images, sometimes my wife and I will get
| different parts of the conversation and can piece it
| together.
|
| And the thing that causes all that friction is including
| an Android user in the group text. It's entirely not your
| fault, but also it's very natural for people to want to
| exclude Android users when the majority of the group uses
| iPhone.
| ncw96 wrote:
| There are some features for group messaging on iMessage
| that aren't available in Group MMS. If you add a non-
| iMessage user to your group, the group downgrades to
| using Group MMS, which does still work for basic
| messaging, but the group loses all of its iMessage-
| exclusive features.
| ArchOversight wrote:
| I have many iMessage groups, but it is an almost unspoken
| rule that you do NOT add a green bubble user to the
| group.
|
| It downgrades to standard MMS which doesn't have all of
| the features, AND delivery is hit or miss.
|
| With iMessage I can be fairly sure that all messages will
| arrive, with MMS groups... it's a shit show. There's been
| plenty of times where someone whose a green bubble will
| receive only part of the group messages, or none of them
| whereas the rest of us do. It all depends on the carrier.
| oneplane wrote:
| I suppose you are one of the special few in that case. In
| other social groups people tend to gravitate towards a
| common messaging infrastructure, only sharing the absolute
| essentials when reminded of those that are not part of that
| shared system.
|
| This means that while you might be part of the group while
| physically present, you are not a part of the group outside
| of that. For billions of people around the world that is a
| problem (not the tech, but the isolation), and as such,
| that is where a good deal of focus goes towards.
|
| This isn't about selecting your friends or social groups
| based on tech, but about groups of people dynamically
| interacting. Replace the applied construct with something
| else and it still applies. (you don't like smoke signals
| because big smoke is evil to you, so you use carrier hawks,
| but al your friends still use smoke signals and can't be
| bothered to learn how to maintain a hawk)
| musingsole wrote:
| Eh, if you aren't able to stay connected to a group
| despite not using that group's chosen technology, you're
| not that critical to the group. I'm not advocating to
| hold your participation hostage, but someone organizing a
| group to use exclusionary practices despite knowing
| specific members can't or won't participate is a classic
| bullying tactic. Family members employ it often.
| oneplane wrote:
| Eh, a social group isn't a business gathering nor is it a
| calculated construct. We're talking about people
| following their natural attraction.
|
| People don't consciously 'organise' a group with some
| 'group manager' and a nice hierarchy, technology choice
| panels, and acquisition procedures. There isn't some
| grand evil plan where the 'group CEO' selects the
| technology that everyone now has to use. This is just
| users using an end-user service on their end-user device
| that doesn't cause them friction and makes them happy.
|
| People don't think "I want to send an instant message to
| my group-colleagues on their mobile OS on their mobile
| hardware over their WWAN link to setup a meeting in our
| shared calendar for a ninety minute gathering for a
| consumption of nutrients". They generally think: "I could
| go for a bite, I'll let my friends know so we could go
| together". Everything that makes that harder just gets
| thrown out.
| musingsole wrote:
| You're right that a lot of it isn't conscious. You're
| wrong that it isn't calculated.
| oneplane wrote:
| I suppose if you only have 'calculating' friends that
| could be true. Most people just don't care and avoid the
| friction of change.
| afavour wrote:
| I have a family, small children, relatives. Grandparents
| loves to see videos of their grandchildren. Sharing a video
| via group MMS is fraught with problems, it often doesn't
| work, or the resolution is garbage. iMessage works every
| time. I'm not dismissing your experience but the green vs
| blue bubbles do make a big difference for many of us.
| ihaveajob wrote:
| In my case I don't care for the green/blue bubble divide,
| EXCEPT that I have a limited SMS plan and every time
| someone messages me it potentially costs me $0.10. That
| is not that significant until someone sends a series of
| short messages that could have been bundled into one, and
| I can't help but think "this person just cost me the
| price of a coffee".
|
| It's not even Apple's fault, but rather AT&T's confusing
| and expensive billing options. I could also upgrade to an
| unlimited messaging plan, but 90% of the billing cycles
| I'd be overpaying.
| cglong wrote:
| We switched from AT&T to T-Mobile years ago and have had
| a great experience.
| WrtCdEvrydy wrote:
| They added a data plan to my bill when I bought my first
| iPhone... it wasn't the $10 a month, it was the
| disrespectfulness of "you can't, we're forcing you to".
|
| Switched to T-Mobile that same week.
| jonp888 wrote:
| There are many popular messaging
| applications(Signal/Telegram/WhatsApp) that are cross
| platform and handle multimedia content well. This is what
| is used outside of the US.
| vegardx wrote:
| There are, but... Incoming rant:
|
| The one big thing about iMessage is that it never really
| changes. And it cannot be hijacked by some other
| application like on Android. For better or worse, and for
| basic services like text messages I'm erring on the side
| of better. I have no idea how many times I had to go fix
| messaging issues when my grandparents were using Android.
| Facebook tried to take over all messaging. Then it was
| Google, with whatever iteration of failed messaging
| application they were pushing out. Or when they had
| phones that actually received updates it would suddenly
| drastically change the user interface.
|
| We're having weekly video calls on FaceTime, and the
| superior sound quality of a FaceTime Audio has made it
| possible to even have a phone call with my hard of
| hearing grandpa. They don't even know they're using it. I
| send them high resolution pictures and videos of my
| hikes, that they can enjoy on their iPhone or iPad,
| whenever they want. Pictures and videos stay there
| without them having to do a ton of complicated tasks in a
| forever changing user interface, like Snap and the likes.
| The Apple Watches lets them know when someone is calling,
| and it gives us peace of mind knowing that they always
| have it with them. Everything uses a format they're used
| to from long before smart phones was a thing: Phone
| numbers. My grandmother is writing her life story on her
| now 7 years old MacBook Air. All their devices are backed
| up to my iCloud-family subscription. We've started using
| AirPods with Live Listen to include my grandpa in our
| conversation when I'm visiting them. If you haven't tried
| this, you should. It's mind boggling good.
|
| The amount of time spent fixing things for them have gone
| from an almost weekly thing to non-existing. Being
| seniors they also have a lot of time on their hands, and
| Apple-partnered stores, at least around here, provide
| excellent support for anyone that owns an Apple device,
| regardless of where it was bought. All their devices are
| updated almost effortlessly: They get a notification
| about a pending update that tells them exactly when the
| device will be updated and what they need to do. The one
| big wish I have would be to postpone major updates for a
| couple of months. The recent trend of Apple radically
| changing the user experience is not a welcoming trend.
|
| There's a lot of things I've really started to hate with
| Apple. And to be honest, at this point the things I just
| listed are more or less the only things holding me back.
| But the things mentioned in this post is such a huge
| quality of life improvements for all of us, almost like a
| cliche of Apple advertising. It's almost embarrassing.
| prepend wrote:
| Exactly this, I spent 5 years of monthly calls with my
| mom over the course of 4 Android (admittedly very cheap)
| phones. Just basic stuff like sending pictures, why so
| and so didn't get her text, etc.
|
| Three years ago she got an iPad and it's zero support
| calls with way more communication.
|
| So while I suppose it is possible to have a non-horrible
| text experience on Android, I've only succeeded on iOS.
| rrrazdan wrote:
| They don't. Whatsapp degrades image/video quality
| massively. Just a choice they made given that a lot of
| their customers are bandwidth constrained. If I have to
| send a photo that I took with my high quality phone
| camera, I prefer to use iMessage.
| afavour wrote:
| I'm very aware of that.
|
| Convincing an entire extended family to switch app is not
| simple. Making sure they are all set up with an
| alternative messaging app is not simple. Getting them to
| remember to use it with your specific chat while they use
| the default app for other conversations is not simple.
| Using an iPhone is simple.
| kop316 wrote:
| > Sharing a video via group MMS is fraught with problems,
| it often doesn't work, or the resolution is garbage.
|
| FYI, this is carrier related. Many carriers have a hard
| limit on how big attachments are, and will silently
| reject them if you go over that limit.
|
| What the limit is varies based on the carrier, but it
| seems that a "safe" limit is ~1.1 MB (This is the hard
| limit that Android enforces for the largest MMS
| attachment it allows). T-Mobile seems to allow higher (I
| think I got up to 10 MB?), but I do not know what would
| happen if you sent an MMS to another carrier that is that
| big (they probably silenty drop it).
|
| So you have two options: either reduce how big it is
| (which Android Messaging silently does), or flat our
| reject it. So the video is problem is silently reencoded
| to accomedate the 1.1 MB limit.
|
| Why doesn't this happen on iMessage? Probably because you
| can set your MMSC (the Server that sends/recieves MMS) to
| Apple's MMSC, so you can standardise how big it is.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| > Why doesn't this happen on iMessage?
|
| Because iMessage is not MMS - it uses a custom protocol
| and works completely independently from the carriers.
| kop316 wrote:
| Fair enough, I admittedly haven't looked the iMessage
| protocol so I don't know much about it.
|
| I just know that if you have an iPhone, you have to set
| your MMSC to Apple's servers versus the carrier's
| servers.
| afavour wrote:
| > I just know that if you have an iPhone, you have to set
| your MMSC to Apple's servers versus the carrier's
| servers.
|
| I don't believe this is true. To the best of my knowledge
| (and a quick Google) Apple has no MMSC servers. I've
| certainly never input any.
|
| SMS and MMS sent on iOS use the same servers an Android
| phone would. But when the target phone number is detected
| as being iMessage capable that whole system is ignored
| and iMessage is used instead.
| kop316 wrote:
| Fair enough. For a day or so I was looking up if I could
| somehow emulate iMessage on a Pinephone, and I remember a
| lot of it being a non-starter unless you had an iPhone.
| It stuck out to me that Apple had their own MMSC for some
| reason. But perhaps it is old news or I read the wrong
| post?
| jonfw wrote:
| On an iphone, when you send a text message, apple will
| take a look at the phone number you're sending it to and
| check if it's linked to an imessage account. If it's
| linked to an imessage account, you're not sending a text
| anymore, you're using an internet service just like
| whatsapp.
|
| There is no technical relationship between SMS and
| imessage, but to the user it's the same interface
| rhino369 wrote:
| The video messaging being garbage is a huge downside. I
| have to resort to facebook messenger to get a copy to my
| whole family.
|
| The actual color of the messages really isn't the
| problem.
| vmception wrote:
| "Does the person appear disconnected from family, friends,
| community organizations, or houses of worship?"
|
| https://www.dhs.gov/blue-campaign/indicators-human-
| trafficki...
| musingsole wrote:
| The weirdest thing is how gleeful you are in supporting
| socially exclusionary practices.
| ForHackernews wrote:
| > (protip: its affecting your life and relationships)
|
| Haha, what?
|
| Anyway, joke's on them, I use Signal.
| sodality2 wrote:
| Group MMS is terrible (group chats in general) and you
| can't really expect a group of people to all download and
| install a new app because one person has it. In all
| likelihood, you will simply be excluded or if it's
| important, you will be forced to use something like
| facebook messenger, google hangouts, instagram, etc which
| is worse than SMS.
| musingsole wrote:
| That logic would've applied to imessenger when it first
| appeared on the scene. Yet it is possible for challengers
| to displace the previous method despite not (yet) having
| the requisite network effects.
|
| To now argue that nothing can or should supplant it is
| just Applecronyism.
| sodality2 wrote:
| Sure, I agree, but that's not the majority of the
| population...
| kop316 wrote:
| I'm curious, why do you say it is terrible?
| sodality2 wrote:
| It becomes terribly low-res. The MMS media limit means
| each video, if longer than a few seconds, has its bitrate
| crippled to fit in the limit. Photos too have their
| resolution lowered, less so than videos but if you send a
| bunch at once it gets worse.
| kop316 wrote:
| I posted a longer explanation here of why that's the case
| if you're curious why:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26970035
|
| TL;DR: This is carrier related.
| vips7L wrote:
| It might be carrier related but the carriers seem
| extremely uninterested in solving the sms/mms problem at
| all.
| room500 wrote:
| It is solved if phones use RCS. RCS allows many of the
| features you love in iMessage - e2e encryption, typing
| indicators, large files, delivery receipts, reactions,
| etc. And it is all standards-based and backed by the
| carriers.
|
| Android phones do support RCS. Apple will not implement
| it. Apple will only support the bare minimum of SMS/MMS
| and then people wonder why it doesn't work well.
|
| Carriers have worked to improve messaging. And Apple
| won't work with them, preferring to make "green bubble" a
| horrible experience. People should be outraged that Apple
| is able to e2e encrypt their chats but refuses to
| implement the standards.
|
| https://9to5mac.com/2019/01/06/apple-rcs-support-
| imessage/
| kop316 wrote:
| > It is solved if phones use RCS.
|
| Unfortunately, if the carriers impose the same attachment
| limit, it really won't help. The limit on MMS is largely
| artificial (considering the phone and the MMSC talk
| HTTP...sending an MMS is literally an HTTP POST).
| room500 wrote:
| RCS does not use MMS so attachment limits do not apply.
|
| RCS is its own technology. If everyone in a chat uses
| RCS, SMS and MMS are not used at all. It is like iMessage
| - but based on an open standard
| panzagl wrote:
| Wait, I can't expect everyone to download an app, but I
| should expect everyone to buy a $500-1000 phone? That's
| ridiculous.
| MomoXenosaga wrote:
| Anyone who has the audacity to send me an SMS in the year of
| our Lord 2021 has my full and undivided negative attention.
| WhatsApp or go home.
| exabrial wrote:
| Agree. One only has to look at the success of WeChat in China
| to see how this would play out.
| madars wrote:
| Sure, not using iMessage means missing out on certain social
| interactions but so does not using Facebook, for example.
| Life can't be played optimally.
| monic wrote:
| The blue green bubble is no more pretentious than letting
| people know if your messages are encrypted.
|
| It'd would've been inflammatory but accurate and informative
| to put an insecure padlock for unencrypted messages which may
| be read by your carrier.
| rovek wrote:
| > And the whole blue/green bubble pretentiousness
|
| Honestly, reading the rest of the comments in this thread to
| this effect, it's terrifying that the runaway success of a
| single company can so degrade the fabric of personal
| relationships this way.
|
| The only people I've met who use iMessage have been Americans
| and the Americans I've met that live in the UK use WhatsApp
| or Messenger as their primary local comms, though frequently
| iMessage with friends in the US. I wonder why it is that
| iMessage hasn't enjoyed the same dominance here, even when
| the iPhone has. (45% iPhone in the US vs 40% in the UK)
| monic wrote:
| iMessage only makes sense on the iPhone with its full suite
| of Apple solutions. I don't know why Google split up their
| video and then their chat into multiple directions but on
| Apple these exist as a workflow of solutions.
|
| Thus they are vulnerable to a do it all app like WhatsApp.
| IMO just exporting iMessage wouldn't have been enough, they
| would've needed to combine FaceTime too.
| jonny_eh wrote:
| They promised FaceTime would be an open standard when it
| was first announced.
| llampx wrote:
| The bubble is a US thing primarily. Not because Americans are
| uniquely prone to it, but because iPhones are not as common
| outside of the US.
|
| But don't worry non-Americans, people are judging you on the
| basis of how you dress, eat, walk and talk and deciding
| silently whether to let you in their social circle or not.
| vmception wrote:
| Yes and WhatsApp is not as popular in the US, with
| messaging being very fragmented between a variety of other
| Facebook products.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| WhatsApp was a game changer for people that had
| international contacts. Before WhatsApp, all the mobile
| networks (at least in the US) charged exorbitant amounts
| of money for international SMS and MMS.
|
| Then, WhatsApp came and it was free and cross platform,
| compressed images and video to send them quick with
| decent quality, and free of spam. Absolutely perfect
| execution, in my opinion. If it was not owned by
| Facebook, I'd probably pay a considerable amount for it
| if it promised security and privacy.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| they owe a huge part of success intially to tricking
| people into what you describe -- that it's a
| replacement/better than SMS -- that it's "free". When it
| was simply that ppl couldn't tell difference between SMS
| network and Internet. And using phone numbers as accounts
| got a ton of people in non-American areas to use it (also
| north american texting rates crazy cheap unlike alot of
| the whatsapp-popular countries). Ridiculous. When all it
| is is another internet messaging app.
| sumedh wrote:
| > Absolutely perfect execution, in my opinion.
|
| There were no usernames with watsapp, its just your phone
| number, its so easy that even my mom can use it.
| patja wrote:
| All it asks is to hand over all your private contacts.
| For me that is a ridiculously high price.
| [deleted]
| lemonade5117 wrote:
| Doesn't the green bubble mean that it's sent over SMS? I'm
| pretty sure the reason it exists isn't because of some
| "pretentiousness"
| criddell wrote:
| Yes. And messages sent over SMS are not private. It's a
| useful thing for Apple to indicate.
| aryonoco wrote:
| I'm in Australia, and here iPhones have about 50% of the
| smartphone market, with the other half being Android of
| course.
|
| I obviously know many iPhone users, including my wife and
| many close friends. I know of no one who uses iMessage. Here
| everyone uses Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp (and to a
| lesser extent Telegram and Signal).
|
| Is this iMessage fascinating a US thing? Why?
| HWR_14 wrote:
| iMessage in the US took over before WhatsApp or Messenger
| landed. So it's still going strong based on that (although
| I wouldn't want to switch to a FB product, so I may be
| biased.) But SMSs are free and therefore the number of
| people who use SMS (or RCS, whatever it's followup is), is
| really high.
| RichEO wrote:
| I'm in Australia, and iMessage usage here is huge and I
| have to assume the reason you're not aware of it is because
| you dont have an iPhone.
|
| Everyone I know with an iPhone chooses iMessages for texts
| and group chats first, and only reverts to WhatsApp when
| someone on Android has to be involved.
| golemiprague wrote:
| Maybe as adults but the kids use the regular imessages and
| it creates two classes among the kids the ones that are in
| the imessages echosystem and the ones that are not. From a
| company that like to harp so much about diversity and
| inclusion I find imessages to be the most deviding tool in
| our kids life. It is disgusting and I hate it but at some
| stage had to buy an iphone for my kid exactly because of
| that, which is the reason Apple do it in the first place,
| to lock the kids into their products. At least I bought
| some crappy earphones instead of ipods, my small little
| rebelion.
| tobobo wrote:
| In the US almost everyone uses SMS. iMessage uses the same
| app as SMS, changing the message type based on whether the
| recipient can accept iMessages. So, most iPhone-to-iPhone
| communication ends up being SMS because we don't have to
| change what we're used to.
| prepend wrote:
| s/being SMS/being iMessage/
| draw_down wrote:
| Gee, that sounds an awful lot like a monopoly to me. Not sure
| why we as consumers would want that.
|
| Not sure why as a business they would want to take away a major
| selling point for their _actual product_ , which is not a free
| messaging service.
| afavour wrote:
| Depends on location, IMO. I was an Android user for years
| (since the Nexus One!) and the vast majority of my contacts
| were on iOS. My lack of iMessage was a constant frustration and
| I would have signed up in an instant.
|
| But I'm in the US, which has a disproportionately high amount
| of iOS users. Across the rest of the world iMessage would be
| competing with WhatsApp and its existing network (something the
| e-mails in the article note) and I think it would have been an
| uphill struggle.
| dan-robertson wrote:
| Strongly agree. The US is weird in two ways:
|
| 1. iOS being uncommonly popular (in other words: the US is
| weirdly rich compared to even most developed countries)
|
| 2. People texting a lot (maybe other countries' carriers used
| to just make texting too expensive?)
|
| Outside the US, people more commonly use messaging apps, and
| there is less peer pressure to be on iMessage as it is less
| likely for someone (in a certain social class...) to have a
| big majority of iOS-using peers. I had never even heard the
| term 'green-texter' until I went to the US
| kiadimoondi wrote:
| Adding on to what others have said, it's also that some
| non-US countries have much better internet infrastructure
| than telecom (which might've affected pricing, can't say
| for sure), so people flocked to internet-only messaging
| apps to avoid their telecom's faulty SMS/call handling.
| TMWNN wrote:
| >2. People texting a lot (maybe other countries' carriers
| used to just make texting too expensive?)
|
| Yes. US mobile plans gave enormous buckets (thousands) of
| SMS messages a month to mobile users 10-15 years ago, so
| there was little incentive to move to other mobile
| messaging systems.
|
| Conversely, the lack of such generous SMS allotments in
| most non-US countries drove widespread adoption of
| WhatsApp/Facebook Messenger/etc.
| mcphage wrote:
| > They would have captured 100% of the messaging market
|
| I'm not sure that would have helped Apple in anti-trust
| battles.
| pwthornton wrote:
| I don't know. Android is not exactly a place with a lot of paid
| software. No way Apple would make it free for Android and ad
| supported. Maybe they could have come up with some kind of
| iCloud Android bundle, and maybe it would have done well, but I
| am not convinced there is a massive market for a paid consumer
| messaging service.
| cglong wrote:
| OP doesn't sound like they were arguing that iMessage should
| be a paid service, just that Apple could've captured most of
| the market.
| RandallBrown wrote:
| I think making iMessage free on Android and then using it as
| a tool to migrate people from Android to iPhone would more
| than pay for itself.
| bsaul wrote:
| i think making it free for android would have certainly
| made it easier for people to try android for their next
| device, and thus the net balance isn't really clear..
| Longhanks wrote:
| No. In 2013, WhatsApp was already the de facto standard
| messenger in Europe. See
| https://web.archive.org/web/20140412064444/http://blog.whats...
|
| Is this the typical american point of view where the US == the
| world?
| imwillofficial wrote:
| I don't know why you're taking this needlessly snide tone. It
| seems obvious that GP thinks that iMessage would have
| dominated, even WhatsApp in Europe.
| dawnerd wrote:
| I still want a windows client, or even a web version.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| It would be a fantastic outcome of this case if the use of closed
| standards and lack of integration APIs in a high-market-share
| product gave rise to a presumption of monopolistic practices.
| That is obviously what drives the lack of integration points with
| iMessage and other messaging services, but right now there is no
| consequence. If it were codified, even in a court precedent, it
| might be enough to get these systems to start playing nicely
| again. Remember the days when you could write a client that would
| connect to most online chat services? I want those days back.
|
| (To be clear, I guess this is wishful thinking. But I would be
| happy if it came to pass.)
|
| Even better would be a requirement to provide interoperability
| APIs at a legislative level, but I guess that will be a long time
| coming.
| tootie wrote:
| The instant messaging market is such an utter failure of
| competitive market economics. There hasn't been a single
| worthwhile innovation in like 25 years yet there is intense
| competition over who owns the proprietary protocols. Text vs data
| is also an entirely contrived competition.
| krrrh wrote:
| End to end encryption was a huge innovation first widespread
| with iMessage, then Signal, and even WhatsApp and eventually
| (optionally) on FB messenger and Telegram. Now it's table
| stakes.
| donarb wrote:
| I find it ironic in a lawsuit over Apple's supposed dominance,
| that Epic is claiming that executives shot down a plan that as
| Cue puts it "that iMessage should expand to Android to cement
| Apple's hold on messaging apps".
| decafninja wrote:
| I feel like I'm the only iPhone user that barely makes use of
| iMessage. All my chat communications is done via Google Hangouts
| (or whatever they call it these days), WhatsApp, or Kakao (I'm
| Korean). I think I have exactly one friend who I use iMessage
| with.
|
| Then again, half my friends are Android users, so...
| intergalplan wrote:
| > Then again, half my friends are Android users, so...
|
| That's the reason. Same reason my friend group is all on
| WhatsApp. If we all had iPhones, we'd just use iMessage.
| peruvian wrote:
| Completely depends on where you live AND also your social
| bubble. That's why these threads are often repetitive in
| nature. Everyone's different.
|
| Here in NYC, I can count the number of Android users I've met
| in one hand... but I know that tons of people have Android
| phones. Most chatting happens on iMessage and maybe Instagram
| chat (people seem to exchange IG usernames rather than phone
| numbers nowadays).
| decafninja wrote:
| I'm actually in NYC too. Definitely see tons of Androids
| here.
|
| I've never seen or heard of people exchanging IG information
| - is that really a thing? Maybe I'm getting old.
| jmt_ wrote:
| Mainly a Gen Z thing I believe (speaking as a member of
| said generation). Many people my age see their phone
| numbers as being more private information that should be
| given to those you trust, so may not want to give out to
| someone you just met at a bar for example. Instagram can be
| used as a sort of barrier. Also, each party gets more
| insight into the others lives by checking out their
| Instagram account which is usually interesting information
| if you're establishing some sort of relationship with
| another
| vmception wrote:
| I'm actually begrudgingly graduating from asking for
| Instagram usernames to asking for TikTok usernames.
|
| A lot of Gen Z (18-23) are not using their Instagram
| accounts, or they have so many instagram accounts that
| they don't check and it is a high probability that you
| receive their "thirst trap" account where they just
| collect followers to look at their body and ignore. Not
| necessarily to consciously ignore, but just never check
| the messages at all because their personal instagram with
| their group conversations are elsewhere.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| dav43 wrote:
| Likewise. Almost all my circles (90%) are iPhone based in
| Australia and Singapore. All WhatsApp, Signal.
| sjg007 wrote:
| imessage should still work?
| girvo wrote:
| Curious. 95% of my circle are Australian, 80% of them use
| iPhones, and absolutely all of us use iMessage for nearly all
| text communication.
|
| Signal is used for the iPhone to Android communication
| sometimes, but honestly it's mostly just SMS.
| aryonoco wrote:
| Fascinating. Most of my circles are Australian, the
| majority have iPhones, and yet I have never seen anyone
| mention iMessage. Everyone I know uses Facebook Messenger
| and WhatsApp, with Telegram and Signal being very distant
| third and fourths.
|
| We must have very different circles!
| rodiger wrote:
| In the US market it's much more dominant.
| ImprovedSilence wrote:
| Yeah. Im us based, and have two different friend groups that
| i text with daily. One group all has iphones and we use
| imessage. The other group recently landed in signal, but has
| been all over the place over the years, from email, to g
| chat, to hangouts, then tried whats app, then back to
| hangouts....
| slfnflctd wrote:
| Like many others, I switched from iOS to Android during a time
| when it (edit: this transition process) was most fraught with
| very unexpected failure modes. I remember being absolutely
| incredulous that anyone thought this experience reflected
| positively on Apple in any way-- it seemed incompetent at best,
| and had a strong stink of maliciousness to boot.
|
| I've always seen this as major bungle on their part, and it's one
| of many reasons I will never go back to their not-so-safe walled
| garden by choice.
| ibero wrote:
| i honestly don't remember what period of time you are referring
| to. could you elaborate on examples from the period of time iOS
| was "fraught with very unexpected failure modes?"
|
| edit: i just saw your edit to specify iMessage the app.
| Sodman wrote:
| For folks switching to iOS for the first time from Android
| the experience can be _incredibly_ frustrating, if you don 't
| know that you're supposed to do things "The Right(tm)" way.
|
| Examples from personal anecdotes include:
|
| - My first Macbook pro several years ago was the cheapest one
| at the time, and basically got stuck in a boot loop when I
| opted out of creating an apple ID on setup. Needed to boot
| into safe mode and factory reset it to start again.
|
| - Setting up an iPad (in the last year) for a first time iOS
| user, required two 2FA challenges and needed the apple ID
| password ended no fewer than 7 times in the first 5 minutes
| of operation. The App Store didn't work for a few minutes for
| reasons unknown, and then with no changes, started working.
| (I'm guessing the creation of a new apple ID takes a few
| minutes to propagate to the app store or something?)
|
| I'm sure everything goes smoothly when you just log in with
| an apple account and import all of your existing settings
| from iCloud etc, but if you're jumping in for the first time
| and press the wrong buttons it's _rough_!
| the_other wrote:
| No.. the 2FA stuff is awkward as hell even for someone
| that's been in the ecosystem for years.
| slfnflctd wrote:
| I'm referring to _iMessage specifically_ causing tons of
| unnecessary problems when switching from an iPhone to an
| Android phone. This was over 5 years ago so I have no idea
| what 's fixed or isn't now, but I do still occasionally have
| problems when an iPhone user tries to message me as part of a
| group.
|
| These were all intermittent: Messages were lost or delayed
| for very long periods (going both ways), groups were
| completely broken, I couldn't tell who was messaging me
| because they were assigned some random source number (which I
| think also happened both ways), and images were compressed to
| illegibility.
|
| Some people I seemingly just couldn't text with at all.
|
| Here is just one small thread of thousands about it:
| https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6750172 [Not the best
| example, but I'm having trouble tracking down the posts I
| remember browsing back when I made the switch.]
|
| It was a complete mess, experienced by many users, and it was
| entirely Apple's fault.
| neetdeth wrote:
| Terrible, considering how text-centric social relationships
| have become. Reply delays on the order of hours are
| considered to send a strong signal. "Double texting" is a
| faux pas.
|
| It pains me to think how many friendships and romantic
| relationships might have been crushed by this bug. Neither
| party will ever know why.
| emsy wrote:
| The reason for not bringing iMessage to Android was because
| parents could just buy cheap Android handsets for their kids.
| First of all, why not create a product for that niche (nevermind,
| we're talking about Apple). But what actually bothers me is the
| weak mindset. I remember when Apple didn't have such concerns
| because they were certain that they have the best product and
| people would buy for that reason. This is going on across the
| board at Apple it'll eventually lead to its IBMification.
| beowulfey wrote:
| More relevant to the article--does anyone know what Epic plans to
| argue from this finding? Honestly, I could interpret not bringing
| iMessage to Android as being decidely anti-monopolistic; they
| actively tried to avoid capturing the entire market. I'm sure
| that is not what this evidence is intended to show though.
| mcphage wrote:
| > The line of questioning is likely to play a significant role in
| Epic's antitrust lawsuit, which argues that iOS app store
| exclusivity represents an illegal use of market power. Epic has
| made clear in previous filings that it plans to make iMessage
| exclusivity part of that argument, citing a 2016 email from Phil
| Schiller that argues iMessage expansion "will hurt us more than
| help us."
|
| This seems weirdly irrelevant. If Epic is arguing that not
| allowing other app stores onto iPhones is hurting consumers, I
| don't understand the relevance of Apple software on non-Apple
| phones. I mean, say Epic wins their case, and so Apple needs to
| support side-loading. The court still can't force Apple to port
| iMessage to other devices.
| imwillofficial wrote:
| For those saying Apple missed the boat on owning global
| messaging, I ask you:
|
| Who says Apple wanted to own global messaging back then?
| FraaJad wrote:
| WhatsApp happened and no one cares about iMessage outside US.
|
| -- sent from my iPhone
| throwastrike wrote:
| Eddy Cue still has a job at Apple.
| alberth wrote:
| Reminds me of BBM (blackberry messenger). Only available on their
| hardware.
| opencl wrote:
| They did eventually release it for Android and iOS, but only
| after they had declined into almost complete irrelevance.
| kevincox wrote:
| I mean the logic is obvious. If you are popular enough you want
| to keep the platform exclusive. If you aren't then it makes
| sense to go multi-platform.
|
| BlackBerry thought their platform was strong enough and BBM
| would pull everyone else in. They were of course wrong.
|
| It seems like Apple is strong enough to keep iMessage useful
| even if it is platform limited, and surely some people are
| buying iPhones for the status-symbol of Green Bubbles (or Blue,
| I can't remember I don't use iMessage).
|
| Of course every platform wants to think they are strong enough
| to pull this trick, admitting otherwise is very difficult. Of
| course by the time it is obvious that you aren't strong enough
| it is probably too late.
| codq wrote:
| Not only did Apple miss an opportunity to own global messaging,
| Google could have done the same if they had designed Allo with
| SMS fallback similar to iMessage.
|
| I have no idea what they were thinking with Allo, but they blew
| one of the easiest layups I've ever seen.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| They were far too late with Allo. The time to get it right was
| when Whatsapp came around.
|
| I like iMessage because it sends full quality media, but
| WhatsApp fills all the other gaps.
| remir wrote:
| Allo was doomed to fail.
|
| RCS is the evolution of SMS, is standardized and should be what
| the industry uses. Carriers mostly adopted it I think, but as
| expected, the situation is a mess. Bell, for example, went with
| Samsung for their RCS infrastructure and for some reasons, they
| don't allow sending RCS messages to other carriers.
|
| Google decided to bypass carriers entirely, but you have to use
| the Google Messages app to use RCS. So if you use another
| texting app, it won't work.
|
| Again, the whole thing is a mess.
| SirSourdough wrote:
| Maybe they missed a chance to own global messaging, though I'm
| not sure that's true given the number of competing messaging
| platforms, but iMessage being a walled garden has sold a
| shitload of devices for Apple and served as a major way of
| locking people into their ecosystem. It's a major
| differentiator from Android/PC products, and it's something
| I've heard mentioned a lot when people are choosing between
| Android and iOS or between PC laptop vs MacBook.
|
| I think people are underestimating the value that Apple has
| derived in terms of device sales from not expanding iMessage to
| other platforms, and device sales are worth a lot of money
| compared to new messaging-only users.
| criddell wrote:
| I don't understand how Google wasn't able to figure out
| messaging. That has to be an embarrassment inside Google.
| slig wrote:
| For whom? They don't seem to care about anything anymore.
| themacguffinman wrote:
| Because of antitrust concerns. It amuses me every time this
| suggestion resurfaces here because this community is most
| familiar with anti-Google pressure when it tries to use its
| market share like this.
| jgalt212 wrote:
| so do Brian Acton and Jan Koum send Craig Federighi the world's
| largest fruit basket every Christmas?
| js2 wrote:
| > I am concerned [that] iMessage on Android would simply serve to
| remove an obstacle to iPhone families giving their kids Android
| phones.
|
| We're an iPhone family, but damn is that lame. How about: make
| the best product. Don't coerce people into buying an iPhone.
|
| It drives me crazy how fractured messaging has become. Here's a
| recent example. My non-technical aunt tried to send a group
| iMessage to my wife and me. For me, she used an email address
| tied to my iMessage account. But for my wife, she used her Google
| Voice #. Now what you need to understand is that iMessage allows
| you to associate one or more email addresses with your account,
| but only a single phone #, which has to be your carrier-assigned
| #.
|
| So now she's trying to send an iMessage to my email address
| (which would have shown up in blue) and my wife's Google Voice #
| (which would have shown up in green).
|
| Well, here's what apparently happened. iMessage handed this off
| as an MMS to Verizon. Verizon's MMS gateway sent me the message
| via email, as a text attachment. My wife got the message in the
| Google Voice app on her phone.
|
| What an f'ing mess.
|
| I've turned off "Send as SMS" and "MMS Messaging" on my iPhone so
| I don't make this same stupid mistake.
|
| I'd use WhatsApp for everything, but, Facebook. (I tried Signal.
| I found it to be pretty sub-par for everyday messaging.)
| jbigelow76 wrote:
| _We 're an iPhone family, but damn is that lame. How about:
| make the best product. Don't coerce people into buying an
| iPhone._
|
| But iMessage isn't the product, it's a feature of the product.
| They think by not letting those features be available on other
| platforms they are creating the best product. You can't make
| the best product while simultaneously commoditizing your
| differentiators.
| tw04 wrote:
| They are repeating RIM's mistakes. It fascinates me they
| haven't actually jumped on the services train, they just
| started charging a monthly fee for the walled garden while
| still focusing on selling product and called it a services
| play.
| president wrote:
| > make the best product. Don't coerce people into buying an
| iPhone.
|
| I think this is what we all wish for but business is warfare
| and corporations will do whatever it takes to "capture" the
| market.
| majjam wrote:
| Would you mind elaborating on why Signal was sub-par? I use it
| as my main messenger and find it to be fine. There have been
| issues where older clients couldn't receive messages and needed
| to upgrade their phones to fix. And migrating to a new phone is
| fragile, but everyday messaging seems ok to me.
|
| Edit: honestly the challenge is getting other people to install
| it
| adrr wrote:
| Cost of iMessage is built into the price of the iPhone and
| other apple products. Why would they pay to develop and
| maintain it for other devices? Apple doesn't monetize their
| data like other messaging services/social networks. If apple
| charged $3/m for iMessage on Android would you pay it?
| room500 wrote:
| Yes. I prefer Android phones, but I don't want my choice of
| phone to impact the communication between my friends and
| family.
|
| The only reason I consider getting an iPhone is for iMessage.
| I would gladly pay a monthly fee so I could use the phone I
| want AND communicate freely with the people in my social
| circles.
| ssabetan wrote:
| > but only a single phone #
|
| I believe you can have multiple phone numbers associated with
| your iCloud account if they are a physical number. This is
| assuming you have a phone that's capable of dual-sim or if you
| have a second iPhone linked to your iCloud account. The latter
| is what I do when to make myself available when traveling
| abroad.
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