Comment by aabajian
2 years ago
The blue background on messages sent between two iMessage users has to be one of the most brilliant vendor lock-in strategies. It is an artificial form of discrimination. I feel a slight annoyance whenever a non-Apple user forms a group chat as I know that person will limit the messaging functionality.
In my opinion, the "monopolistic" aspect of it comes down to the fact that they tied it into an otherwise open messaging system - SMS. You cannot separate SMS messages from iMessages (to my knowledge). So, the only way to know a message was sent via SMS is the green background for incoming messages and the green background plus the "sent via SMS" for outgoing messages. This creates a disdain for SMS, and anyone who uses it over iMessage. It is such a strong feeling, that having green messages makes you "uncool", especially in the younger crowd.
On the other hand, I think the long-term sequalae of the blue-green message is to push people to use stand-alone apps like WhatsApp and FB Messenger. I think it'll be a hard sell at this point to convince a jury that iMessage is an overt monopoly.
The main question I want addressed is: If SMS messages can be directly shown in iMessage, and are not secure, then the argument of not allowing "insecure" 3rd-parties to integrate with iMessage goes out the window. All I want is Android messages to be shown in iMessage. Sure we can make them green, but at least they will be sent over the data network and not SMS.
> On the other hand, I think the long-term sequalae of the blue-green message is to push people to use stand-alone apps like WhatsApp and FB Messenger
I find it amusing that in 2024 people in the US still talk about WhatsApp as a future step. Where I'm from already 10+ years ago every single person you know would have a WhatsApp account.
With WhatsApp, LINE, WeChat, Telegram etc. I think this is pretty much a solved problem in the rest of the world, really only the US is behind here.
I hope WhatsApp is the past and RCS is the future.
Insane to me the amount of WhatsApp evangelism I read on this site. Sure, let's trade international protocols for Zuckerware. What could go wrong?
SMS/RCS are flawed but can be improved. Advocating instead for Meta-produced software is irresponsible and reckless IMO.
> RCS is the future
It's really not. It's a step up from SMS, but the real future is true end-to-end encrypted communications. Signal is the next step up, and then hopefully we'll eventually get really secure messaging where the core OS doesn't help leak out your information.
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RCS is trash. No E2E by default should make mentioning it on a site like HN an instant dismissal. Secondly it's effectively owned by Google (or as good as) and it relies on the carriers (the same people who brought us SMS). Why people want to run headfirst into the arms of carrier+Google is beyond me, especially for a "standard" that is anything but and will undoubtedly wither on the vine. Carriers will not make any improvements (see SMS/MMS) and Google will probably lose interest when they turn their attention to their 10014124120412412th attempt at a chat app.
I have two questions about RCS.
First, the pricing model. Similar to SMS, RCS is a service provided by carrier. Many carriers include unlimited text messages in their phone plans, but not all carriers do that. And that's only for domestic messaging. When it comes to international communication, would carriers handle RCS like an instant messaging app or charge users per text message like SMS? That could be a huge number on the bill.
Second, the structure and server. Currently, most carriers have given up on making their own RCS infrastructure and let Google's Jibe run it. If iOS joins RCS, and RCS is implemented globally in the future, how would messages be transferred between different carriers, different cloud platforms, and different operating systems?
I hope a protocol that has built in E2E encryption is the future. RCS is dead on arrival without that.
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> Sure, let's trade international protocols for Zuckerware. What could go wrong?
Whatsapp uses the signal protocol, not sure why you would prefer RCS to that.
This "Zuckerware" is powerful enough to defeat judges, governments. It works just like Signal, same end-to-end encryption implementation.
Network effects make the perfect solutions dead on arrival. It's pointless to complain. I'll just count my blessings instead: never in the history of humanity have so many people used something this secure to communicate with each other.
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RCS does not support any end to end encryption. Yes you can send end to end encrypted messages over it, same as over SMS, but it's not part of the protocol. I don't hope RCS is the future, I don't want my ISP or any intermediate party to read my text messages, thank you.
Traveling with family it’s been nice to use the WhatsApp but it’s ui is and the onboarding was so bad - took about 10 tries to get it working … I’m amazed how many people use it… but pretty hard to compete with 0 cost service…
Oh I definitely agree with you that I hope WhatsApp is the past. I sure do hope for something open, not sure if RCS is the solution here though.
In any case, iMessage share the exact same issues and also adds the issue of locking you to a single platform, so at least WhatsApp solves one issue that iMessage has.
> let's trade international protocols for Zuckerware. What could go wrong?
To be clear, you want to use "international protocols" that aren't even E2EE by default over WhatsApp, which is built on the Signal protocol with the help of Signal engineers?
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Carriers are basically infinitely evil all the time. I'd much rather be at the mercy of a Silicon Valley company than an "open standard" that leaves anything up to the telecoms.
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What I find amusing is that all of those WhatsApp users don't know or don't care that they are uploading their entire list of contacts (with phone numbers) to Meta/Facebook and syncing it every day.
That "end-to-end encrypted" advertising has done its job, and most people don't want to be bothered with thinking too much anyway.
WhatsApp is a gold mine of real-world social graph data for Facebook/Meta. If you think for a moment how much you can infer by merging that data with other information you get from people using other FB apps and sites, it's incredible.
> I find it amusing that in 2024 people in the US still talk about WhatsApp as a future step.
One person said that. Almost nobody I know has any interest in WhatsApp. The infatuation with putting all of your messaging into Facebook's hands is a European thing. What I don't understand at all is why Europeans think Facebook is superior to Apple.
> With WhatsApp, LINE, WeChat, Telegram etc. I think this is pretty much a solved problem in the rest of the world, really only the US is behind here.
I have a hard time believing that having multiple chat apps is any kind of solution to the problem. The nice thing about iMessage in the US is that it covers about 90% of everyone I talk to. Right out of the box, no asking what ecosystem someone else is using, it just works. And if I'm talking to someone who does not have iMessage ... it still just works, albeit with fewer features.
I heartily disagree that Europe or the rest of the world has a better system. Best would be if every phone from every manufacturer supported a modern protocol equivalent to iMessage or Google's proprietary RCS. Until then, iMessage in the US is the closest things to universal modern messaging.
>The nice thing about iMessage in the US is that it covers about 90% of everyone I talk to.
You are literally the caricature the OP is railing against.
"How gullible are Americans that they think Apple invented messaging?"
two posts down
"I'm not gonna use Europoor trash, only iMessage or bust"
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WhatsApp took off in a big way in Europe before it was acquired by Meta.
Android is more popular in Europe than in the US. WhatsApp provided an early way of easy cross platform communication that was superior to SMS/MMS and didn't involve having to share new usernames or anything like that, it just relied on your existing mobile number.
The rest of the world does WhatsApp, Australia/NZ/Southeast Asia/almost all of South America, it's massive.
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> it still just works, albeit with fewer features.
If it doesn't have features I rely on then I don't see how can I treat it as "it still just works".
> iMessage in the US is the closest things to universal modern messaging.
The key part here is "in the US". What if you want to message someone who is outside the US? To be honest I am not sure about carrier prices in the US, but I am sure the person on the other side of the conversation would get extremely high bills for international MMS messages. Personally I don't see how the words "universal solution" can apply to something that works well in only a single country in the entire world.
I don’t know if iMessage makes for an antitrust claim. But you are absolutely right: it covers the majority of my friends and family, and for folks that use Android everything still works well enough.
Why would I ever want 6 messaging apps instead of using the default?
Are people defending WhatsApp, or just saying its widely used? In the places I go, you use it for everything from contacting friends to messaging businesses to schedule appointments. It's unavoidable.
> What I don't understand at all is why Europeans think Facebook is superior to Apple.
It is not facebook vs apple, it is cross-platform vs platform specific (if you do not have an iphone imessage is not even a choice).
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> WhatsApp, LINE, WeChat, Telegram
These are not good options to have secure and private communication.
Signal and Threema should be the choices given.
It's interesting that two actually secure apps were missing from that list
What's wrong with WhatsApp end to end encryption?
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Also Matrix.
Could also say it was 'solved' 30 years ago with ICQ (OK, I know it was centralized and insecure, but from a strictly user-experience perspective I honestly liked it better than anything that came since) or maybe 35 years ago with IRC.
I miss ICQ, I still remember my number. It was my first instant messenger and even after MSN IM and Yahoo IM got big I still preferred chats on ICQ.
These are all available in the US but it sounds like you have the same problem we do. There are way too many of them and they aren't compatible.
In most countries one of these is the one everybody uses, and it works on every phone. In the US, the country is split, mostly by economic class, between people on iMessage and “the rest”.
I’m not saying “whatsapp is effectively a monopoly in $country” is great, but it’s better than the US situation. You can buy a $50 phone and use the ubiquitous messaging app.
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I don’t think relying on Facebook for your entire countries messaging is considered “a solved problem”.
Relying on any one company is bad. But Facebook might be just about the worst.
It's a solved problem as in it's one single problem that is solved. I agree that WhatsApp is a really bad solution overall, just compared to iMessage it does solve the cross-platform issue.
I would also by far prefer a more open solution, but between relying on Apple for your country's messaging to relying on Facebook, at least by relying on Facebook you have one less issue.
Except for all the US people that keep in touch with Europeans! Source: me (a European) that has a GF in the US. They all get converted to WhatsApp :')
> Where I'm from already 10+ years ago every single person you know would have a WhatsApp account.
It's the same with payment system. I hear that bank to bank transfer is still a big pain in the US and that check payment is prevalent there.
It's not really a "big" pain these days, but it was definitely a problem more annoying than it should have been for much longer than it needed to be. The main problem as you can guess, is that US transfers are either fast and relatively expensive, or free/cheap and takes a few days.
Ofc in this case Musk "solves" this problem as Venmo is one of the most popular solutions, as a spinoff of Paypal. just what we needed, to turn our financial transfers into social media.
Zelle is a much better solution nearly identical to what a bank to bank transfer is, but it's not quite as prevalent.
> With WhatsApp, LINE, WeChat, Telegram etc. I think this is pretty much a solved problem in the rest of the world, really only the US is behind here.
I don't think this is accurate. In ANZ at least it's fairly uncommon, and I'd imagine there are a number of other similar countries. I would be surprised if the number isn't 100m+ first world users who don't fall into that bucket, not including the US.
I can't speak for everything else, but LINE was not well known for privacy.
Everything people complain about WRT Meta was being done with impunity; their privacy policy basically said that they could read your messages and tailor ads based on them.
I really don't understand why people are crowing about using platforms like LINE and WhatsApp and sneering at Americans; they are not better.
> This creates a disdain for SMS, and anyone who uses it over iMessage. It is such a strong feeling, that having green messages makes you "uncool", especially in the younger crowd.
The thing is, I think it's perfectly fine, reasonable, and correct to have a disdain for SMS. The problem is that people transfer this disdain onto anyone they are "forced" to communicate with over SMS.
> I think the long-term sequalae of the blue-green message is to push people to use stand-alone apps...
Defaults matter. The friction to using iMessage on a brand-new iPhone is zero: it's right there, front and center, and doesn't require anyone to download anything new or confer with family and friends to figure out what the "right" other messaging platform is.
> ... like WhatsApp and FB Messenger
Oof, no thanks. I'd rather not be pushed toward using messaging apps owned by a company known to do shady things with user data. I've managed to get a few friends and group chats off those platforms and onto something else, but unfortunately there are still a few on them that I don't want to just cut ties with.
I find this whole debate over what is essentially the background color of chat messages to be rather silly.
iPhones implement SMS/MMS, which are both standards set forth by the GSM specification. That's the level of message exchange the underlying protocol offers. RCS is the "next gen" SMS, which is also being implemented. SMS/MMS/RCS does not support E2E encryption.
Apple then offers iMessage as a seperate service, on par with WhatsApp, Signal, Facebook Messenger, etc. It is literally just a messaging service running over the internet, using some form of identifier to identify you, which might be your phone number, like signal, or your email.
iMessage also offers proper E2E encryption, which is hit or miss with competitors. The challenge with E2E encryption is peer discovery. iMessage has made encryption easy, to the point that nobody thinks about it, but that's really what the blue bubble indicates, that your message is E2E encrypted.
There is literally no monopoly there other than Apple offering the superior tool. There is open communication with other phones, using SMS/MMS, which is the lowest common denominator when you're talking phones. That is literally the level of capability you can guarantee when talking over GSM.
> I find this whole debate over what is essentially the background color of chat messages to be rather silly.
Are you aware that it's actually so serious that Apple officially uses it in their marketing? They quite literally say "iMessages are blue. So you're not." and most notably: "SMS texters will be green with envy."
https://beast-of-traal.s3.ap-south-1.amazonaws.com/2022/01/i...
So what ? Your reply doesn't make it about anything else than the color of the messages.
It's no different than WhatsApp creating an add saying "I give the same color chat bubbles to everybody".
It is essentially a dispute over people wanting iMessage because people delivers the superior tool. iMessage does nothing that any other messaging client doesn't already do, but with fewer users.
Any evidence of that image in context? It really doesnt look like it abides by Apples strict design standards, so unless proven otherwise Im inclined to think it is fake.
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Most ads target teenagers. Doesn’t mean 55 year old joe shmoe gives a damn.
You cannot separate SMS messages from iMessages (to my knowledge)
I have only had an iphone for a few months, and I haven’t tried it yet, but when I enabled imessage I had the option of using an email address instead of my phone number. and From an android users perspective texting an iphone user is terrible, because they are incapable of sending quality photos, i suspect they just default to over compression for mms
…on a side note, the overall iphone experience is not great, everything just feels like it is trying to stop me from doing what i want. Not that android was all that better, but I definitely felt a bit more free with even simple things like how copy/paste works.
I’m actually thinking I will switch after my iPhone 8 packs it in. iPhone is now about extracting money not providing the best phone. Every app has an in app purchase. Let us have root to our iPhones so we can install open source projects.
It seems like DOJ might force Apple to make separate "SMS" and "iMessage" apps, and perhaps forbid preinstalling iMessage so users have to download it from the App Store when they get a new phone (giving it equal footing with its competitors). This would diffuse the claim that iOS is downgrading Android users within the same app.
I would prefer they just require Apple implement RCS (which they've already agreed to do), and -- crucially -- require feature parity with Android's RCS implementation. Which means standardizing Google's proprietary E2EE extension, and implementing that as well.
While I'd prefer being able to install a standalone Android iMessage app over the current situation, I really don't need or want another chat app.
End result - Apple is forced to do whatever Google wants.
I find it hard to imagine a company - that cares about its own future - would agree that they are required to implement things that their _competitor_ decides.
That scenario will just hand over the monopoly keys to Google, and we're back to square one.
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Apple is adopting the Universal profile. If GSMA wants to add E2EE to that profile then they should. I believe that there was some talk of Apple working with GSMA to add or improve encryption on that profile. AFAIK rcs is licensed out to OEMs and so there are a number of different implementations around. In my opinion it would be better for all if there was a secure standard in place - for all to adopt - instead of hoping that everyone works with google to try to get googles proprietary implementation working.
I’m sure RCS messages would stay green though, so it’s less than clear that your proposal addresses the alleged social lock-in.
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The only open question (in my mind) is if Google's E2EE extension is intrinsically tied to Jibe. If it wasn't designed to eventually become part of the RCS standard, it could be real messy trying to open it up after the fact while remaining security.
> I would prefer they just require Apple implement RCS
I would prefer the US Government not dictate to private companies what protocols they have to use. That would be a preposterous overreach.
Possibly split Messages and SMS in to distinct apps.
Have the latter handle SMS/MMS/RCS with options (in its settings area) to enable/disable each of the three, such that any or all of them may be individually allowed (or not).
Then also have an additional pair of options in the SMS app to indicate which other message app can operate as a proxy. Said proxy being able to send or receive SMS/MMS/RCS as appropriate. Possibly have the default set to Messages, but allow it to be set to any other app which has opted in.
Remove all of the SMS/MMS options from Messages, except the 'Send as SMS', which would then try to do the existing fall back when there is no data service.
The default behaviour would be as now. Disabling the 'Send as SMS' option would keep Messages and SMS as two distinct services, and one could then run the that way. Further flipping the config in SMS would allow any other app to be the preferred primary contact point.
I'm not sure how one would handle 'Group Chats' in such a situation.
With such a situation, I'd split the two and operate as distinct systems, iMessages in its own app, SMS/MMS/RCS in the SMS app, all other message facilities confined to their own playpen.
I know some relatives who would prefer to keep the proposed defaults such that everything appears in the Messages app.
The DOJ can’t really force Apple to do anything here without a consent decree, and with the case they just filed I’ll be surprised if they even get that much. Although, who knows, maybe a New Jersey district court will be a friendlier jurisdiction for this spaghetti case.
Man that would so awesome. The lack of control over what I'm actually sending the message on is annoying as hell on iPhone's. I want to explictly send and receive SMSes at points.
So in order to protect users from a beneficial service they like, the DOJ would force Apple to gut the user experience?
I hope the UX changes are limited to that extent, yes. I’m concerned about another cookie banner unintended consequences situation.
The annoying thing about any other messaging service except SMS is that if you're out in BFE, as long as you can ping a tower, you can get a message out ... or in.
> that person will limit the messaging functionality
Don't have an iPhone -- what functionality do they limit?
The person not using iMessage doesn't limit anything, in most cases, now that RCS is a thing on most Androids. Apple is the one that breaks the experience for everyone and then implies it was the non-iMessage user.
- reacting to messages/replying to messages
- sending messages over data (obviously)
questions: "reacting to messages"
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The main thing I miss about having an iPhone is the ability to send full resolution pictures and videos over iMessage. In practice, SMS and MMS are seriously limited in the size of files they can send.
Do you not have Android with RCS?
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It falls back to plain ol SMS/MMS. So any features newer than 2008 or so.
> This creates a disdain for SMS, and anyone who uses it over iMessage. It is such a strong feeling, that having green messages makes you "uncool", especially in the younger crowd.
When iMessage was introduced it was at a time SMS and MMS incurred extra charges, or, at best, came out of a fixed monthly allowance.
Making the user aware of whether they were using SMS/MMS or iMessage was actually a technically important feature, not a way to shame Android users.
emphasis on "was". but we're much farther away from those times than we are to when sms more or less became unlimited on every major network.
Is there any reason to change the colours now?
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How about when you send a video or photos between iPhone and android the quality is abysmal. That is apples doing.
I’d also add that because the carriers SMS is so terrible it was easy for Apple…
My guess is even if iMessage bubbles were green, the sheer horribleness of SMS would still make communicating with Android a second class experience in a way everyone found frustrating. Sure RCS might make that better (I’m skeptical — standards support in the Android ecosystem is very inconsistent and varying in quality), but it’s a decade late. The basic argument is: Apple can’t make anything better for iPhone users until they can make it a standard for every mobile computing platform and competing service provider. About as absurd as it sounds.
>Sure RCS might make that better (I’m skeptical — standards support in the Android ecosystem is very inconsistent and varying in quality)
Maybe, but my old mom and her old Huawei phone works with zero problems with my brand new OnePlus and whatever mix of phones her friends have. All of them on RCS. The only one that has a problem is a friend with an iPhone that cannot receive images in the size everyone else shares them in. No-one here uses zuckerware - it is all SMS (IE. all RCS except for the few that likes old style Nokias so they get it as a SMS).
The blue background isn't lock-in -- it's branding and fashion. It's labeling the in-group and the out-group. The cool kids with their Nike shoes and the kids who got their shoes from Payless Shoe Store. The Abercrombie & Fitch wearing kids vs Costco or Walmart wearing kids.
The sooner it can be learned that a symbol on a shoe is ... kind of a silly status symbol, the better. Same with blue background or blue check mark.
When iMessage was introduced it was at a time SMS and MMS incurred extra charges, or, at best, came out of a fixed monthly allowance.
Making the user aware of whether they were using SMS/MMS or iMessage was actually a technically important feature, not as a status symbol.
At the time most everyone was on verizon which gave free in network sms and mms regardless of your plan. Social pressure at least in my area was therefore huge to get on verizon in particular since it was more dominant. Then that stopped once everyone had unlimited texting from any carrier.
I fear that's a losing battle. Forming cliques seems to be basic human behavior. It's not so much about the status symbol itself, as it's about being able to "other" people for whatever reason du jour.
This seems especially true for children, who lack the maturity to judge social interaction less superficially. Not saying adults are immune to this sort of thing, of course.
This strategy doesn't work in all the other more sophisticated markets, where WhatsApp/Telegram/FB Messenger/etc are the most popular communication apps.
Time and again seems to be US-only curiosity.
It's not artificial. SMS is terrible on its own, and that's none of Apple's fault. It's not like Android users are getting together and happily having SMS/RCS group chats.
> It's not artificial. SMS is terrible on its own, and that's none of Apple's fault. It's not like Android users are getting together and happily having SMS/RCS group chats.
What? RCS is a real thing that works between Android users. It is Apple's choice to not support (or contribute to it or improve the standard) it because it locks people in and creates a very cozy, very real in-group sentiment.
RCS doesn't work well in practice. Android group chats happen on WhatsApp, not on RCS.
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SMS is inferior to imessage, and less secure, so color coding helps
> You cannot separate SMS messages from iMessages (to my knowledge)
You can message iCloud accounts without a phone number using only the email address
That’s not Apple’s doing. They introduced iMessage as a direct result of telecom companies charging customers for text messages a la carte. If DoJ has issues with those blue bubbles then they should’ve sued telecom back then. This entire suit is a joke.
The problem isn't the messaging service, the problem is the artificial hardware requirement in order to use it. Second would be the inability to make another app the primary/default once you have said hardware.
That’s not what antitrust is about. Functionally speaking, you would not be able to prove there’s economic harm. Apple’s share of smartphone does not even compare to MSFT’s share of PC back in 90/00s.
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Remember everyone, your bubbles are green because you have an iPhone, not because the person you are texting has an Android.
Agree, but its also more importantly the (...) bubbles that people have become addicted to. Green doesnt show that.
So when you see (...) and then it goes away and comes back a bunch of times - peoples fear and anxieties project into that (...) -- and its that fear dopamine that people are addicted to wrt to gree/blue...
where people are annoyed at green when they basically send a UDP txt - whereas blue is a TCP txt, so to speak...
What I want to know is how there’s any legal basis to compel any business to implement and service specific, arbitrary software features. It would be one thing if there were a law that mandated a class of messaging apps interoperate on a certain standard if they use certain regulated communication networks. But “Apple messages must implement interoperability with Android messages” feels very hamfisted as an expression of that, and doesn’t strike me as legally defensible.
Sure it is. Anti-trust law gives the government (assuming they prevail in court) broad authority to require that a specific company take specific, tailored actions that the government believes will make it so the company can't abuse its market position to harm consumers anymore.
There's a long history of this, with Microsoft being a fairly recent, famous example.
I think you’re responding to a more basic question than I posed. I think I made it clear I understand the government can compel actions…
> that the government believes will make it so the company can't abuse its market position to harm consumers anymore
… and that I don’t believe “Apple must support Android messages” is that.
Since you mention Microsoft, I think it would be equally indefensible if the government had ordered “Microsoft must create a Windows Subsystem for Linux” as a remedy for their market abuse. Or a much closer analogy, “Microsoft must create a Windows Subsystem for Macintosh”.
I would find it much more compelling if the order were something like “Microsoft must maintain stable interfaces for Linux and/or Macintosh vendors to produce a functioning Windows Subsystem”. But it seems pretty absurd to me that the government could just mandate arbitrary labor on arbitrary products on behalf of their competitors.
In all of these arguments, I haven't heard about any harmed consumer yet. Half the things Apple is accused of actually benefit customers, at least in my opinion.
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There isn't, but the way anti-trust works it more or less says "You need to do X by Y date". That X usually nudges a path or least resistance towards iplementing and servicing a new feature (or undoing chokeholds on old features), but as we see with the DMA Apple can play with loopholes for months before getting with the program.
To your example (and excuse my lack of sound legalese), they wouldn't say "Apple must implement RCS", they would say "Apple must allow for an cross-compatible solution" or "Apple must document XYZ features keeping competitors from implementing a proper iMessage alternative".
They don't even need to mandate anything. They need to neuter intellectual property, unambiguously legalize reverse engineering and circumvention, and make it illegal for corporations to retaliate against consumers who exercise those rights. Then all this stuff will happen on its own via adversarial interoperability.
Want to use a custom client to connect to some service? Want to bridge two rival networks? Such things should be our rights.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interopera...
>unambiguously legalize reverse engineering and circumvention
That'll never happen. It basically opens the door for all kinds of malicious activity that can go unpunished. From Malware to distributing decryption mechanisms for sensitive information. It's pretty important for some of that stuff to be stopped at its root.
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This is much more reasonable IMO.
god damn, just use whatsapp
> The blue background on messages sent between two iMessage users has to be one of the most brilliant vendor lock-in strategies. It is an artificial form of discrimination.
This is, always has been, and will always remain bullshit.
The problem isn't the blue vs green background. It would be the same if the backgrounds were purple and gold, red and gray, or just both blue.
The problem is the different capabilities between SMS and iMessage. And because those capabilities are different, it is useful and productive to communicate that in a clear, but unobtrusive way—like making their message bubbles different colors.
Apple doesn't control the featureset of SMS.
Well, sure, "green and blue background" is a proxy for "SMS capabilites and iMessage capabilities".
People aren't protesting the actual primary colors of green or blue.
And when iMessage was introduced it was at a time SMS and MMS incurred extra charges, or, at best, came out of a fixed monthly allowance.
Making the user aware of whether they were using SMS/MMS or iMessage was actually a technically important feature so the user could understand if/how they would be charged.
> Apple doesn't control the featureset of SMS.
Interoperability doesn't have to be through SMS. Apple could allow other developers to implement the iMessage protocol.
> Apple doesn't control the featureset of SMS.
If they control how SMS is received and displayed, they absolutely do control the featureset of SMS. On Android it's trivial to use different SMS apps, the receiver gets to decide how, if at all, they'll be separated.
Apple cannot add typing notifications, end-to-end encryption, and reaction support to SMS.
Apple does not control the featureset of SMS.
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> The main question I want addressed is: If SMS messages can be directly shown in iMessage, and are not secure, then the argument of not allowing "insecure" 3rd-parties to integrate with iMessage goes out the window. All I want is Android messages to be shown in iMessage. Sure we can make them green, but at least they will be sent over the data network and not SMS.
There’s the Messages app and the iMessage protocol — two different things. How would Apple allow messages from Android that are not SMS? That’s by adding RCS support, which is coming later this year. It still won’t have end to end encryption (like the iMessage protocol does) because Apple isn’t going to support (as of now) the proprietary and closed extensions Google has developed for RCS. Any Android message that comes over the data network will have to have some sort of encryption. Otherwise SMS is just fine, as it is today.
> How would Apple allow messages from Android that are not SMS?
Quite easily: by releasing a standalone iMessage app on Android. The Beeper folks have shown this of course can be done (even if Apple doesn't like it and blocks them).
Doing this would certainly be orders of magnitude easier than implementing RCS. It's quite telling that Apple still wants to maintain iMessage as iOS-only. And if Apple doesn't work with Google to implement the E2EE extension (assuming Google is reasonable about it), that tells us all we need to know (and should have already known): Apple doesn't actually care about their users and user privacy. They just care about their market position and "prestige", and want to maintain these silly "class divisions".
> The Beeper folks have shown this of course can be done (even if Apple doesn't like it and blocks them).
They hacked together a solution that “quite easily” exposed your private comms to them..
> It's quite telling that Apple still wants to maintain iMessage as iOS-only.
Also iMessage also works on macs and ipads, Apple Watches, and maybe Vision Pro (haven’t looked)
> And if Apple doesn't work with Google to implement the E2EE extension (assuming Google is reasonable about it), that tells us all we need to know
Apple is implementing the Universal profile. Instead of forcing companies to rely on google, GSMA can improve that profile.
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>It still won’t have end to end encryption (like the iMessage protocol does)
If Apple can access it in any way (which they can) then it is not real E2EE.