[HN Gopher] One trick Apple uses to make you think green bubbles...
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One trick Apple uses to make you think green bubbles are "gross"
Author : allenwhsu
Score : 251 points
Date : 2022-10-12 13:29 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (uxdesign.cc)
(TXT) w3m dump (uxdesign.cc)
| scarface74 wrote:
| What are the chances that the EU will come in a year and mandate
| that "all messages must have the same color" and use it as an
| excuse that having some blue bubbles and some green colors is
| harming the mental health of children?
| schroeding wrote:
| Very slim, as this is appears to be a _very_ american problem.
| It 's normal for teenagers (and people in general) to have an
| Android phone in Europe. It isn't anymore in the US.
| scarface74 wrote:
| But yet, the EU is mandating the USB C "standard" without
| going into details about which part of the standard is
| required still requiring you to know whether the USB C cable
| will actually transmit data and at what speed will it
| transmit video (something that USB required iPads already do
| and is a standard), etc
| enragedcacti wrote:
| The contrast between your perception of the EU and their actual
| positions is pretty entertaining to me:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act
|
| https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/04/eu-digital-markets-act...
| scarface74 wrote:
| So you mean my perception that the EU is run by a bunch of
| bureaucrats who don't understand technology, stymie
| innovation and don't think about unintended consequences? Do
| you think there may be a reason that hardly any successful
| technology companies come out of the Eu?
| enragedcacti wrote:
| maybe 'perception' was the wrong word, moreso attacking
| them on imagined grounds of legislating trivialities of
| message color instead of commenting on the actual (highly
| publicized) sweeping changes they are already making to
| attempt to address the problem.
| scarface74 wrote:
| That worked out really well with the 99 section 11
| chapter GDPR. All it got us was cookie consent banners.
| enragedcacti wrote:
| Have a good one
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| More than likely it would start in California. I say we start a
| petition that the colors be indistinguishable. Be the change
| that you want to see, I'm looking at the man in the mirror.
| leobg wrote:
| Also, I suspect the association of blue as modern and green as
| outdated might also stem from LEDs. Early LEDs were green or red.
| It took many years until blue LEDs became available, and those,
| at first, were much more expensive.
| samatman wrote:
| Interesting that reducing contrast is the exact 'nudge' Hacker
| News uses to inform us that a comment is less credible.
| samatman wrote:
| Although this comment leads me to think that either this has
| changed in subsequent iOS releases, or the author has issues
| with telling the truth:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33178848
| sangnoir wrote:
| in HNs case, I suspect it's deliberately intended to lower
| interaction with grayed out text (to avoid pile-ons and low-
| quality/flamey discussions rooted on such comments)
| jasonjamerson wrote:
| I disagree with two things here. Green IS traditionally an off-
| putting color, when we're talking about light: aliens, x-files,
| goo, and everything witchy.
|
| But in this context the thing that's harder on the eyes is the
| bubble itself. So the lighter one is easier for me. Although I'd
| rather see no bubbles at all.
| 0898 wrote:
| Texts have been green before iMessage came out though
| Double_a_92 wrote:
| Nature is green though...
| jasonjamerson wrote:
| That's why I said green light, which is unusual in nature.
| Sure, it's a little green when it filters through leaves, but
| that's very hard to perceive because the yellow of the sun or
| the blue of the sky usually cancels that out. It's almost
| never enough to light up another object with green.
| martin_a wrote:
| > Green IS traditionally an off-putting color
|
| I don't think that's true for the reasons you put up.
|
| Our eyes are specialized to distinct more shades of green from
| each other than with other colors. That's a useful evolutionary
| feature when you are an animal and have to hunt in the wild.
|
| For humans that leads to the point that we're rather good in
| picking "unnatural" shades of green (gooish ones and self-
| emitting shades of green).
| jasonjamerson wrote:
| Absolutely, I'm referring to emission of green light, which
| is unnatural.
| viridian wrote:
| As a counterpoint to everyone saying they've never heard of
| anyone caring about the bubbles; back when I was in college my
| fraternity sent out big group messages via iMessage only.
|
| If you wanted to know about events and didn't have an iPhone, you
| needed to check your email or hear about it second hand. No one
| wanted to deal with broken MMS, formatting, etc, so that's how
| things were handled.
|
| Some folks with Android phones were annoyed, but the official
| stance is that your email should be the place you check for this
| stuff anyways.
| jeremy0x4a wrote:
| Whenever I see this iMessage/SMS, blue/green topic come up I
| descend into an internal debate that, as I get older, I am
| becoming increasingly familiar with.
|
| The debate is that one where I am forced to reconcile whether I
| am too far removed from popular culture to see how this is a real
| issue versus accepting that the issue is entirely contrived.
| colinmhayes wrote:
| The green texts isn't just branding or aesthetics. iMessage
| with non iphones is a legitimately degraded experience and the
| green texts exist to remind you of that, but even if they
| weren't green the experience would still be bad because apple
| realizes that forcing people to buy their phone if they want to
| have texts that send in under 5 seconds is an incredibly
| successful strategy. Having long form conversations over SMS
| just doesn't work given the time they take to send, and tons of
| iPhone users refuse to get a messaging app.
| d23 wrote:
| It's a really really really short article. Really short.
| Please.
|
| It gets to the point in the second paragraph: the green bubbles
| have bad contrast. It mentions the design of the green bubbles
| rank as "very poor" by accessibility standards.
|
| That's why it matters.
| randomdata wrote:
| The nice thing about getting even older is that you soon won't
| care about such reconciliation.
| jeremy0x4a wrote:
| I appreciate this, but I will still cherish the joy of
| yelling at the children on my lawn, as I slowly descend into
| comfortable curmudgeonhood.
| adrr wrote:
| I would love to see a survey of mobile phone users to see if
| this matters to them. I'll take a guess it doesn't matter
| because Google would be flaunting the results.
|
| As for negative effects on kids. There's more than just phones.
| Clothes, cars, vacations, social media posts, tutoring, sports.
| Maybe we should put everyone in uniforms, don't allow kids
| drive to school, ban sports, and forbid them from talking about
| their vacations. And everyone was equal.
| OJFord wrote:
| > I'll take a guess it doesn't matter because Google would be
| flaunting the results.
|
| I'm not sure how easy that would be - 'Apple will make you
| more popular if you use an iPhone instead of Android!'...'No
| no, that's _bad_ , you don't want that, _don 't_ buy an
| iPhone!'
| snazz wrote:
| Google did an ad campaign recently that's basically that
| line of thinking (plus trying to encourage them to adopt
| RCS): https://www.android.com/get-the-message/
| kaba0 wrote:
| Obligatory addition: Google's version of RCS is just
| built on top of an open standard but is hardly more open
| then apple's imessage so adopting that is not a solution
| either.
| criddell wrote:
| It matters to me a little bit. A green bubble means the
| message is basically a postcard that the carrier can read. A
| blue bubble means the message is in an envelope that my
| carrier can't read.
| thatguy0900 wrote:
| My school had uniforms, bullying doesn't stop. Kids are
| honestly just mean, and not idiots. You can dress a wealthy
| kid and a poor kid in the same clothes and you will not fool
| anyone in class about which one is the poor one.
| threatofrain wrote:
| But does it mitigate bullying? Going straight to "but
| bullying doesn't stop" is an unconvincingly perfectionist
| stance.
| thatguy0900 wrote:
| Not really, no. If a kid wants to bully you theyll find a
| reason to do so. If you've ever been a third party
| watching that stuff, you'll see what people are actually
| being bullied for doesn't really make sense. Take away
| the shoes and the phone and it will just be your hair or
| your posture. Bullying is a targeted activity
| idk1 wrote:
| It's certainly an issue with a lot of teenagers. Speaking
| broadly, social status and brands say a lot at that age, and
| you could miss out on friends or social occasions based on it.
|
| As an adult of course the green/blue bubbles simply don't
| matter, we grow up and realise that, but it certainly is a
| significant issue if it's affecting young peoples lives.
|
| So I'd say it's somewhere inbetween what you descibe, perhaps a
| bit contrived, but also could have a significant impact on some
| people.
|
| Side note - I have heard of people saying they won't date green
| or blue bubble people, but of course if someone takes that
| point of view as an adult then it's a good indicator to show
| how they think.
| milkytron wrote:
| > It's certainly an issue with a lot of teenagers.
|
| > As an adult of course the green/blue bubbles simply don't
| matter
|
| I disagree that the green/blue bubbles simply don't matter as
| an adult. I've had friend groups not include me in group
| messages because of it. Some have gotten visibly mad at me
| for having green bubbles and "breaking their chat". There is
| certain functionality that iPhones don't support in MMS chats
| that Android phones do (like adding a new member to the group
| chat).
|
| It does indicate how people think when they buy into the
| stigma, but also I think it's a general lack of understanding
| around why Apple keeps iMessage so tightly coupled to its
| ecosystem and hardware. And many people aren't interested in
| gaining that understanding.
|
| Social status is very important to many adults, and blue
| bubbles have become a way to display that social status.
| browningstreet wrote:
| > I have heard of people saying they won't date green or blue
| bubble people
|
| But how many times, really?
|
| It's like the missing iPhone headphone jack. The press and
| bloggers hammered away at it for years, making sure it was an
| ongoing meme in all coverage, but... do people really care?
| Some people, sure.. but enough for the coverage?
|
| Same with bubbles.
| mdtusz wrote:
| Sidebar, but I care about the headphone jack issue and am
| still annoyed by it.
|
| Bluetooth headphones just aren't very good, and we've all
| gotten in the habit of buying a new pair every few years
| because they either break, get lost, are unsupported, or
| have bad batteries.
|
| I previously had the same pair of IEMs for almost a decade
| that had better sound quality, replaceable cables and
| eartips, and didn't ever run out of battery. Never did I
| complain about the cables being annoying or in the way, and
| never did I complain about the presence of the headphone
| jack, or the Bluetooth chip onboard.
|
| Removing headphone jacks was a horrible misstep in my
| opinion and we're stuck with the path dependency it's
| created now. It's probably not long before we have laptops
| that omit 3.5mm audio jacks as well.
| thatguy0900 wrote:
| I'm down to just using a permanent audio jack to USB c
| dongle for phones and my computer. Very very silly.
| marssaxman wrote:
| I've cared about the missing headphone jack on a couple of
| occasions, when I wanted to stream some music off my
| partner's phone, but we had to listen to its tinny little
| speaker instead.
|
| Of course Apple does not need to care what I think, as I am
| not likely to buy their products anyway.
| idk1 wrote:
| > But how many times, really?
|
| Two people in the pub, I didn't know them well, but it
| comes up. What's interesting actually is the green bubble
| was not an issue for hook-up, but it was an issue for long-
| term dating. I am talking about two people I've chatted to
| in a pub about this, and everyone else as well, so take it
| with a grain of salt.
|
| Bring it up next time your in the pub! See for yourself.
| quantumsequoia wrote:
| In this experiment, they created identical dating profiles,
| with the only difference being the brand of phone displayed
| in photographs. The control was no phone shown in the
| image.
|
| Featuring an iPhone increased the number of likes received
| by 82%. Featuring a Samsung increased the number of likes
| by 20%. That means if you display a Samsung instead of an
| iPhone in your profile, you will get 34% less likes
|
| Other phone brands did even worse. If your dating profile
| displays a Oneplus phone, you will get 55% less likes than
| an identical profile featuring an iPhone
|
| https://www.moneysupermarket.com/mobile-
| phones/features/mobi...
| yieldcrv wrote:
| This isn't the same.
|
| Very otherwise upstanding people will absolutely talk
| behind people's back about that person's green bubble
| pollution.
|
| People go on to mock the sales pitches android users use
| since everyone's heard them ad nauseam for a decade
|
| They are generally making deep assumptions about people's
| decision making process if they have a choice in phone
| model, and making conclusions about that person's
| socioeconomic class if they don't have a choice in phone
| model
|
| And it all ends with a laugh about how most android users
| live their life without knowing this is happening, but that
| reinforces the perception of a lack of self awareness and
| inability to pick up social cues
|
| " _mimicking robot_ but I love how much controllll I have
| over my phoooone"
|
| "I dont want to be around anyone that cares about
| superficial things anyway" bro its everyone
| edf13 wrote:
| Ermmm. Wasn't it green for sms way before iMessage was launched?
| Hamuko wrote:
| Yes.
|
| https://youtu.be/VQKMoT-6XSg?t=1863
| croes wrote:
| But black text
| bongobingo1 wrote:
| Funny to see even Jobs hit `return` to send the message
| initially.
| randomdata wrote:
| Yes. From the article: "To be clear, it is not that green is
| gross. It is the low color contrast of the green Apple picked
| and used against white text is gross." The original design used
| black text, for one thing.
| angulardragon03 wrote:
| Yes and no. It used to be black on green (with imo a way worse
| green).
|
| https://www.oreilly.com/api/v2/epubs/9780133016529/files/gra...
| tpmx wrote:
| Yes, but the contrast was good.
|
| iOS 4, green Aqua-ish bubbles with black text:
| https://d2bs8hqp6qvsw6.cloudfront.net/article/images/750x750...
|
| iOS 5, introducing blue iMessage bubbles (still good contrast
| in both colors):
| https://images.anandtech.com/doci/4956/IMG_0907.PNG
|
| The change in contrast came with Ive's "flat" iOS 7:
|
| https://i.insider.com/5df902c5fd9db27769749a5f?width=1300&fo...
| s3p wrote:
| Read this as "I've OS 7" for a few seconds lol
| thenerdhead wrote:
| I don't know. The green always looked like the Android logo green
| back in the day. Less about contrast.
| intrasight wrote:
| I've never heard an actual human express noticing or caring about
| the color of the bubble.
| nrb wrote:
| The main annoying thing when added to a mixed group of SMS and
| iMessage group chats is that you cannot leave them, or add
| anyone after the fact without creating an entirely new chat
| with all the contacts from scratch.
| extragood wrote:
| It was commented on frequently when I was online dating, to the
| point that it got annoying. I've had a few friends mention it
| and jokingly tell me to give in and get an iPhone. I'm mid-
| thirties.
| MerelyMortal wrote:
| Me either, and the adults I know, don't even seem to know the
| difference.
|
| I often get people trying to send me videos or files via SMS (I
| have an Android, and I guess it normally works for them when
| sending to other Apple users).
|
| (I say adults, because I often hear kids use it as a status
| symbol or way to exclude other kids from group messages. I will
| have to ask the kids I work with what they think about message
| color bubbles.)
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Kids do it, I've heard it, it's an actual thing in that age
| group, adults don't care. It's like having a collection of
| gobots instead of transformers if you're an 80s kid.
| umanwizard wrote:
| I care, and I'm an adult. I don't care _a lot_ , certainly
| not so much that I'd exclude someone from a social group, but
| I do get slightly annoyed when I have to communicate with
| someone via SMS because it's so much slower, less reliable,
| less featureful etc. than iMessage.
| occamrazor wrote:
| On my iPhone the green bubbles are much more saturated and
| legible than in the posted article.
| null_object wrote:
| Exactly - the author fictionalized some examples for his phony
| thesis.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| phony... I see what you did there.
| malshe wrote:
| Same here. https://imgur.com/a/7k5dMtm
| graeber_28927 wrote:
| I checked those background colors with this contrast
| calculator [0] against white:
|
| - Contrast of your iPhone: 2.21:1 (#35c759)
|
| - Contrast that's "poor": 2.17:1 (#65c466)
|
| - Contrast that's "good": 2.93:1 (#3bac3c)
|
| - Contrast of the blue: 3.95:1 (#367bf5)
|
| Based on this I would say that the Contrast of your green and
| the "gross" one from the article are actually pretty close,
| both being very far from the contrast that blue provides.
|
| Not even the good green from the article does match the
| contrast of the blue. They are being lenient I'd say, not
| misleading.
|
| [0]: https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/
| freeplay wrote:
| It's not the color or contrast of the bubbles that make me think
| negatively, it's the fact that once I see a green bubble in a
| group text, I know it's going to be a bad experience.
|
| Any photo, video, or reaction gif that people send will be
| compressed down a couple of pixels and replies will often be out
| of chronological order.
| joshenberg wrote:
| I take so much shit for 'ruining the group chat' when it's
| always the complainants devices that is blocked from sending
| high resolution pics to poor people. Drives me fucking bonkers
| when I point out that their reactions to it are precisely why
| it's not being fixed.
| CharlesW wrote:
| I have a problem with the thesis statement that people think
| green bubbles are "gross", which uncritically parrots Google's
| "Get the Message" PR campaign.
|
| I know that iPhone-using teens don't care about this in SoCal,
| the virtue signalling capital of the world. Their group chats
| with friends are all green, so if anything's "gross" it's the
| blue bubbles of their parental conversations.
|
| In the meantime, RCS is missing really basic capabilities. For
| example, RCS encryption only works for 1:1 conversations, so
| things like family chats are not private. Even Android
| publications are asking if RCS is too little, too late.
|
| https://www.androidpolice.com/android-iphone-rcs-give-up-mes...
| pkulak wrote:
| > which uncritically parrots Google "Get the Message" PR
| campaign.
|
| You're misunderstanding the order of events here. "I don't talk
| to green bubbles" has been a thing for at least five years now,
| which Google has very recently used in an ad campaign.
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _" I don't talk to green bubbles" has been a thing for at
| least five years now..._
|
| Almost always as a joke. And if you search HN, nearly all
| conversations about this PR-manufactured "green bubbles"
| outrage have happened since the launch of Google's campaign.
| pkulak wrote:
| Nearly all the conversations about the PR have been since
| the PR? I don't doubt it. I'm saying the green bubbles
| thing has existed since long before that. Google ticked it
| up a bit, but come on. Let's not give Google PR too much
| credit here:
|
| https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%205-y&g
| e...
| snowwrestler wrote:
| Have you ever actually used Messages? "I don't talk to green
| bubbles" can't be a thing because your own messages are the
| ones that are blue or green.
|
| The bubbles for everyone else (the people you are talking to)
| are always all the same color: dark grey.
| enragedcacti wrote:
| > In the meantime, RCS is missing really basic capabilities.
| For example, RCS encryption only works for 1:1 conversations,
| so things like family chats are not private.
|
| As opposed to iMessage, but certainly not as opposed to SMS
| which is what RCS would actually be replacing on the iPhone.
| Apple would rather have EVERY conversation with an android user
| unencrypted rather than work towards a solution.
| CharlesW wrote:
| Apple is not standards-resistant, if that's what you're
| suggesting. Given their history of supporting standards (and
| occasionally leading a standard's adoption), that's clearly
| not the case.
|
| RCS is not a slam dunk. Juniper Research says RCS-capable
| subscribers represent less than 13% of global mobile
| subscribers in 2022. (They project that that will double to
| 40% by 2026, FWIW.)
|
| End-to-encryption is not part of the RCS standard, but is
| instead a Google-proprietary layer on top of that. I assume
| that Apple can't seriously consider adopting RCS until that
| omission is fixed. It would be crazy for Apple to create a
| Google dependency for something as critical as messaging,
| especially given Google's long history of failures in this
| area.
| enragedcacti wrote:
| fwiw I completely agree, RCS is completely dead outside of
| Google dragging it forward and thats a huge problem, I just
| don't think the largest company on the planet shrugging
| their shoulders and saying "maybe your grandma should buy
| an iPhone" is acceptable.
|
| Their historical position has hurt their own customers,
| android users, and the standardization process itself. RCS
| (or a different standard) would be in a completely
| different place if Apple in their US market leadership
| position had made an effort.
|
| They could open the iMessage spec, they could publish an
| iMessage app for Android, or they could just contribute in
| good faith to the standardization process. Their hostility
| to _this particular_ standardization process (I don 't
| contest that Apple is happy to support many standards
| efforts, such as USB) is driven by profit to the detriment
| of pretty much everyone else.
| frabia wrote:
| mmm I really doubt that was the real reason why you "dislike" the
| green message and that it was purposefully designed like so by
| Apple.
|
| I think this is a case of learned significance, for which you
| know that a green bubble means a message sent via SMS rather than
| the "smarter" message. Added to the fact the blue is often used
| by tech companies due to its fresh and modern connotation, you
| have the full picture on why your brain prefers the blue to the
| green message.
|
| That being said, I think Apple should have been more careful
| about making their message bubble pass contrast tests. But I
| doubt there was an "evil designer" carefully planning to make
| that bubble with lower contrast on purpose to make you dislike
| it.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| I don't think I've seen this much speculation without a single
| source in a long time...
| henriquez wrote:
| It reminds me how MacOS has the icon for any networked Windows PC
| as a "blue screen of death" monitor
| s3p wrote:
| Actually love this one lol
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| they want to prepare you :)
| detritus wrote:
| I had to check to see if you were kidding. You're not. That's
| hilarious. Petty, and hilarious.
| bitwize wrote:
| That's almost as good as the Windows Vista/7 icon for
| "Network" -- computers connected to a pneumatic tube
| (referencing Senator Ted Stevens and his "series of tubes"
| comment).
| drewzero1 wrote:
| I found it especially funny that it still uses that icon for
| Linux machines with Samba shares.
| trissylegs wrote:
| Unless you enable fruit vfs then it thinks it's a mac but
| doesn't not what model you so get a big question mark.
| rsfinn wrote:
| ...which suggests that the notion that some designer at Apple
| subtly decreased the contrast on green bubbles to make them
| look "gross" is ridiculous -- if they really wanted to make SMS
| messages look bad, they could be much less subtle about it...
| scarface74 wrote:
| Green was the original color of text messages when the iPhone was
| introduced. When Apple introduced iMessages four or five years
| later they made iMessages Blue.
|
| This isn't some great conspiracy.
| nixpulvis wrote:
| I have no idea why this comment is downvoted. This is exactly
| the question you should be asking if you care about Apple's
| intent as the article claims.
| 1over137 wrote:
| Did you RTFA? It's not about the colour, it's about the
| contrast.
|
| I wonder if the contrast has changed over the years. It could
| be a worse green today than originally.
| scarface74 wrote:
| Have you thought that screen technology used in iPhones may
| not be the same since 2007?
|
| The original iPhone had a resolution of 320x480 with much
| worse color reproduction.
| croes wrote:
| But the text was black
| scarface74 wrote:
| And the screen had much worse color reproduction, a lower
| resolution, and much worse text rendering. There are a
| million reasons to change the color than to make your kids
| feel bad.
| at_a_remove wrote:
| If it doesn't pass an accessibility suite, that's fine. Point it
| out, mock, and so on. Perhaps a shame into action. But that word
| choice ...
|
| Low contrast is now "gross." Yikes!
| rubyist5eva wrote:
| It's because the plebes that can't afford iphones are gross. /s
| xnx wrote:
| If Google didn't have so many messaging apps, they could counter
| by putting messages from non-Android users in comic sans.
| dimitrios1 wrote:
| Nice theory, but the reality of how these decisions get made is
| usually far less interesting.
|
| Some product owner probably wanted the iMessage enabled texter to
| "pop" and the designers usually take that and roll with it
| usually through some combination of boldening one, and
| deemphasizing the other to give the overall desired effect. It's
| a good call out for them to improve the color contrast, but you
| can adjust the contrast yourself through the accessibility
| options.
| unknownaccount wrote:
| When will people realize that the point of differentiating
| between Android/iOS bubbles isn't about discriminating against
| teenagers, but rather it's about security. If my messages are
| being sent through an insecure protocol that leaks my messages to
| the police, carrier, and skids with a rtl-SDR (SMS) rather than a
| secure encrypted protocol (iMessage), I want it to be obvious.
|
| They have every reason to make "green bubbles" look toxic and off
| putting, because unencrypted SMS is genuinely hazardous.
| schroeding wrote:
| The shade of low-contrast-y green is similar to the one used by
| some browsers not too long ago when an EV TLS certificate was
| used, to underline the security of the connection.
|
| If it's the goal to implicate danger, this strikes me as a
| weird colour choice for dangerous messages, to be honest.
|
| This whole "thing" around "bad" green vs blue message bubbles
| appears a bit, for the lack of a better word, insane to me as a
| non-american. The bubbles are fine. IMO, the problem is very
| obviously that kids can be cruel jerks and "not having an
| iPhone" is a social stigma for US teenagers, just like "not
| having a flashy cell phone with Bluetooth and MMS" was 15 years
| ago. Changing the colour will not fix this stigma, there still
| isn't an Apple on the back of the Android phones.
| unknownaccount wrote:
| If they put a more fitting skull or danger icon on the
| bubbles instead people would really lose their shit.
| staticassertion wrote:
| That makes very little sense. If it's for security it does a
| terrible job of conveying that, nor would it help anything
| since you're already in the conversation with that person.
| asdajksah2123 wrote:
| The point is to make non iPhones uncool.
| unknownaccount wrote:
| No, it's to indicate when you are texting someone over an
| insecure protocol.
|
| This is just like saying the colored HTTPS symbol in the
| browser toolbar on websites that support SSL was designed to
| make websites without SSL look uncool.
| MAGZine wrote:
| RCS has end to end encryption.
|
| When I text other android users, my messages are encrypted.
| When I text an iPhone, they are not.
|
| Stop supporting closed protocols and bad-faith actors.
| unknownaccount wrote:
| RCS isn't anywhere nearly as widely adopted as SMS, depends
| entirely on the carrier setting it up properly, and didn't
| get end to end encryption until relatively recently. Many
| years after this whole green vs. blue debacle started.
|
| Once 99% of phones and carriers support RCS then maybe you
| could make this argument, but it won't be for several years.
| MAGZine wrote:
| anecdotally, in the US/Canada, everytime I text someone
| running android, I get e2e encryption.
|
| Most US carriers have rolled it out by now (or can be
| completely circumvented by using Android Messages app) and
| the green bubble teasing seems like a USA specific
| phenomena.
|
| Anyhow, so what you mean to say, is that it's not about
| security (because it's present and accessible), but it's
| about appearances. And worst, the platform perpetuating the
| the appearances is not making any moves to secure it's
| messaging to non-Apple devices. Unacceptable.
| daniel-cussen wrote:
| samiam_iam wrote:
| Green is not a negative color in all cases. Green also signifies
| good to go
| bongobingo1 wrote:
| The fine article makes no mention of green being a "negative
| color", it's not even about the color, try giving it a read.
| yalogin wrote:
| The author is just overthinking things here. If anything, green
| is the color used to indicate "go", a positive sign that has been
| etched into our minds. The reason is very clear as already
| mentioned "it doesn't support messages". Why isn't that
| explanation enough?
|
| EDIT: to clarify here, the author does explain his point about
| the color and the contrast of the text. He may have a point there
| but IMO, the main issue was that it's not messages. The thing I
| should have added is that back when it was implemented people had
| to pay real money per message to send as a text message. That
| means everyone in the group had to feel uncomfortable sending
| frivolous messages when it costs someone money. I think that is
| the real reason for the bifurcation and not the color choice.
| volleygman180 wrote:
| The article elaborates, however. It's not a problem that green
| is used. It's that Apple chose a lightness/shade that is less
| accessible.
|
| Given their attention to detail in design (see the rabbithole
| of their Human Interface Guidelines -
| https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-
| guideline...), I agree with the author in that this was an
| intentional design choice that Apple made.
| afavour wrote:
| I don't mean to sound like an asshole here but did you read the
| article? The author outlines that the contrast applied to the
| green is less readable than the blue, to the point where it
| falls below accessibility guidelines.
|
| I personally am not convinced by the theory that Apple is doing
| this deliberately (though it doesn't sound impossible to me
| either!) but either way it's something they should change.
| scarface74 wrote:
| Well seeing that every one of the authors images don't jibe
| with reality - ie his images aren't what are actually on
| iPhones in terms of saturation - it kind of makes his entire
| thesis moot
| afavour wrote:
| Yes and no: a screenshot of an iPhone isn't really a great
| representation of what you see when you're outdoors in
| daylight, for example. The general point still stands that
| the contrast is better in the blue than it is in the green
| and Apple could normalize them with no issues.
| malshe wrote:
| The author's example of the green text looks pale compared to
| what it really is.
| moolcool wrote:
| If you don't think Apple had the same thoughts OP did during
| the design process, you don't know Apple.
| scarface74 wrote:
| Seeing that the change in saturation happened when Ives took
| over the iPhone UI when iOS 7 was introduced, it was just one
| of many poorly thought out decisions that were made under
| Ives leadership.
| arikr wrote:
| The author should've included an example of a green with great
| contrast.
| sainotbot wrote:
| It's in the first image, the one that says "Good".
| 1ko wrote:
| It's there, in the first image of the article.
| badwolf wrote:
| This seems super cherry picked and disingenuous.
|
| The colors of both blue and green messages fade as they scroll
| up. Looking at my phone right now, the lighter contrast the
| author seems to be calling out is only shown on a message that is
| scrolled up. This is the same with blue imessage bubbles, they
| also fade and have lower contrast when scrolled up.
| brap wrote:
| A few weeks ago I went over my SMS history, going back several
| months.
|
| About 99% of the SMS I get is bots. The vast majority was spam
| (making me wish I could disable SMS altogether), then some alerts
| (e.g from my bank) and 2SV codes.
|
| The other 1% were delivery people.
|
| Exactly 0.0% were people in my contacts.
| Overtonwindow wrote:
| But I want to know is, who cares? I have yet to find a single
| person who says to me that they think it's unfair that their text
| messages come across as a green bubble on my iPhone instead of
| blue.
|
| Why is this even an issue?!?
| lifeformed wrote:
| No one here read the article, it has nothing to do with it being
| green but with it being low contrast.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Or it's interesting to discuss the fact that Apple deliberately
| makes SMS message UX and UI worse than iMessage.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Author had zero proof of that and speculated the entire time.
| LAC-Tech wrote:
| I'm not sure if you're imploring us not to read the article
| because the title sucks.
|
| Or admonishing us for not reading the article, because we've
| misunderstood it based on the title.
| gigglesupstairs wrote:
| Title is kind of on point too because it is indeed a trick -
| a dark pattern - which is part of the topic of User
| Experience which the website uxdesign.cc specializes in.
| Also, it would have been hard to put the explanation inside
| title without making it too long.
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| To be fair, he could've cut to the chase sooner. Since it was a
| UI UX article, HN readers probably aren't aware that it's a
| contrast between fonts and background, not blue vs green or
| green vs dark green.
| onychomys wrote:
| He could have cut to the chase sooner than the header to
| paragraph 2?
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| They could sum it up in the first paragraph and then
| extrapolate, but like most of these things they stretch it
| out until the bottom.
| r12343a_19 wrote:
| HN readers are aware about poor contrast. Eg, your comment
| (which seems tame) is downvoted and has some lovely light
| color on light background combo.
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| What a weirdly snide comment.
| sjsdaiuasgdia wrote:
| It opens with an image of two green bubbles, one higher
| contrast than the other. The higher contrast one is labeled
| "Good" and the lower contrast "Gross".
|
| After a two sentence paragraph expressing how the green/blue
| technical differentiation has become a social one, it then
| asks the question "Why is green worse than blue?" The next
| line: "The answer is color contrast."
|
| What could they have realistically done to cut to the chase
| sooner in a meaningful way? The only real thing is ditching
| those two context building sentences. But it's two short
| sentences, providing relevant context.
|
| Doesn't really feel like a valid criticism IMO.
| bombcar wrote:
| I wish Apple accessibility let you change the colors.
| pdpi wrote:
| A large problem with this whole idea is that there is no one
| single blue or green involved.
|
| iMessage shades the bubbles depending on position, and shows both
| the blue and green bubbles as darker at the bottom of the screen,
| and lighter at the top.
| tpmx wrote:
| So, then compare them at a similar position?
|
| A side-by-side screenshot of iOS 7, when this design was
| introduced:
|
| https://i.insider.com/5df902c5fd9db27769749a5f?width=1300&fo...
| nyuszika7h wrote:
| That's definitely not iOS 7. Those screenshots are from a
| notched device, which means at least iOS 11, and based on the
| app drawer on the bottom it looks more like iOS 12 or above.
| tpmx wrote:
| Should have been "the design introduced with iOS 7".
| wrs wrote:
| Given all this swirling cultural context, doesn't it seem odd
| that the icon for the Messages app is still green?
| denismurphy wrote:
| why does this even matter? As a european i just don't get it, i
| use a iPhone have in the past used Android most of my friends and
| family use Android no one cares.
| booleandilemma wrote:
| The problem for us was not the color of the bubbles but the
| issue of android users not being able to join imessage group
| chats. My family solved the problem by using whatsapp.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Basically US teens/kids assume you're poor and not cool if you
| have a green bubble. It really is as simple as that. It's
| exactly as shallow as it sounds and is not actually as big of a
| deal as the article makes it out to be.
| denismurphy wrote:
| Where i live Schools have banned both phones and social media
| because it greatest source of bullying/harassment. The kids
| have iPad's in class for educational purposes
| https://www.rte.ie/news/munster/2018/0419/955622-kerry-
| schoo...
| SllX wrote:
| Yeah no. The iMessage white-on-blue isn't a significantly better
| contrast ratio. I would actually prefer black text here.
|
| Low contrast UI elements are the calling card of Alan Dye's
| design team. The iMessage and SMS contrast ratio doesn't rank
| because there are so many other UI issues that have crept in from
| this team over the years. If the blue provides a slightly better
| contrast ratio, it is bound to be incidental and if I were a
| betting man, I would bet that someone actually _likes_ the green
| used for SMS.
|
| This entire message style by the way is a direct descendant of
| iChat AV where you could actually choose your message color. When
| Apple developed SMS and then iMessageS for iPhones, they chose
| basically iChat's design, and picked their favorite bubble colors
| and what we have today evolved from that.
|
| E.g.: [1] https://osxdaily.com/2011/02/14/prevent-annoying-im-
| text-sty...
|
| (note the drop-down menu with "Lime" selected, you can Google
| around for other colors).
|
| [2] https://flylib.com/books/en/1.463.1.538/1/
| jmbwell wrote:
| Summary: the green bubbles have lower contrast than the blue
| bubbles. Lower contrast is associated with lower accessibility,
| according to published Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.
| Tricks, purpose, and grossness are speculative.
| rsfinn wrote:
| At the time the green/blue distinction appeared in Messages, it
| was widely reported that the green color for SMS messages
| represented the fact that most cellular plans in the US at the
| time charged a fee for each SMS message sent, or had a higher
| monthly rate for "unlimited" texts. It would seem that very few
| people remember the days before "unlimited data/text/minutes".
|
| (US currency is typically associated with the color green in a
| way that probably doesn't apply elsewhere in the world. Also, the
| actual color of green on US paper currency is quite different
| from the green bubbles... but I digress.)
| swamp40 wrote:
| They also flash "Android Sucks" in large Arial letters on the
| screen for 30ms once every 5 seconds when you have green bubbles.
|
| Subliminal messaging work better than poor contrast.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| It would be an interesting test to make the green bubble dark and
| the blue bubble light.
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| At this point the fact they're using this as a product
| differentiator is so blatant they may as well make a fart sound
| when they appear if they're green.
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| At first, it sounded like a stretched out conspiracy theory. When
| I looked at the "correctly" contrasted green in the first image
| that was darker, it made more sense.
|
| The lighter greyish green gives off a lower standard, almost as
| if the Android user was a guest user or in free trial mode.
| drcongo wrote:
| This article is absolute nonsense from start to finish. If this
| was remotely true, they'd have done a side by side of a low
| contrast blue with good contrast green, but they didn't, because
| everyone would have seen exactly how wrong the article is.
| null_object wrote:
| Ye article is complete bullshit and makes-up some fictional
| examples: for instance the bubbles supposedly on a "brighter
| screen" are shown as totally desaturated and 'blown-out' but
| unfortunately for the author's thesis, screen brightness does not
| affect UI elements in this way, at all.
|
| Edit: Haha thx for the downvotes but the article is still lying
| with phony made-up images.
| martin_a wrote:
| It does affect your visual impression in the eye, though. If
| you're using a bright screen in a dim environment, your eyes
| will be hurt by the bright light, you flinch and that will
| reduce the perceptive contrast.
| null_object wrote:
| > It does affect your visual impression in the eye, though.
| If you're using a bright screen in a dim environment, your
| eyes will be hurt by the bright light, you flinch and that
| will reduce the perceptive contrast.
|
| See a few posts above where someone did the hard work of
| taking _real_ screenshots instead of the totally bullshit
| fictional ones the author has in the article.
| oneplane wrote:
| This seems to be mostly a US American thing, mainly because of
| the same reasons BBM was a thing: lots of chats over SMS used to
| be a thing, and then chats over iMessage, which like BBM, you can
| only join if you have a device from a specific vendor. That means
| that you can only be in a special social circle if you buy the
| same stuff. That won't change because of some colours, because
| it's not the colours causing the tribalism, it can exist
| perfectly fine without it.
|
| In Western Europe, South America and Asia it's mostly just some
| specific app (WhatsApp for example, or Signal, or WeChat or LINE)
| and as a fallback SMS. And if SMS turns from one colour bubble to
| another colour it doesn't really do anything for users on either
| end. This deep integration with colours and status symbols does
| remain in specific areas like middle school where it is still
| seen as important to try to project wealth.
| ahaseeb wrote:
| Absolutely but in US, you'll be surprised how much texting is
| still used
| nottorp wrote:
| Yeah, no one uses plain sms messages across the pond any more.
|
| And sms group chats? I only know about sms group chats from US
| posters.
|
| You can just assume everyone has Whatsapp here, and just
| message them over that.
| nottorp wrote:
| Id rather not exclude people who dont have an iPhone, either
| because they cant afford it or believe Samsung marketing.
| mmcnl wrote:
| Even iMessage is barely used. In The Netherlands, WhatsApp is
| king. And WhatsApp doesn't discriminate.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _You can just assume everyone has Whatsapp here, and just
| message them over that._
|
| Trusting your private conversations to ~Facebook~ Meta is
| also a signal.
| taylodl wrote:
| Using Facebook to do messaging? No thanks! Sure, when
| communicating with international friends I use WhatsApp
| because that appears to be what the rest of the world uses,
| but here in the States? No. We don't trust Zuckerberg. And
| yes, iMessage group chats are very much a thing here in the
| States and SMS group chats in general. And also yes, there's
| always that techie friend with an Android and makes your
| whole conversation go "green." Thing is, only middle
| schoolers really seem to care. I just know it means the
| communication isn't secured end-to-end.
| kaba0 wrote:
| Well, I would fear verizon or whatever much more than
| Zuckerberg, especially that sms is plain text (not iMessage
| though).
|
| Nonetheless, it is a self-made problem in the US, which
| wouldn't even make sense in the EU because we don't have
| such a high percentage of apple devices.
| brokenkebab2 wrote:
| I didn't like FB well before it became fashionable, but I
| don't understand your logic here: what is that exactly that
| you can't entrust WhatsApp to send, but you can trust
| Apple, or your mobile carrier?
| ar_lan wrote:
| I'm not really answering your question, but in the
| States, there is a lot more trust placed in Apple over
| Facebook. This isn't _that_ surprising - Apple has a much
| stauncher stance on privacy than alternatives.
|
| I wish Signal would be more popular, but it's just not. I
| can't really ask new people I meet to communicate over
| Signal because it's a burden to get others to install
| some new application.
| Dma54rhs wrote:
| DMing on Instagram is super popular in USA. Most of the
| people don't give a shit about privacy to begin with.
| nottorp wrote:
| Im tired of super secure apps that ask for your phone
| number and even publish it to your contacts. Wake me up
| when Signal doesnt depend on a phone number any more.
| ls15 wrote:
| I don't know about GPs logic, but my logic is pretty
| simple. I don't use any infrastructure that Mark
| Zuckerberg had his fingers on. That was clear to me after
| the first time I saw him.
| mmmlinux wrote:
| Facebook's goal is to extract as much information from
| you as possible. Apple wants to sell you a new phone.
| brokenkebab2 wrote:
| It's absolutely not like that. Apple extracts profits in
| a lots of ways, including those which rely on gathering
| personal data.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32539762
| taylodl wrote:
| Apple's iMessage is secured end-to-end, your mobile
| carrier can't see the message. As soon as the box goes
| green then any intermediary, including your mobile
| carrier and your friend's mobile carrier, can read the
| message and/or make it available to law enforcement.
|
| In a U.S. court of law Apple has stood up to authority
| and pointed out they can't provide the messages requested
| as they're locked even to Apple. Facebook on the other
| hand has acquiesced to U.S. law enforcement. That tells
| me that even if Facebook has secured end-to-end
| messaging, which I don't think they've ever claimed, they
| have backdoors.
| umanwizard wrote:
| WhatsApp definitely claims end-to-end encryption. There's
| a bubble telling you so at the top of every new WhatsApp
| thread.
| ahaseeb wrote:
| If that's the case how do they detect if a message has
| been forwarded too many times ?
| mmcnl wrote:
| WhatsApp is end-to-end encrypted. WhatsApp actually uses
| the Signal Protocol. Probably the best protocol they
| could use. It's described pretty detailed in a whitepaper
| publicly available on the WhatsApp website:
| https://www.whatsapp.com/security/WhatsApp-Security-
| Whitepap...
| taylodl wrote:
| You got me to look into this further. I was seeing if
| there was a backdoor - and it appears there isn't.
| https://signal.org/blog/there-is-no-whatsapp-backdoor/
|
| Given that I don't see why more of us Americans aren't
| using WhatsApp! :)
| mmcnl wrote:
| Ofcourse WhatsApp is not open source, as opposed to
| Signal (the app). You can never be truly sure if the
| protocol is implemented without backdoors because you
| can't verify the code. But I agree, WhatsApp is a pretty
| solid app.
| umanwizard wrote:
| > but here in the States? No. We don't trust Zuckerberg
|
| Completely false. I have multiple group chats in Messenger.
| The people who "don't trust Zuckerberg" enough to not use
| his messaging products are a tiny minority of people in the
| US.
| quantumsequoia wrote:
| > We don't trust Zuckerberg
|
| This is a common excuse I hear in college to not use FB
| messenger or Whatsapp. But those same people usually have
| no issues using Instagram DMs. For most people, it's just a
| cover story to mask the real reason: Facebook messenger and
| whatsapp are uncool in the US
| ericmay wrote:
| > You can just assume everyone has Whatsapp here, and just
| message them over that.
|
| Yea but that's a problem too.
| scatters wrote:
| WhatsApp doesn't have anywhere near the same lockin as
| Apple. You can run multiple messaging apps even on a low
| end android phone.
| checkyoursudo wrote:
| I can run WhatsApp on my iPhone. I cannot get my kids'
| school parents-group not to use WhatsApp. It was a pain
| to get even my best friends in Europe to use anything
| except WhatsApp.
| scatters wrote:
| Well done that parents' group. Obviously something like
| Signal would be better, but that'll happen once there's
| enough social consensus.
| ls15 wrote:
| Meanwhile, I am lighting a candle for every poor soul
| that has been pressured into installing Meta products.
| stevedzreams wrote:
| What did you propose as the alterntive?
| kube-system wrote:
| Lock-in through the network effect is lock in. The fact
| that it's the de facto standard outside the US is quite a
| network effect.
|
| SMS by contrast is an open standard.
| kaba0 wrote:
| SMS is just terrible though, and is just not worth using.
| It is plain text, limited in size and simply has less
| features.
| kube-system wrote:
| What anyone means when they say SMS post ~2010 is SMS/MMS
| kaba0 wrote:
| It didn't get better.
| kube-system wrote:
| That's just like, your opinion, man. SMS/MMS is
| decentralized, open, and works on every modern mobile
| phone out of the box. No other text messaging technology
| does this yet.
| ericmay wrote:
| > Lock-in through the network effect is lock in.
|
| Exactly. If your complaint is about being locked in but
| the platform you use is the one everyone has to use
| because of network effect or otherwise _you yourself are
| locked in with that platform_.
| scatters wrote:
| The network effect only results in lock-in if there's an
| obstacle to using multiple networks at the same time.
| Obviously no-one is going to carry around two phones, so
| that's how Apple achieves lock-in. By contrast, keeping
| two or more messaging apps running is trivial.
|
| And SMS is irrelevant.
| ericmay wrote:
| Did you mean WhatsApp doesn't have anywhere near the same
| lock in as the Messages app? I don't know what you mean
| by "same lock in as Apple". I also don't know what you
| would mean by lock in with the Messages app. What's
| locked in? I can use WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, WeChat,
| or any number of communication apps on my iPhone
| effortlessly.
| scatters wrote:
| Apple's messages app isn't really an app; it comes
| preinstalled on the phone, you can't remove it or
| substitute it with another app, and you can't install it
| on non-Apple hardware.
|
| The lock-in is obvious: if you're part of Apple-oriented
| chat groups you can't switch to Android without losing
| access to those groups, degrading the experience for
| everyone, or convincing each one of those groups to make
| the switch to a multi-platform alternative. Claiming not
| to see this is disingenuous.
| ericmay wrote:
| > Apple's messages app isn't really an app; it comes
| preinstalled on the phone, you can't remove it or
| substitute it with another app, and you can't install it
| on non-Apple hardware.
|
| I'm not sure, but I don't think you can actually
| uninstall the default SMS from Android phones either
| without having another app installed at a minimum and
| then I bet similar to Messages if you were to somehow
| uninstall that app then the default app would appear
| since it's probably part of the core operating system
| (similar to other basic functionality like settings or a
| phone app to receive calls).
|
| I don't know what you mean by you cannot substitute
| Messages with another app. If I didn't want to use
| Messages I would just disable all settings and remove it
| from the home screen and use whatever I wanted instead
| just fine.
|
| You are correct that you cannot install Messages on non-
| Apple hardware. Not all software is open source or
| available for all platforms. For example I cannot install
| Playstation software on my Xbox, nor can I buy a Nest
| Thermostat and install a competitor's software on it
| (without hacking both of course). There are games that
| are made that aren't created with support for macOS. Etc.
|
| > if you're part of Apple-oriented chat groups you can't
| switch to Android without losing access to those groups
|
| What is an Apple-oriented chat group?
| scatters wrote:
| > if you were to somehow uninstall [the Android SMS] app
| then the default app would appear since it's probably
| part of the core operating system
|
| No. Why would it?
|
| > I don't know what you mean by you cannot substitute
| Messages with another app.
|
| On Android, if you don't like the SMS app you can replace
| it with another app that has all the same functionality
| (and more). Does Apple let you do that?
|
| > What is an Apple-oriented chat group?
|
| Please engage with the discussion. One that uses Apple's
| proprietary SMS extensions, obviously.
| criddell wrote:
| Is WhatsApp open? Are there alternative clients?
| scatters wrote:
| Even better: it's a player in a competitive market. So
| you can switch your chats one-by-one to Signal, Telegram
| or whatever floats your boat.
| criddell wrote:
| What do you mean by _switch your chats_. You can't have
| the chat in more than one client at a time?
| scatters wrote:
| Yes, that's why it's switching.
| ls15 wrote:
| I am glad that the EU actually has another definition of
| letting people use what is floating their boat: Force
| big-tech player to open up protocols, so users can send
| messages from any messenger to any other messenger.
|
| https://techcrunch.com/2022/03/24/dma-political-
| agreement/
|
| As a user I cannot see any downsides.
| alistairSH wrote:
| How do you message when you don't have wifi/data? I can SMS
| from more remote places than I can any internet-based
| service.
| bmicraft wrote:
| I've never been anywhere where I legitimately had signal
| but no data. When it seems to be connected buy isn't, sms
| mostly also won't go though. I also think there are less
| "remote" places in europe in general.
| joecot wrote:
| You don't. But in the US I'm rarely in a place where I have
| no data but SMS still works. And Europe has more effective
| telecom service.
| culturestate wrote:
| _> Europe has more effective telecom service_
|
| _Some_ of Europe has very effective telecom
| infrastructure, but that 's far from universal.
| dghughes wrote:
| Cries in Canadian :(
| culturestate wrote:
| It could be worse. Service is so famously bad in Germany
| that they invented a word for it - Funklochrepublik,
| which basically means "radio hole republic."
| kaba0 wrote:
| Well, with imessage being on topic, apple seems to be
| really terrible at changing to sms when someone is not
| available online -- I ran out of internet data once and
| tried to text my girlfriend on imessage assuming it will
| just send an sms, and it just waited for like 10 minutes
| before telling me it couldn't be sent. The other side is
| even worse - I would have assumed apple checks whether the
| other half is expected to come online anytime soon and if
| not, send an sms instead. Nope, you just don't get a
| message and are expected to long press and send as sms
| manually.
| zeku wrote:
| You just don't. Their adoption of Whatsapp(at least in
| Spain), seems to have been driven by a period in time when
| WhatsApp was coming up that the plans sold by cell service
| providers were near unlimited data, but only X amount of
| calls/texts allowed to be sent per month.
|
| In the USA we had opposite plans during this time.
| Unlimited talk/text, but strict data caps.
| coldtea wrote:
| In most of the world you do have either wifi or data
| coverage.
|
| Usually, if you don't have data for signal (as opposed to
| run out of data in your plan) reasons, then you don't have
| signal at all, even for SMS, either...
| yieldcrv wrote:
| so its only an American thing because everyone in your
| continent agrees that SMS sucks too and should shun anyone
| using it
|
| Yes, thats exactly whats going on in the US as well
|
| (and yes, we know that Google has recently adopted some other
| open source messaging standard that _now_ Apple hasn 't.)
| dj_mc_merlin wrote:
| > in specific areas like middle school where it is still seen
| as important to try to project wealth.
|
| Surely it's not middle school when people try to project wealth
| the most.. kids care more about who has an iPhone than adults
| but adults project wealth _a lot_ more than kids overall: fancy
| cars, homes, holidays etc. More expensive things are also nicer
| than their cheaper counterparts but I think most people would
| be lying if they don't say having access to them also gives
| them some status boost, if only internally. Can't turn off the
| monkey in the head easily.
| chinchilla2020 wrote:
| I agree that this is a middle school level analysis, but I've
| seen it a couple times in practice during my career.
|
| 1. In the dating scene, I have heard women remark that it was a
| red flag (Android users are stereotypically poor... despite a
| large number of techies using Android)
|
| 2. A manager at my old company was advised to get an iphone for
| communication with VCs. One of our old leaders had heard
| commentary from a VC at one point about the text message
| colors.
| nakedrobot2 wrote:
| Both are good reasons to avoid such toxic people. VC's
| especially.
| sicp-enjoyer wrote:
| I think courting VCs already involves sacrificing your
| pride and doing a song and dance. Why not do a small easy
| thing to help close the sale?
| NickC25 wrote:
| Because a VC that is more concerned with the type of
| phone you use than your product/service/company is
| probably a VC you should stay away from.
|
| Imagine explaining to investors in your VC - "You know
| that XYZ company that just IPO'd for several billion
| dollars? Yeah I passed on their series A because the
| founder didn't have an iPhone despite the business itself
| being really solid". If I was an investor in that VC I'd
| sue the partners into the ground over such trivial
| bullshit.
| sicp-enjoyer wrote:
| I completely agree with the sentiment, but i'm sure deals
| are made on less trivial factors all the time. They just
| aren't explicitly stated.
| NickC25 wrote:
| Yeah, but the whole point is that if it IS explicitly
| stated or even implied, then the whole concept of a VC's
| fiduciary duty to its investors gets thrown out the
| window because of some partner's personal biases that
| have no impact on a given company or product. That's
| unethical and dubious at best, and illegal or outright
| fraud at worst. All because someone didn't like that
| someone else was using a different kind of phone. That's
| nuts if you think about it.
| yamazakiwi wrote:
| If a VC finds importance in a specific song and dance you
| find silly, I would take that as a signal of their market
| and technology understanding.
|
| Some topics can be deal breakers, you don't have to marry
| the first VC you talk to, or court them all.
| 4gotunameagain wrote:
| joecot wrote:
| It has nothing to do with "toxic femininity", it's
| classism. And no one's "banning" you from using this term,
| you're just getting downvoted for your performative "Cancel
| Culture" signalling.
| 4gotunameagain wrote:
| yes it does. It is well known that women have a
| proclivity to climb the social ladder and marry upwards,
| therefore desiring wealth etc. Duckduckgo hypergamy.
|
| I obviously used the term in a sarcastic manner, to show
| how stupid it is, together with its sister term
| derac wrote:
| This seems to be related to both gender roles and class.
| The culture around the male role in a diadic relationship
| is classist. I wouldn't use the term toxic femininity,
| but I think in spirit it has some merit. The complaining
| about what words you "can say" is annoying for sure.
| hallway_monitor wrote:
| Agree - you would _never_ see a man turning down a woman
| because she had a different phone.
| kyledamon wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32765884
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32766935
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32766998
| smegsicle wrote:
| three links to the same metrosexual?
| romeoblade wrote:
| > despite a large number of techies using Android
|
| I use an iPhone. Not for any philosophical reason. I tried
| switching to android 3 times over the years since the first
| iPhone came out. Same plan, same provider, grandfathered in,
| same house, same spot. Each android phone did not get the
| same level of cell service in my house as the iPhone. I have
| side gigs I do contracting for, I have had cases of missing
| calls where the androids have literally cost me $100's of
| dollars, phone didn't ring... just a voicemail notification
| showing up hours later.
|
| After the 3rd attempt, last being a nexus 5, I gave up. I'm
| sorry but I draw a line when a device messes with my income
| regardless of my ideological stance on open source and not
| having a windows device or even an Apple laptop in the house
| for the last 13 years.
|
| With that said the Pixel 7 Pro looks nice, and I would love
| to give it a try but I'll only do that if I have it on a
| separate dedicated line to try out besides my main one that
| have had for 20 years. Not sure it's worth the effort at this
| point.
| protomyth wrote:
| Its ever so fun to have to deal with middle school with green
| bubbles. Apple is directly responsible for some kids getting
| bullied, but I guess it works out for them since we had to
| buy some more Apple devices.
| computerfriend wrote:
| What? No. Apple is at best _indirectly_ responsible.
| protomyth wrote:
| Apple knows exactly what coloring the bubble differently
| will do. The bully is just a marketing instrument to the
| Apple executives. Normally, I would blame only the bully,
| but this seems willful on Apple's part. They want kids to
| feel bad and tell their parents they need an iPhone. They
| don't give a damn that they're just another point of
| friction in people's days.
| rosnd wrote:
| Do you think there would be less bullying in a world
| without different coloured bubbles?
|
| Do you think the bubbles _cause_ bullying?
|
| I'd imagine the bubbles are just an excuse, which would
| immediately be replaced with something else in their
| absence.
| protomyth wrote:
| _Do you think there would be less bullying in a world
| without different coloured bubbles?_
|
| If the Apple's own messages were the same color as SMS or
| other avenues and Apple made a best faith effort to make
| sure messages worked, then there would be one less avenue
| of bullying.
|
| _Do you think the bubbles cause bullying?_
|
| Yep. Its status and a lot of bullying comes from the
| world reaffirming your status over others.
|
| _I 'd imagine the bubbles are just an excuse, which
| would immediately be replaced with something else in
| their absence._
|
| Maybe, but it wouldn't be Apple's fault.
| spoils19 wrote:
| What? No. Apple is directly responsible, like the GP
| said.
| wewtyflakes wrote:
| Wouldn't the bully be the one directly responsible?
| jeremy0x4a wrote:
| The modern bully demands all lunch money be submitted via
| Apple Cash, or else.
| nineteen999 wrote:
| > 1. In the dating scene, I have heard women remark that it
| was a red flag (Android users are stereotypically poor...
| despite a large number of techies using Android)
|
| This is a red flag against the women in question, not the
| Android user. That attitude/behaviour is a great indicator of
| a gold digger. You'd be dodging a bullet by avoiding these
| women.
|
| The only other people that share that attitude are teenagers.
| So if you go along with this horseshit and buy an iPhone just
| to feel more comfortable dating, you're courting women with
| the maturity and intelligence of the average teenager.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _A manager at my old company was advised to get an iphone for
| communication with VCs._
|
| This doesn't seem very different from a Director of Sales
| telling the salespeople to upgrade their wardrobe.
|
| Image is important in business. Some people may be
| uncomfortable with that, but it's a fact. Companies, and
| people, spend trillions of dollars a year to project an
| image.
|
| It just happens that blue text bubbles are more in style than
| green text bubbles.
|
| But Google fell into the same trap that all large companies
| do: If you can't innovate, litigate.
| solardev wrote:
| 1. Joke's on them. I just got a new iPhone and now my net
| worth is even more negative than it was before!
| brokenmachine wrote:
| Not understanding that they've already been manipulated by
| Apple is a (slight) red flag to me.
| lupire wrote:
| #1 is great. A gold digger (and a low intelligence one at
| that) waving their red flag at first contact.
| artificialLimbs wrote:
| The vast majority of women would rather have a successful
| man as a mate than the alternative.
| selfhoster11 wrote:
| Yes, because Android is only for the poors and the rich
| universally use the iPhone without exception.
|
| You're on HN. Half of us use Android.
| smegsicle wrote:
| so probably a red flag if you are not successful
| valarauko wrote:
| Not in question. I guess the issue is that SMS bubble
| color is such a weak indicator of success that it should
| call into question somebody who regards it as noteworthy.
| Mikeb85 wrote:
| The parent is saying that the choice of phone is a poor
| indicator of success (likely because Androids can cost
| just as much as the most expensive iPhone and vice versa,
| old iPhones can cost as little as the shittiest Android).
| notyourday wrote:
| No, #1 is "this is his burner number"
| golergka wrote:
| > Android users are stereotypically poor... despite a large
| number of techies using Android
|
| I haven't lived in a country where text bubbles used to be a
| thing, but I noticed this. People, even people who are smart
| and kind in other aspects, still cling to the easiest social
| cues. Doesn't matter if you wear a Margiela t-shirt or what
| you drive; your tinder date or a person who you just met in a
| bar will look at your phone and take notice. Personally, I
| was quite happy with Samsung flagship phones, and then not
| less happy with pretty cheap Xiaomi ones -- they literally do
| anything I want in a phone. But after getting frustrated with
| how people read social cues, I moved back to iPhones and
| simply got myself the most expensive one, just for the sake
| of being easier to read for other people.
|
| Obviously, it would be nice to be so laidback and independent
| as to not care what other people care about your wealth, but
| sadly, I'm not on that level yet.
| computerfriend wrote:
| It's the opposite. You're now missing out on the valuable
| signal of whether someone is obsessed with wealth and class
| or not.
| sangnoir wrote:
| I have ascended to the even more-conceited plane of "I
| don't bother with social signifiers" (which ironically is
| a signifier in itself- but in my case, I mostly _do not
| care_ ). Then again, I'm not currently in the dating
| pool, so YMMV
| feet wrote:
| I know you aren't the GP, but if you didn't care would
| you buy an iPhone for social reasons?
| orangecat wrote:
| Women who are in their 20s or 30s and at least moderately
| attractive are deluged with male attention. It's not
| necessarily irrational for them to use quick and dirty
| filters, even if that often produces false positives.
| Mikeb85 wrote:
| Well, might as well get a BMW and Rolex now...
| mrep wrote:
| I've legit had 1 girl say "I don't know about these green
| bubbles" after we started texting...
| lupire wrote:
| How did it end? Was she worth an iPhone?
| mrep wrote:
| We ended up going on a date still but it did make me
| raise my eyebrows.
| umanwizard wrote:
| > a large number of techies using Android
|
| This doesn't match my experience. Almost everyone I work with
| has an iPhone.
|
| Anyway, having a good income isn't the whole story. It's
| probably also about willingness to conform to subtle,
| arbitrary social norms. Plenty of women are more attracted to
| a guy who dresses well, despite the fact that plenty of
| techies wear free hoodies. I think that's a better analogy.
| ericd wrote:
| Many of the best technical people I know use Android. Of
| course, they're also not generally using SMS, they tend to
| use eg Signal.
| tfehring wrote:
| I think using Android can be either a low income signal or
| a Grey Tribe [0] cultural signal, and people on dating
| sites might want to screen out either (or both).
|
| Like you said, it's about arbitrary norms, but we make
| assumptions about others all the time based on which norms
| we follow. An analogy from a different angle is that
| texting your Tinder match from an Android phone is a bit
| like applying for a tech job with a @hotmail.com email
| address.
|
| [0] https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/30/i-can-tolerate-
| anythin...
| jcelerier wrote:
| .. people use SMS on tinder ? I had overall a couple
| hundred matches and going through classic text has been
| exceedingly rare, 80% of the time conversations move on
| to instagram, and otherwise to fb messenger or whatsapp
| mrep wrote:
| Guessing you are not in the US? I am and all matches I
| have had on hinge have moved onto text and I have had a
| girl comment on the green bubbles. I don't even have fb
| messenger or whatsapp installed.
| jcelerier wrote:
| Yes, France (and Canada where I moved recently looks like
| the same so far)
| ilrwbwrkhv wrote:
| Those VCs are the VCs you don't want money from anyway.
| greenbub1 wrote:
| > This deep integration with colours and status symbols does
| remain in specific areas like middle school where it is still
| seen as important to try to project wealth.
|
| Are the kids wrong?
|
| When I look at my app's stats, Android users are worse in every
| way.
|
| More expensive to develop for, pay less or none at all, and
| their halo effect is sometimes negative: they might word-of-
| mouth my app to more Android users instead of more iOS users.
| denismurphy wrote:
| > More expensive to develop for
|
| As iOS developer i disagree, You can develop android app on
| any platform that support JDK you pay a one-time registration
| fee of EUR25, Google Play is faster at approving apps
| (anecdotal evidence from working on team that support both
| iOS and Android)
|
| iOS apps have to be compiled on recent Mac with latest
| version of macOS, you pay a yearly fee of EUR100 and AppStore
| review process is more in-dept especially for new apps
| lupire wrote:
| Not saying Apple deserves the $100, am saying that's not
| the expensive part of app dev.
| williamscales wrote:
| All I can say is that there are dozens of us! who pay for
| Android apps.
|
| > pay less or none at all
|
| Maybe just make the app paid only?
| vachina wrote:
| > pay less or none at all
|
| Maybe because there is always a free alternative that is
| better than yours.
|
| Whereas iOS users only has the App Store, and if they don't
| pay they don't get app.
| samatman wrote:
| Keep telling yourself a paycheck has no affect on app
| quality if it makes you feel better.
| candiodari wrote:
| You can make everyone equal (and thereby eliminate
| "status") by making everyone worse off. For a lot of
| things that's exactly the choice society makes.
| mfru wrote:
| I love how Anki is free on Android but paid on iOS. (Apple
| tax gets a totally new meaning here)
| seanalltogether wrote:
| Yeah all my group conversations in Ireland are on whatsapp now,
| but I think this is mostly due to the fact that carriers still
| charge extra to send photos over sms. It's just not worth it to
| use sms anymore.
| malshe wrote:
| This is a clickbait. On my iPhone the green color is much darker
| than what the author shows in the article. Here are some images
| with the hex color codes for example:
|
| https://imgur.com/a/7k5dMtm
| tpmx wrote:
| A comparison between blue and green bubbles on your phone would
| be more relevant. Color space handling makes direct comparisons
| between screen grabs (from different devices) tricky.
| malshe wrote:
| The author used the screen grabs from different places too.
| On iPhone you can't have the blue and green bubbles side by
| side
| tpmx wrote:
| A reasonable start would be screen grabs of both blue and
| green bubbles, grabbed from the same phone in the same way.
| (And vertical placement; see the other comment.)
| zzot wrote:
| It's actually really cherry-picked samples. All messages (blue
| and green) in the Messages app fade out slightly as you scroll.
| The author picked a blue message from the bottom of the screen
| and a green one from the top. If only they scrolled around a
| bit... they would have noticed.
| malshe wrote:
| Great point. I just now confirmed that as well. The bottom
| message is much darker than the one on top
| s3p wrote:
| Also the article doesn't mention that the iMessage blue
| _also_ fails the same WCAG test. I just ran it myself.
| bmicraft wrote:
| As shown in the image, the blue at least passes the test
| for "large text"
| gigglesupstairs wrote:
| Here are the results for your image. Contrast still fails on
| WCAG guidelines.
|
| https://ibb.co/sKfrZ16
| pixelnudger wrote:
| Your hex value was sampled from a screenshot taken in dark
| mode, and actual color values are slightly different between
| dark and light mode.
| s3p wrote:
| This is not true. I just sampled green bubbles from both dark
| mode and light mode iOS _and_ macOS and got the same hex of
| 34c759.
| umanwizard wrote:
| > This segmentation has then evolved into discrimination against
| green bubbles, especially among young smartphone users in the
| U.S1.
|
| The footnote is a link to a WSJ article that doesn't back up that
| sentence at all, i.e. makes no claim that the issue is most
| prevalent in the US.
| aoeusnth1 wrote:
| Besides the cherry-picked colors of green from the top of the
| screen, the author assumes turning up the screen brightness
| reduces contrast in the same way that applying a brightness
| filter in photoshop does. That's obviously not true - a given
| colorspace has less dynamic range if you make everything brighter
| in photoshop, but turning up your screen backlight brightness
| makes everything brighter by a constant factor, which doesn't
| change the dynamic range.
| sliken wrote:
| Assuming a perfect screen, yes. But at some point the brightest
| pixels on the screen will get no brighter, but all the other
| pixels will. So the dynamic range decreases. Similar happens
| when dim enough.
| aoeusnth1 wrote:
| Does a blank white screen not get brighter on your phone when
| you turn up the brightness?
| sliken wrote:
| I have a pixel 6 pro, and it does look like I can't wash
| out the brightest.
|
| However on a grey scale test image I can lose the bottom
| 1/3rd of the range by going too dark. Maybe the brightness
| cap is to save battery.
| machinawhite wrote:
| I just checked and there's a significant difference between
| full brightness and a little less than full brightness so
| I'll just assume the screens Apple is using are pretty good
| at that
| travisgriggs wrote:
| This article is weird to me. On one hand, it's interesting
| science about color perception. Good stuff.
|
| But on the other hand, it assumes an unsubstantiated motive for
| why it is as it is. I've worked with designers a bunch, and they
| have all kinds of reasons for why they choose as they do. I would
| not put this past apple at all. But given there's no quotes from
| the original designers, I'd go with "Do no attribute to malice
| that which you can attribute to incompetence."
| nerdponx wrote:
| > Do not attribute to malice that which you can attribute to
| incompetence.
|
| IMO this is only good advice there's no obvious motive for
| malice.
|
| When big corporations are involved, cynicism is absolutely
| warranted.
| ogab wrote:
| As noted in one of the article comments: One of the first
| settings I change on my iPhone is "Accessibility > Display & Text
| Size > Increase Contrast" for this very reason. It darkens both
| the blue iMessage and green SMS colors, but I mostly do it
| because I do find that green color "gross" and
| annoying/distracting.
| nrvn wrote:
| I have just compared the "gross" bubble from the article with my
| "real" bubble. Made a screenshot of both and used the ios color
| picker.
|
| "Gross": #7EC170
|
| Real from the bottom of the message reel: #65C466
|
| Real from the top: #73E173
|
| No issues with contrast in either case. Also keep in mind that
| those color hexes will slightly vary depending on where exactly
| you decide to pick since bubbles are filled with gradients.
|
| Not sure where author gets his bubble from but in real life they
| look as "good" bubbles at the bottom of the screen that makes me
| think the article itself is gross.
| abracadaniel wrote:
| It's worth pointing out that text message bubbles were always
| green from the first iPhone as well. Coloring iMessages as blue
| was done so you knew whether you were getting billed for that
| text or not.
| simonh wrote:
| I'm not so sure, I just looked at some chats in iMessage, both
| to other iPhones and Android phones, and there's no doubt to me
| that the blue bubbles give much better contrast and
| readability, even comparing only messages at the bottom of the
| screen.
| somedude895 wrote:
| Yeah seems really far-fetched. The whole idea that Apple did
| the green bubbles with the purpose of branding kids with
| Android phones as poor as some way of bullying them into
| getting an iPhone is borderline conspiracy theorist, possibly
| stemming from some anti-capitalist sentiment.
|
| It's kids being kids and seems like an exclusively US thing.
| leobg wrote:
| Might it might it not also be just conditioning? Users have
| learned to associate green messages with all of the limitations
| that SMS impose. Hence they perceive it as bad. If that was true,
| they could've picked a higher contrast version instead, and
| people would still feel the same way.
| jaywalk wrote:
| Correct. Users don't need any color tricks to associate SMS
| with reduced functionality.
| bfgoodrich wrote:
| alfor wrote:
| I dislike most Apple software even if I like their hardware.
|
| From Itune and podcast that always try to sell me something
| instead of just letting me use my library to mail or safari to
| iCloud.
|
| Seems to me they are good at pushing the boundaries in hardware
| and integration, but the software make me run in the other
| direction.
|
| Is there value in their software?
| IYasha wrote:
| The bubble chat interface itself is gross. Terrible. Disgusting.
| Unusable. Distracting. Eye-hurting. Illogical. Counterproductive.
| Log-unfriendly. Code-offensive. Intolerable. Since day one.
| snarf21 wrote:
| Serious question: What would be better? What would that look
| like?
|
| (I think the current one is perfect for 1:1 conversations ..
| Multiple people is more of an issue visually)
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| A lot of people won't be happy until their phone is just a
| bash terminal.
| isitmadeofglass wrote:
| I really hate this conspiracy. Before iMessage all messages on
| iPhones where green. And when they needed to differentiate they
| chose to make the new ones blue.
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