4 ms·

It always made sense to me. For a few reasons - Android phones have a low end, and thus a lot of people associate them with being poor. It's simple status symb

It always made sense to me. For a few reasons - Android phones have a low end, and thus a lot of people associate them with being poor. It's simple status symbol showing off. This is stupid - I don't like it, but it's what people seem to think. - A single Android user can "drag down" the conversation of a bunch of iPhone users. Group chats are a perfect example of this. Not to mention, reacts, rich media sharing, and threading doesn't work across platforms. This is really frustrating when it happens. You could argue that Apple should adapt RCS - I would argue that RCS is technically terrible, poorly designed, and Apple has a legitimate point of not adopting it on those grounds. - "Green bubble" is also beyond just messaging. It's referring to the overall friction of the two ecosystems, such as file sharing, location sharing, payments, etc.

deleted 4y ago
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smoldesu 4y ago
> Not to mention, reacts, rich media sharing, and threading doesn't work across platforms. Because none of those are SMS features. They are features Apple introduced with iMessage, and then refused to scale across the rest of the industry. RCS is a response to iMessage being closed; if Apple can do better, nobody is stopping them from opening the iMessage specification. ..except they won't. Not because it's impossible, but because there's no money in improving the cross-platform user experience, even if it makes your users happy.
- parker_mountain 4y ago
  Well, let me preface by saying I specifically avoided talking about vendor lock-in in my previous post for a reason. I only wanted to talk about why iPhone users perceive Android users negatively. I think this lock-in is generally bad. I think there are actual, material reasons why Apple won't integrate with RCS until they're forced to, but also opening up iMessage is a very difficult proposition. Here is my speculation: > refused to scale across the rest of the industry. iMessage was not designed to be a decentralized chat protocol, RCS was. iMessage was not designed to work well with carrier UIs, RCS was. They are extremely different things. "scaling it" is much easier said than done. > nobody is stopping them from opening the iMessage specification iMessage is tied closely to apple accounts and centralized auth. It'd take a huge amount of engineering effort to open iMessage up, for zero benefit to Apple. iMessage uses per-device-keys as a mechanism of spam control, and will blacklist physical devices. One of iMessage's key spam controls would be wrecked if it was "completely open". This means that android devices would have to be certified for imessage, to ensure that they have unique device keys, and that the manufacturer is actually operating in good faith. They'd probably have to negotiate with individual device vendors for enrollment. How would you feel if iMessage was on Samsung devices only? Anyways, it's a huge amount of work that only yields negative strategic benefit. Anyways, Porting iMessage to Android is extremely non-trivial. RCS is a piece of shit (it really is, go look at the spec, the carriers put their hands all over it and it's rough). Stop trusting major vendors, use signal or self host your chat.
  - deleted 4y ago
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  - smoldesu 4y ago
    I don't know why you're obsessed with RCS so much; Apple doesn't have to use it. People just want a sustainable, open interface to use with iMessage; if Apple won't provide that, then they're the ones responsible for locking people out. It's as simple as that. Your response here is a very measured take that boils down to "don't trust iMessage either", which defeats the purpose of promoting any improvement over SMS. If we're just going to promote cross-platform software anyways, why should we not encourage our software vendors to work together? What do we stand to lose?
    - parker_mountain 4y ago
      1. Not obsessed with RCS, it's just directly relevant to the conversation. I think that RCS is poorly implemented and something else should take it's place. I feel like you are being unnecessarily combative. 2. What people want is decent cross platform chat. 3. The iMessage model makes an open interface a difficult proposition, for the reasons mentioned plus additional ones. I would describe it as a technical deficiency, and not a sustainable solution. 4. I think SMS and carrier-provided messaging is a dead end. Frankly, they're defacto authn providers, and I don't like that either. 5. Only one phone OS software vendor provides a compelling E2EE solution, and that's Apple - and they've made their choices, quite clearly. I don't trust the major phone os vendors to do the right thing - they've had a decade to figure it out and they still haven't.
arrrg 4y ago
It makes sense in markets where iMessage has a relevant market share. In other markets other messaging apps like WhatsApp dominate (and for those it’s irrelevant what platform you are on). Also, "Green Bubble" is not at all about (any and all) friction between platforms. That makes no sense. It’s fundamentally about a specific kind of friction relating to network effects and and an obvious display of difference.
- parker_mountain 4y ago
  > Also, "Green Bubble" is not at all about (any and all) friction between platforms. That makes no sense. My friends and I all use Find My Friends, I have heard some refer to our android-having friends as not being able to share location because they have "green bubbles". It's become a term that means more than just chat.
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ghaff 4y ago
I'm in a few group chats where someone is an Android user. It's not a status thing for me and I'm fine with it. But it does mean I need to type from my phone rather than MacBook.
- lotsofpulp 4y ago
  Why is this? I can respond to SMS and MMS via the Messages all in MacOS.
- ericmay 4y ago
  If you wanted to you can sign in to Messages and enable general SMS messaging from your device. I send SMS through Messages on my Mac all the time without any issues.
- parker_mountain 4y ago
  Fwiw there's a flag in ios settings somewhere that lets you also sync sms to icloud. Settings > Messages > Text Message Forwarding. You may have to enable syncing on the messaging app on macos as well

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smoldesu 4y ago

> Not to mention, reacts, rich media sharing, and threading doesn't work across platforms. Because none of those are SMS features. They are features Apple introduced with iMessage, and then refused to scale across the rest of the industry. RCS is a response to iMessage being closed; if Apple can do better, nobody is stopping them from opening the iMessage specification. ..except they won't. Not because it's impossible, but because there's no money in improving the cross-platform user experience, even if it makes your users happy.

parker_mountain 4y ago
Well, let me preface by saying I specifically avoided talking about vendor lock-in in my previous post for a reason. I only wanted to talk about why iPhone users perceive Android users negatively. I think this lock-in is generally bad. I think there are actual, material reasons why Apple won't integrate with RCS until they're forced to, but also opening up iMessage is a very difficult proposition. Here is my speculation: > refused to scale across the rest of the industry. iMessage was not designed to be a decentralized chat protocol, RCS was. iMessage was not designed to work well with carrier UIs, RCS was. They are extremely different things. "scaling it" is much easier said than done. > nobody is stopping them from opening the iMessage specification iMessage is tied closely to apple accounts and centralized auth. It'd take a huge amount of engineering effort to open iMessage up, for zero benefit to Apple. iMessage uses per-device-keys as a mechanism of spam control, and will blacklist physical devices. One of iMessage's key spam controls would be wrecked if it was "completely open". This means that android devices would have to be certified for imessage, to ensure that they have unique device keys, and that the manufacturer is actually operating in good faith. They'd probably have to negotiate with individual device vendors for enrollment. How would you feel if iMessage was on Samsung devices only? Anyways, it's a huge amount of work that only yields negative strategic benefit. Anyways, Porting iMessage to Android is extremely non-trivial. RCS is a piece of shit (it really is, go look at the spec, the carriers put their hands all over it and it's rough). Stop trusting major vendors, use signal or self host your chat.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- smoldesu 4y ago
  I don't know why you're obsessed with RCS so much; Apple doesn't have to use it. People just want a sustainable, open interface to use with iMessage; if Apple won't provide that, then they're the ones responsible for locking people out. It's as simple as that. Your response here is a very measured take that boils down to "don't trust iMessage either", which defeats the purpose of promoting any improvement over SMS. If we're just going to promote cross-platform software anyways, why should we not encourage our software vendors to work together? What do we stand to lose?
  - parker_mountain 4y ago
    1. Not obsessed with RCS, it's just directly relevant to the conversation. I think that RCS is poorly implemented and something else should take it's place. I feel like you are being unnecessarily combative. 2. What people want is decent cross platform chat. 3. The iMessage model makes an open interface a difficult proposition, for the reasons mentioned plus additional ones. I would describe it as a technical deficiency, and not a sustainable solution. 4. I think SMS and carrier-provided messaging is a dead end. Frankly, they're defacto authn providers, and I don't like that either. 5. Only one phone OS software vendor provides a compelling E2EE solution, and that's Apple - and they've made their choices, quite clearly. I don't trust the major phone os vendors to do the right thing - they've had a decade to figure it out and they still haven't.

arrrg 4y ago

It makes sense in markets where iMessage has a relevant market share. In other markets other messaging apps like WhatsApp dominate (and for those it’s irrelevant what platform you are on). Also, "Green Bubble" is not at all about (any and all) friction between platforms. That makes no sense. It’s fundamentally about a specific kind of friction relating to network effects and and an obvious display of difference.

parker_mountain 4y ago
> Also, "Green Bubble" is not at all about (any and all) friction between platforms. That makes no sense. My friends and I all use Find My Friends, I have heard some refer to our android-having friends as not being able to share location because they have "green bubbles". It's become a term that means more than just chat.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

ghaff 4y ago

I'm in a few group chats where someone is an Android user. It's not a status thing for me and I'm fine with it. But it does mean I need to type from my phone rather than MacBook.

lotsofpulp 4y ago
Why is this? I can respond to SMS and MMS via the Messages all in MacOS.
ericmay 4y ago
If you wanted to you can sign in to Messages and enable general SMS messaging from your device. I send SMS through Messages on my Mac all the time without any issues.
parker_mountain 4y ago
Fwiw there's a flag in ios settings somewhere that lets you also sync sms to icloud. Settings > Messages > Text Message Forwarding. You may have to enable syncing on the messaging app on macos as well