4 ms·

This is the brilliance of iMessage where it gets critical mass- fallback to SMS but pushing the iMessage identity tied to an account that follows you to new pho

by mrkstu 8y ago

This is the brilliance of iMessage where it gets critical mass- fallback to SMS but pushing the iMessage identity tied to an account that follows you to new phones/devices. I think that iMessage network effect is a big reason for the steady market share growth of iPhone in the US- none of the competitive apps have cross-generational appeal, just iMessage.

paulryanrogers 8y ago
Wouldn't a federated solution be better though? After all email and SMS are decentralized, albeit somewhat archaic.
- sorenjan 8y ago
  If email and SMS was invented today, they wouldn't be open and decentralized. Everything is locked and centralized nowadays, since everything is tied to accounts at companies wanting to make money of of you. It's the current state of the Internet, a world wide open network with siloed incompatible services. I'm actually contemplating ICQ, it's still around and looks no worse than any other service. Matrix might be a better solution though, it's federated and open. https://matrix.org/blog/home/ https://matrix.org/blog/home/
  - secabeen 8y ago
    Yep. 20 years ago, if you developed something cool, you open sourced it. Now, you turn it into a SAAS startup and monetize it to make your millions.
    - beagle3 8y ago
      Nostalgia isn't what it used to be. ICQ, AIM, MSN Messenger, PawWaw, Yahoo Messenger, Odigo, (and 30 more names I can't remeber) - there was a huge instant messaging war, the first stage of which was decidedly won by AOL (with AIM and the purchase of ICQ), but Microsoft later made great headway through sheer monopoly force and persistence - but that eventually became irrelevant with SMS taking over as the main form of instant messaging and then WhatsApp taking the world by storm. None of this was open source. Not a single one of the successful messengers. In fact, AOL fought alternative clients fiercely all the time, and Microsoft started fighting them as soon as they got non-trivial market share. What about XMPP (Which started life as Jabber before being standardized?)? Well, that one is open source. But it only survived and flourished because all the commercial outfits were busy fighting each other. I was tangentially involved with the failed instant messaging standardization process at the turn of the millennium, and Jabber was by far the worst technical proposal at the time -- but the process was political, and when the committee disbanded due to all the political infighting, Jabber, which didn't have the commercial interests, was the remaining option.
- mxuribe 8y ago
  sorenjan referenced matrix...and honestly, that's the way to go.
brendanmc6 8y ago
I agree with you, but a hardware specific messaging app is just stupid. As you can tell by the length of my last post, thinking about this situation has got me upset. So upset, that right now I've decided to launch a non-profit, open collective organization called OOMA. Only One Messaging App. OOMA will be comprised of the millions of people who are annoyed and upset at the result of tech companies competing for our communication. We are taking things into our own hands. We are agreeing to switch to ONE service, for ALL of our messaging needs. All of us, all over the world, all at once. We are going to do 5 things, in order: 1. Choose a switch date. 2. Define a spec for the "perfect messaging app" (encryption, licensing, finance model, features, tech, etc.) 3. Invite companies to pitch their app, and/or secure funding to develop our own to spec. 4. Spread the word. 5. Make the switch. I'm going to prepare a marketing web page and (ironically) a discord server right now. At the very worst it's a fun side project and way to express my anger. EDIT: OOMA server is live. If you think an app is not the solution, come tell us why: https://discord.gg/CmdgUp https://discord.gg/CmdgUp
- yaacov 8y ago
  XKCD has a comic for just this situation: https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/
  - brendanmc6 8y ago
    Hahaha I had that in my copy clipboard while typing the post :) For real though, has any sort of movement or organization tried to alleviate these problems without financial motivation?
    - balladeer 8y ago
      I would say that would not be done by "an app", nor "a service with an API exposed", but by "a protocol" that other/most/all apps follow. Jabber/XMPP comes to mind, so does Matrix.
    - mxuribe 8y ago
      I encourage you to read about matrix [https://matrix.org https://matrix.org] - the protocol. In addition, there are numerous open source clients to use [https://matrix.org/docs/projects/clients-matrix https://matrix.org/docs/projects/clients-matrix]. Also, as far as organizations, matrix.org has recently become a foundation moving towards somewhat you described [https://matrix.org/blog/2018/10/29/introducing-the-matrix-org-foundation-part-1-of-2/ https://matrix.org/blog/2018/10/29/introducing-the-matrix-or...].

by mrkstu 8y ago

paulryanrogers 8y ago

Wouldn't a federated solution be better though? After all email and SMS are decentralized, albeit somewhat archaic.

sorenjan 8y ago
If email and SMS was invented today, they wouldn't be open and decentralized. Everything is locked and centralized nowadays, since everything is tied to accounts at companies wanting to make money of of you. It's the current state of the Internet, a world wide open network with siloed incompatible services. I'm actually contemplating ICQ, it's still around and looks no worse than any other service. Matrix might be a better solution though, it's federated and open. https://matrix.org/blog/home/ https://matrix.org/blog/home/
- secabeen 8y ago
  Yep. 20 years ago, if you developed something cool, you open sourced it. Now, you turn it into a SAAS startup and monetize it to make your millions.
  - beagle3 8y ago
    Nostalgia isn't what it used to be. ICQ, AIM, MSN Messenger, PawWaw, Yahoo Messenger, Odigo, (and 30 more names I can't remeber) - there was a huge instant messaging war, the first stage of which was decidedly won by AOL (with AIM and the purchase of ICQ), but Microsoft later made great headway through sheer monopoly force and persistence - but that eventually became irrelevant with SMS taking over as the main form of instant messaging and then WhatsApp taking the world by storm. None of this was open source. Not a single one of the successful messengers. In fact, AOL fought alternative clients fiercely all the time, and Microsoft started fighting them as soon as they got non-trivial market share. What about XMPP (Which started life as Jabber before being standardized?)? Well, that one is open source. But it only survived and flourished because all the commercial outfits were busy fighting each other. I was tangentially involved with the failed instant messaging standardization process at the turn of the millennium, and Jabber was by far the worst technical proposal at the time -- but the process was political, and when the committee disbanded due to all the political infighting, Jabber, which didn't have the commercial interests, was the remaining option.
mxuribe 8y ago
sorenjan referenced matrix...and honestly, that's the way to go.

brendanmc6 8y ago

I agree with you, but a hardware specific messaging app is just stupid. As you can tell by the length of my last post, thinking about this situation has got me upset. So upset, that right now I've decided to launch a non-profit, open collective organization called OOMA. Only One Messaging App. OOMA will be comprised of the millions of people who are annoyed and upset at the result of tech companies competing for our communication. We are taking things into our own hands. We are agreeing to switch to ONE service, for ALL of our messaging needs. All of us, all over the world, all at once. We are going to do 5 things, in order: 1. Choose a switch date. 2. Define a spec for the "perfect messaging app" (encryption, licensing, finance model, features, tech, etc.) 3. Invite companies to pitch their app, and/or secure funding to develop our own to spec. 4. Spread the word. 5. Make the switch. I'm going to prepare a marketing web page and (ironically) a discord server right now. At the very worst it's a fun side project and way to express my anger. EDIT: OOMA server is live. If you think an app is not the solution, come tell us why: https://discord.gg/CmdgUp https://discord.gg/CmdgUp

yaacov 8y ago
XKCD has a comic for just this situation: https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/
- brendanmc6 8y ago
  Hahaha I had that in my copy clipboard while typing the post :) For real though, has any sort of movement or organization tried to alleviate these problems without financial motivation?
  - balladeer 8y ago
    I would say that would not be done by "an app", nor "a service with an API exposed", but by "a protocol" that other/most/all apps follow. Jabber/XMPP comes to mind, so does Matrix.
  - mxuribe 8y ago
    I encourage you to read about matrix [https://matrix.org https://matrix.org] - the protocol. In addition, there are numerous open source clients to use [https://matrix.org/docs/projects/clients-matrix https://matrix.org/docs/projects/clients-matrix]. Also, as far as organizations, matrix.org has recently become a foundation moving towards somewhat you described [https://matrix.org/blog/2018/10/29/introducing-the-matrix-org-foundation-part-1-of-2/ https://matrix.org/blog/2018/10/29/introducing-the-matrix-or...].