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Also WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, WeChat, Telegram, LINE, and a handful of others with more than a half-billion users. Are those heptopolists or septopolists?

Also WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, WeChat, Telegram, LINE, and a handful of others with more than a half-billion users. Are those heptopolists or septopolists? The word "monopolist" in 2023 seems to mean "a company whose corporate values are different than my personal ones and/or whose pricing and packaging don't match my consumption function and/or who has a lot of money and of whom I am jealous".

rezonant 3y ago
I think you might be mistaking what monopoly/duopoly is being mentioned here. Those companies aren't phone manufacturers and they don't make phone texting apps. The distinction might not matter to you, but it's clearly the meaning of the GP. You can say iMessage isn't a texting app because iMessage functionally (as in, the technical details) works like a non-texting app, but it is the only texting app on those phones and is the way normal texting is done. Perhaps it would be different if iMessage was just installable from the app store.
- eek2121 3y ago
  You are aware that iPhones have many alternative messaging apps right? The second part of your comment is simply not true.
  - rezonant 3y ago
    Texting is a feature of a phone. You cannot, without elaborate workarounds, text from a consumer computer, tablet or other device as if it was a phone. Texting requires a phone number and a phone plan. I understand that the distinction might seem slight, but in the eyes of most US consumers, texting is distinct from a chat app that you download from an app store even if it uses your phone number. The absolute one way that everyone with a phone has to send a textual message to another person is to text them with their phone number. In the US, where adoption of Signal, Whatsapp, Discord, or insert hundreds of other apps is very small, the percentage of your real world contacts using a particular app is also extremely small. Convincing all of them to use Signal would certainly be great, but in reality you will be using all of those apps if you are trying to escape the interoperability nightmare that is currently texting. Given that everyone has a phone and they are all texting already, it would be awfully nice if we could just use texting without these interoperability problems without having to manage all of the apps, and without having to remember who prefers which one. Group texting is also hugely popular in the US. If no single third party messaging app covers the set of friends you want to group text, what do you do? You text them. Because everyone has it. Let's say when you started your group everyone was on Whatsapp. Phenomenal! Start the group on Whatsapp. Then you meet Joe, and Joe is very cool and you definitely want him in the group chat. Joe doesn't trust Meta products and doesn't want to use Whatsapp. Should Joe capitulate, install another chat app used only for a single group chat, and grant access to their device to a Meta app? Should a negotiation occur amongst the rest of the group where they select a new common app to run the group on and split the conversation history, while also adding an app that they only use for that group chat? Let's say they choose to switch to Signal, but Josh keeps forgetting (dammit Josh) and keeps messaging the group on Whatsapp. And instead of yell at Josh that the group is on Signal now, folks reply! Because Josh's joke was super funny. Conversation also continues on Signal. Someone on Signal now does a reference to Josh's joke on Whatsapp. Joe is confused, but everyone else gets the joke. Someone realizes what happens and sends a screenshot of the joke and ensuing replies from within Whatsapp so Joe can catch up, but the messages around the joke are longer than one phone screen so there's a lot more context that he misses. Joe is annoyed but he gets over it. A few months pass and Sandra seems to have a bug where Signal is chewing through her battery life. Since only one of her group conversations is on Signal (she uses Whatsapp mostly) and she is fine not getting the work related banter that is often the topic of the group chat. But then she finds an article that's super interesting and she wants to share it with the group. She remembers that the group moved to Signal, but who cares, that Whatsapp group still exists and there's only, like, one person that isn't in it. She sends the link in the WhatsApp group instead. This leads organically to the group wanting to get together for a holiday. They plan out that July 12th would be a perfect weekend, and since they want to do a potluck, they all choose what part of the meal they'll bring. A few days before the potluck, someone mentions on the Signal chat that they are excited to see everyone at the potluck. Joe is very confused and asks what they mean. They realize that this was in the WhatsApp group chat and explain what everyone is bringing. Unfortunately Joe is working that weekend, and can't come. Should the group chat reschedule?
    - drdaeman 3y ago
      Just to explain - some people may think different because they have different experience. Personally, I don't use default texting, like, at all. Except for those notification/2FA SMSes and couple of contacts, I don't ever open it. For me, mentally, chatting with people (with 2 exceptions) is done through different apps, not the built-in one. And this forms a view that default app is just "one rarely used messenger, of many". But then, even though I'm in the US, most of my chats are international.
    - mlindner 3y ago
      > You cannot, without elaborate workarounds, text from a consumer computer, tablet or other device as if it was a phone. Texting requires a phone number and a phone plan. Nitpick, but I can text from my Mac laptop using the messages app. I haven't looked into exactly how exactly it works but I think it's somehow proxying/mirroring the messages through my iPhone. It's very smooth and "just works" though. > interoperability nightmare that is currently texting. How about calling it an open competitive market? Centralizing everything on a single format would be a bad thing for the industry and for consumers. Having separate independent networks with drastically different feature sets is a good thing. Trying to find the intersection feature set of Discord, LINE and Signal would result in three applications drastically hampered in their features. LINE for example has an extensive independent industry of artists selling "stamps" that you can buy.
      - rezonant 3y ago
        > Nitpick, but I can text from my Mac laptop using the messages app. I haven't looked into exactly how exactly it works but I think it's somehow proxying/mirroring the messages through my iPhone. It's very smooth and "just works" though. Yes, SMS from iMessage on your non-iPhone (Mac, iPad) proxy through your iPhone. iMessages do not require your phone to be on, since Apple can deliver it directly without using SMS. However, without a phone you cannot send an SMS message, and most people use phone numbers as contacts in iMessage, which requires an SMS based registration done transparently by your phone. But all of this is just the technicals of how it works, to the end users it is just texting. The only reason non-technical users are even aware of, or care about, the distinction is because of how iMessage breaks group texting as soon as there's a non-iMessage user involved.
  - empyrrhicist 3y ago
    Yet you cannot set a new default messaging app...
    - mlindner 3y ago
      "Default messaging app" is a creation of Android, necessitated because every cell phone manufacturer wanted its own messaging app. It somehow later became a feature people needed because those pre-installed apps were often dreadful adware junk. This was never a problem on iPhones. No one wants to set a "default messaging app". It mixes up where messages go. I want my Signal messages in the Signal app. I want my LINE messages in the LINE app. Putting them in random different places doesn't make sense and confuses where they're coming from. I don't want my contacts showing up half a dozen times repeatedly for every messaging app they're using. I don't see anyone on Android wanting to put their SMS messages in the Discord app.
      - rezonant 3y ago
        On Android there is no such thing as a default messaging app. There is such a thing as a default SMS app, but my point is that messaging and texting represent two different things (texting is a subset of messaging) which has an extremely material impact on the dynamics of what is happening in the US, and why iMessage, RCS, and interoperability is a very big deal to users who use a texting app.
      - seabrookmx 3y ago
        Weird take. Default apps for certain file types and links (email, video, etc) are a precedent across multiple operatings systems. > No one wants Quite the assumption. I had Google Hangouts set as my default SMS app for a time.. this seems quite similar to your Discord example? It hurts nobody to have the _choice_. If you don't want to change the default that's totally OK.
    - dwaite 3y ago
      Do you mean a default "carrier SMS service" app? In everyday iPhone usage, you would either run an app directly, use sharing intents, or use a messaging service specific identifier (eg custom URI scheme) to converse with someone. The social graph is either in the messaging app itself or in individual contact entries. There's no expectation of a Trillian/Adium style app that consolidates all information and messaging options.

rezonant 3y ago

I think you might be mistaking what monopoly/duopoly is being mentioned here. Those companies aren't phone manufacturers and they don't make phone texting apps. The distinction might not matter to you, but it's clearly the meaning of the GP. You can say iMessage isn't a texting app because iMessage functionally (as in, the technical details) works like a non-texting app, but it is the only texting app on those phones and is the way normal texting is done. Perhaps it would be different if iMessage was just installable from the app store.

eek2121 3y ago
You are aware that iPhones have many alternative messaging apps right? The second part of your comment is simply not true.
- rezonant 3y ago
  Texting is a feature of a phone. You cannot, without elaborate workarounds, text from a consumer computer, tablet or other device as if it was a phone. Texting requires a phone number and a phone plan. I understand that the distinction might seem slight, but in the eyes of most US consumers, texting is distinct from a chat app that you download from an app store even if it uses your phone number. The absolute one way that everyone with a phone has to send a textual message to another person is to text them with their phone number. In the US, where adoption of Signal, Whatsapp, Discord, or insert hundreds of other apps is very small, the percentage of your real world contacts using a particular app is also extremely small. Convincing all of them to use Signal would certainly be great, but in reality you will be using all of those apps if you are trying to escape the interoperability nightmare that is currently texting. Given that everyone has a phone and they are all texting already, it would be awfully nice if we could just use texting without these interoperability problems without having to manage all of the apps, and without having to remember who prefers which one. Group texting is also hugely popular in the US. If no single third party messaging app covers the set of friends you want to group text, what do you do? You text them. Because everyone has it. Let's say when you started your group everyone was on Whatsapp. Phenomenal! Start the group on Whatsapp. Then you meet Joe, and Joe is very cool and you definitely want him in the group chat. Joe doesn't trust Meta products and doesn't want to use Whatsapp. Should Joe capitulate, install another chat app used only for a single group chat, and grant access to their device to a Meta app? Should a negotiation occur amongst the rest of the group where they select a new common app to run the group on and split the conversation history, while also adding an app that they only use for that group chat? Let's say they choose to switch to Signal, but Josh keeps forgetting (dammit Josh) and keeps messaging the group on Whatsapp. And instead of yell at Josh that the group is on Signal now, folks reply! Because Josh's joke was super funny. Conversation also continues on Signal. Someone on Signal now does a reference to Josh's joke on Whatsapp. Joe is confused, but everyone else gets the joke. Someone realizes what happens and sends a screenshot of the joke and ensuing replies from within Whatsapp so Joe can catch up, but the messages around the joke are longer than one phone screen so there's a lot more context that he misses. Joe is annoyed but he gets over it. A few months pass and Sandra seems to have a bug where Signal is chewing through her battery life. Since only one of her group conversations is on Signal (she uses Whatsapp mostly) and she is fine not getting the work related banter that is often the topic of the group chat. But then she finds an article that's super interesting and she wants to share it with the group. She remembers that the group moved to Signal, but who cares, that Whatsapp group still exists and there's only, like, one person that isn't in it. She sends the link in the WhatsApp group instead. This leads organically to the group wanting to get together for a holiday. They plan out that July 12th would be a perfect weekend, and since they want to do a potluck, they all choose what part of the meal they'll bring. A few days before the potluck, someone mentions on the Signal chat that they are excited to see everyone at the potluck. Joe is very confused and asks what they mean. They realize that this was in the WhatsApp group chat and explain what everyone is bringing. Unfortunately Joe is working that weekend, and can't come. Should the group chat reschedule?
  - drdaeman 3y ago
    Just to explain - some people may think different because they have different experience. Personally, I don't use default texting, like, at all. Except for those notification/2FA SMSes and couple of contacts, I don't ever open it. For me, mentally, chatting with people (with 2 exceptions) is done through different apps, not the built-in one. And this forms a view that default app is just "one rarely used messenger, of many". But then, even though I'm in the US, most of my chats are international.
  - mlindner 3y ago
    > You cannot, without elaborate workarounds, text from a consumer computer, tablet or other device as if it was a phone. Texting requires a phone number and a phone plan. Nitpick, but I can text from my Mac laptop using the messages app. I haven't looked into exactly how exactly it works but I think it's somehow proxying/mirroring the messages through my iPhone. It's very smooth and "just works" though. > interoperability nightmare that is currently texting. How about calling it an open competitive market? Centralizing everything on a single format would be a bad thing for the industry and for consumers. Having separate independent networks with drastically different feature sets is a good thing. Trying to find the intersection feature set of Discord, LINE and Signal would result in three applications drastically hampered in their features. LINE for example has an extensive independent industry of artists selling "stamps" that you can buy.
    - rezonant 3y ago
      > Nitpick, but I can text from my Mac laptop using the messages app. I haven't looked into exactly how exactly it works but I think it's somehow proxying/mirroring the messages through my iPhone. It's very smooth and "just works" though. Yes, SMS from iMessage on your non-iPhone (Mac, iPad) proxy through your iPhone. iMessages do not require your phone to be on, since Apple can deliver it directly without using SMS. However, without a phone you cannot send an SMS message, and most people use phone numbers as contacts in iMessage, which requires an SMS based registration done transparently by your phone. But all of this is just the technicals of how it works, to the end users it is just texting. The only reason non-technical users are even aware of, or care about, the distinction is because of how iMessage breaks group texting as soon as there's a non-iMessage user involved.
- empyrrhicist 3y ago
  Yet you cannot set a new default messaging app...
  - mlindner 3y ago
    "Default messaging app" is a creation of Android, necessitated because every cell phone manufacturer wanted its own messaging app. It somehow later became a feature people needed because those pre-installed apps were often dreadful adware junk. This was never a problem on iPhones. No one wants to set a "default messaging app". It mixes up where messages go. I want my Signal messages in the Signal app. I want my LINE messages in the LINE app. Putting them in random different places doesn't make sense and confuses where they're coming from. I don't want my contacts showing up half a dozen times repeatedly for every messaging app they're using. I don't see anyone on Android wanting to put their SMS messages in the Discord app.
    - rezonant 3y ago
      On Android there is no such thing as a default messaging app. There is such a thing as a default SMS app, but my point is that messaging and texting represent two different things (texting is a subset of messaging) which has an extremely material impact on the dynamics of what is happening in the US, and why iMessage, RCS, and interoperability is a very big deal to users who use a texting app.
    - seabrookmx 3y ago
      Weird take. Default apps for certain file types and links (email, video, etc) are a precedent across multiple operatings systems. > No one wants Quite the assumption. I had Google Hangouts set as my default SMS app for a time.. this seems quite similar to your Discord example? It hurts nobody to have the _choice_. If you don't want to change the default that's totally OK.
  - dwaite 3y ago
    Do you mean a default "carrier SMS service" app? In everyday iPhone usage, you would either run an app directly, use sharing intents, or use a messaging service specific identifier (eg custom URI scheme) to converse with someone. The social graph is either in the messaging app itself or in individual contact entries. There's no expectation of a Trillian/Adium style app that consolidates all information and messaging options.