Comment by thisislife2

13 hours ago

Exciting news! Can't wait for iMessage to open up too. Any idea if this (or other future messengers) will work outside of Europe too or does WhatsApp use some kind of geofencing, like Apple, to prevent non-EU citizens from enjoying the same rights too?

18 comments

thisislife2

Reply
thevillagechief  13 hours ago

iMessage will not be opening up. They lobbied hard in the EU and got an exemption for not being popular enough there I guess.

  • nozzlegear  13 hours ago

    Did they lobby for an exemption, or is that just how the law is written?

    • bsimpson  13 hours ago

      The DMA is enforced by bureaucracy. The commission proposes that certain platforms are big enough to be regulated, and then there's a comment period/negotiation. The list of platforms currently being regulated is publicly available.

      2 replies →

  • Hamuko  13 hours ago

    iMessage really isn't popular in Europe. Although the fact that any SMS sent between two iPhones automatically converts into an iMessage message means that there are definitely (accidental) users.

TZubiri  13 hours ago

But iMessage is already open? You can send an SMS to any number and it shows in iMessage, completely interoperable through that standard protocol.

Whatsapp on the other hand does not show SMS messages (Which is a design choice that makes sense from a security perspective I guess, not saying it's wrong.)

  • kelnos  13 hours ago

    You're confusing two different things, though I don't blame you for it, as it is confusing. "iMessage" is the OTT E2E-encrypted chat protocol. "Messages" note the lack of the leading "i" and trailing "s") is an iOS app that lets you send and receive messages using both the iMessage and SMS/MMS/RCS protocols.

    iMessage is not open, and Apple fights efforts by other companies (e.g. Beeper) to interoperate with it.

    • TZubiri  8 hours ago

      Ok then, Apple's Messages is interoperable, as you can communicate via SMS with its users.

  • cheema33  10 hours ago

    > But iMessage is already open?

    How do you send/receive messages from a Windows system? My guess is that you think iMessage is SMS-only.

    • TZubiri  8 hours ago

      >How do you send/receive messages from a Windows system?

      You can send an SMS.

      >My guess is that you think iMessage is SMS-only

      No, there's Apple's proprietary protocol, that you can only use on Apple devices. But from non Apple devices you can use the standard SMS.