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Apple using iMessage as a moat, and locking it to their platform, and including it as a built in, is pissing off a lot of other competitors. Microsoft got smack

Apple using iMessage as a moat, and locking it to their platform, and including it as a built in, is pissing off a lot of other competitors. Microsoft got smacked for this kind of behavior in the 90s (albeit, they acted a lot more egregiously). Apple purposefully degrades major features of their chat app when SMS users are onboard. They will be adopting RCS, which will address a lot of this and probably take a lot of pressure off them. When you have that much of a market, it becomes way more complicated than "their servers, their devices, their rules"

chongli 3y ago
Google had the chance to solve this problem a long time ago. How many different chat protocols have they killed off? It’s not Apple’s fault that Google can’t sustain a product past one promotion cycle of the lead.
- genocidicbunny 3y ago
  Help, help, Google! Save us from Apple! It's neither up to Google, nor should be left to them, to 'solve' this. We the people should be perfectly capable of telling Apple to do better without needing Google in our corner.
  - chongli 3y ago
    What's in it for Apple? Why should Apple subsidize Android users?
    - genocidicbunny 3y ago
      Well, right now, there's nothing, but there's also nothing stopping us as a society from imposing costs on Apple that are far higher than the cost to 'subsidize android users'.
      - chongli 3y ago
        Why would I, as a member of society, want to impose costs on one company in an industry and not on their competitors? That’s picking favourites! Either force all the companies to work together on a standard or stay hands off!
        genocidicbunny 3y ago
        > Why would I, as a member of society, want to impose costs on one company in an industry and not on their competitors? ...Because I like their competitors, and not them? I don't really have any obligation to be even-handed.
        chongli 3y ago
        I think you do if you're talking about changing public policy (law-making). Or maybe you're not doing that and just trying to create pressure from the buying public. Fair enough. In that case, why should Apple listen to you? You're not their customer. You've admitted that you don't like them as a company, so you'd never buy their products. They have no reason to listen to anything you say. Likewise for anyone who agrees with you (other people who don't like Apple or their products). If you're hoping to get people who do like Apple products on your side, well, good luck with that. These people tend to be quite happy with their purchases, and happy with iMessage in general. I have no problems messaging Android users on my phone. It makes no difference whatsoever to me whether Apple releases iMessage for Android or not, so why should I put pressure on Apple to do that? I'd rather they put the effort into improving the products I use.
        genocidicbunny 3y ago
        I think you're spinning this into a bigger topic than I was. I was (with a not insignificant amount of snark) pointing out that we shouldn't be relying on Google to save us -- we the people as a society have the power to ultimately dictate terms. And that ultimately, the rules are made up and the points don't matter.
zer00eyz 3y ago
>> Microsoft got smacked for this kind of behavior in the 90s (albeit, they acted a lot more egregiously). If apple were blocking Signal, or if apple screwed up SMS this might be a comparison. > Apple purposefully degrades major features of their chat app when SMS users are onboard. Does sms work? The iMessage features, and more so the ones that use their infra are their walled garden.... just because they are in the same app as SMS doesn't grant some magical right for any one to use them... >>> When you have that much of a market, it becomes way more complicated than "their servers, their devices, their rules" 57 percent US 30 globally is not a moat, its first mover advantage, and its on a premium product. And if apple had 90%, and still allowed for Signal, and complied with SMS you would be hard pressed to get iMessage access to raise to the levels of the DOJ and anti trust measures.
- parl_match 3y ago
  Features like group chats and image sharing are barely useful on SMS. There is no encryption either. > 57 percent US 30 globally is not a moat, its first mover advantage, and its on a premium product. And if apple had 90%, and still allowed for Signal, and complied with SMS you would be hard pressed to get iMessage access to raise to the levels of the DOJ and anti trust measures. Those are still huge numbers and way more people using their product than microsoft had in the 90s. I don't even think Apple needs to open iMessage, they just need to support RCS (which the EU is forcing them to do), and most complaints will go away.
  - hedora 3y ago
    There’s no encryption in rcs (in practice) and it doesn’t support many of the things iMessage does. Google and the carriers could have worked together to produce a non-terrible iMessage-style protocol, and could have released an iOS app that supported it. They chose not to do either of those things, and now they’re whining about the outcome.
twoodfin 3y ago
At the time, Microsoft had something like 94% market share for personal computer operating systems.
inferiorhuman 3y ago
> Apple purposefully degrades major You realize that limits on MMS attachments are handed down and enforced by the carriers and not Apple, right? https://www.verizon.com/support/knowledge-base-14641/ https://www.verizon.com/support/knowledge-base-14641/ https://support.twilio.com/hc/en-us/articles/360018832773-Twilio-Programmable-SMS-Supported-File-Types-and-Size-Limits-for-MMS-Media-Messages https://support.twilio.com/hc/en-us/articles/360018832773-Tw...
- yencabulator 3y ago
  You realize that the carriers are all pushing for RCS now, and Apple has been intentionally dragging its feet on that front, right?
  - inferiorhuman 3y ago
    So what? Reasonable file size limits and codec support in MMS predate the push for Google RCS. Besides, Universal RCS is still a broken mess. At any time in the past decade carriers could've solved pretty much everything RCS claims (and fails) to address with mature, standards based technology. But somehow this is an Apple problem? Give me a break.
    - yencabulator 3y ago
      You seem to be talking only about MMS attachments, when GP just said "major features". Please understand that you come across as a fanboy defending Apple by finding a singular aspect in which something was not Apple's fault, and then saying the universally agreed upon improvement is a "broken mess", with no further contribution to the conversation.
      - inferiorhuman 3y ago
        And you come across as a Google fanboy by jumping up and down about RCS despite interoperability being a mess for carriers that haven't bought Google's RCS stack. I'm not talking about a "singular aspect". MMS supports read receipts, modern video codecs, proper group messaging, and reasonably sized attachments. These are all features that carriers decided not to implement. Your interoperability problems are an MMS implementation issue, nothing more. Meanwhile RCS, which exists solely to monetize users, largely suffers the same fate as MMS even with the so-called Universal Profile. The solution for carriers in North America at least has been to buy into the Google stack. Ergo your complaints can be summed up as: Apple sucks because telcos did a shit job with MMS because they haven't implemented Google's RCS.

chongli 3y ago

Google had the chance to solve this problem a long time ago. How many different chat protocols have they killed off? It’s not Apple’s fault that Google can’t sustain a product past one promotion cycle of the lead.

genocidicbunny 3y ago
Help, help, Google! Save us from Apple! It's neither up to Google, nor should be left to them, to 'solve' this. We the people should be perfectly capable of telling Apple to do better without needing Google in our corner.
- chongli 3y ago
  What's in it for Apple? Why should Apple subsidize Android users?
  - genocidicbunny 3y ago
    Well, right now, there's nothing, but there's also nothing stopping us as a society from imposing costs on Apple that are far higher than the cost to 'subsidize android users'.
    - chongli 3y ago
      Why would I, as a member of society, want to impose costs on one company in an industry and not on their competitors? That’s picking favourites! Either force all the companies to work together on a standard or stay hands off!
      - genocidicbunny 3y ago
        > Why would I, as a member of society, want to impose costs on one company in an industry and not on their competitors? ...Because I like their competitors, and not them? I don't really have any obligation to be even-handed.
        chongli 3y ago
        I think you do if you're talking about changing public policy (law-making). Or maybe you're not doing that and just trying to create pressure from the buying public. Fair enough. In that case, why should Apple listen to you? You're not their customer. You've admitted that you don't like them as a company, so you'd never buy their products. They have no reason to listen to anything you say. Likewise for anyone who agrees with you (other people who don't like Apple or their products). If you're hoping to get people who do like Apple products on your side, well, good luck with that. These people tend to be quite happy with their purchases, and happy with iMessage in general. I have no problems messaging Android users on my phone. It makes no difference whatsoever to me whether Apple releases iMessage for Android or not, so why should I put pressure on Apple to do that? I'd rather they put the effort into improving the products I use.
        genocidicbunny 3y ago
        I think you're spinning this into a bigger topic than I was. I was (with a not insignificant amount of snark) pointing out that we shouldn't be relying on Google to save us -- we the people as a society have the power to ultimately dictate terms. And that ultimately, the rules are made up and the points don't matter.

zer00eyz 3y ago

>> Microsoft got smacked for this kind of behavior in the 90s (albeit, they acted a lot more egregiously). If apple were blocking Signal, or if apple screwed up SMS this might be a comparison. > Apple purposefully degrades major features of their chat app when SMS users are onboard. Does sms work? The iMessage features, and more so the ones that use their infra are their walled garden.... just because they are in the same app as SMS doesn't grant some magical right for any one to use them... >>> When you have that much of a market, it becomes way more complicated than "their servers, their devices, their rules" 57 percent US 30 globally is not a moat, its first mover advantage, and its on a premium product. And if apple had 90%, and still allowed for Signal, and complied with SMS you would be hard pressed to get iMessage access to raise to the levels of the DOJ and anti trust measures.

parl_match 3y ago
Features like group chats and image sharing are barely useful on SMS. There is no encryption either. > 57 percent US 30 globally is not a moat, its first mover advantage, and its on a premium product. And if apple had 90%, and still allowed for Signal, and complied with SMS you would be hard pressed to get iMessage access to raise to the levels of the DOJ and anti trust measures. Those are still huge numbers and way more people using their product than microsoft had in the 90s. I don't even think Apple needs to open iMessage, they just need to support RCS (which the EU is forcing them to do), and most complaints will go away.
- hedora 3y ago
  There’s no encryption in rcs (in practice) and it doesn’t support many of the things iMessage does. Google and the carriers could have worked together to produce a non-terrible iMessage-style protocol, and could have released an iOS app that supported it. They chose not to do either of those things, and now they’re whining about the outcome.

twoodfin 3y ago

At the time, Microsoft had something like 94% market share for personal computer operating systems.

inferiorhuman 3y ago

> Apple purposefully degrades major You realize that limits on MMS attachments are handed down and enforced by the carriers and not Apple, right? https://www.verizon.com/support/knowledge-base-14641/ https://www.verizon.com/support/knowledge-base-14641/ https://support.twilio.com/hc/en-us/articles/360018832773-Twilio-Programmable-SMS-Supported-File-Types-and-Size-Limits-for-MMS-Media-Messages https://support.twilio.com/hc/en-us/articles/360018832773-Tw...

yencabulator 3y ago
You realize that the carriers are all pushing for RCS now, and Apple has been intentionally dragging its feet on that front, right?
- inferiorhuman 3y ago
  So what? Reasonable file size limits and codec support in MMS predate the push for Google RCS. Besides, Universal RCS is still a broken mess. At any time in the past decade carriers could've solved pretty much everything RCS claims (and fails) to address with mature, standards based technology. But somehow this is an Apple problem? Give me a break.
  - yencabulator 3y ago
    You seem to be talking only about MMS attachments, when GP just said "major features". Please understand that you come across as a fanboy defending Apple by finding a singular aspect in which something was not Apple's fault, and then saying the universally agreed upon improvement is a "broken mess", with no further contribution to the conversation.
    - inferiorhuman 3y ago
      And you come across as a Google fanboy by jumping up and down about RCS despite interoperability being a mess for carriers that haven't bought Google's RCS stack. I'm not talking about a "singular aspect". MMS supports read receipts, modern video codecs, proper group messaging, and reasonably sized attachments. These are all features that carriers decided not to implement. Your interoperability problems are an MMS implementation issue, nothing more. Meanwhile RCS, which exists solely to monetize users, largely suffers the same fate as MMS even with the so-called Universal Profile. The solution for carriers in North America at least has been to buy into the Google stack. Ergo your complaints can be summed up as: Apple sucks because telcos did a shit job with MMS because they haven't implemented Google's RCS.