4 ms·

What you’re describing isn’t even what the article is about. For your problem: users that haven’t deregistered their phone number from iMessage when switching

by quitit 3y ago

What you’re describing isn’t even what the article is about. For your problem: users that haven’t deregistered their phone number from iMessage when switching to a non-Apple phone: there is the option of using a website to deregister, calling customer service, or simply waiting as iMessage will release registered numbers after a short period anyway.

bastawhiz 3y ago
It's definitely about what the article is about. People fundamentally don't understand that iMessage is not vanilla texting. They know you send messages to phone numbers. The fact that you need to do a secret step to stop having your messages routed to a platform you don't use anymore is wild and unintuitive and plays directly into the argument that Apple/iMessage is abusing its market position.
- quitit 3y ago
  Did you read the article?
  - bastawhiz 3y ago
    Yeah, it's the same problem in both directions. Whether the sender or the receiver is the root cause of the bad routing of messages doesn't matter: normal people text phone numbers, which are represented by contacts in their phone. Apple doesn't abide by this intent and instead prefers their own platform for messaging regardless of what the user(s) use or want. Whether I put your number and email on the same contact and my messages go to the wrong device or you stop using an iPhone and disconnect your iMessage from your phone doesn't matter—it's the same fundamental issue caused by nonobvious behavior of a proprietary system that pretends to be what the user expects it to be. This is what happens when you recycle the same UIs and metaphors (as a market dominance strategy, no less!) for two similar but separate and incompatible systems. If we all didn't have a decade or so of experience text messaging before Apple built their own messaging platform, maybe this wouldn't be a problem. But here we are.
    - quitit 3y ago
      Then you didn't understand the article. This is a situation when writing a message to a named recipient will default to an iMessage email address and not their non-iMessage phone number (and only for the first message mind you.) The solution: one drop down menu and selecting the phone number, or simply deactiving iMessage if they don't want to use it. Why this matters: The user made the choice to enable iMessage as part of an optional set up process on their Mac. They did this to themselves, and could very easily undo it, but wrote a bullshit article instead. It's a case of "Professional computer person" is either an idiot, or not worth hiring. Also I'm over-joyed at the "very smart" people in here who seemingly think this is very hard stuff.
      - bastawhiz 3y ago
        > The solution: one drop down menu and selecting the phone number, This is why you're wrong. It's not about "using the phone number". You as the sender have no way to know whether they have iMessage on their phone or not. You can't say "use iMessage or SMS?" because if they do have it on their phone, you don't want to use SMS. > The user made the choice to enable iMessage as part of an optional set up process on their Mac. Imagine explaining to your mom that this is her own fault and it's happening because she checked a box during the setup for her computer. You can't get back to the setup, you just have to figure out how to dig through settings to turn it off. How would anyone intuit that the consequence of checking that box will suddenly start making text messages that used to go to your android phone suddenly start going to your laptop instead? That's insane behavior. Moreover, if your suggested fix for this "professional computer person" is to remove the email from the contact, that's not really a fix, is it? Now you just have to hope you remember the email address and that nobody else adds the phone number and email to their contacts. Software engineers build software for people. If you find yourself suggesting that it's the user's fault for experiencing some unhinged software behavior, you've lost your way. These interactions suck because of iMessage, not because the users are "idiots".
jtbayly 3y ago
No. The problem was that it refused to send to her number and instead kept sending to her iMessage email address in my contact. Even when I tried to specify to send it to her number instead of her email address.

by quitit 3y ago

bastawhiz 3y ago

It's definitely about what the article is about. People fundamentally don't understand that iMessage is not vanilla texting. They know you send messages to phone numbers. The fact that you need to do a secret step to stop having your messages routed to a platform you don't use anymore is wild and unintuitive and plays directly into the argument that Apple/iMessage is abusing its market position.

quitit 3y ago
Did you read the article?
- bastawhiz 3y ago
  Yeah, it's the same problem in both directions. Whether the sender or the receiver is the root cause of the bad routing of messages doesn't matter: normal people text phone numbers, which are represented by contacts in their phone. Apple doesn't abide by this intent and instead prefers their own platform for messaging regardless of what the user(s) use or want. Whether I put your number and email on the same contact and my messages go to the wrong device or you stop using an iPhone and disconnect your iMessage from your phone doesn't matter—it's the same fundamental issue caused by nonobvious behavior of a proprietary system that pretends to be what the user expects it to be. This is what happens when you recycle the same UIs and metaphors (as a market dominance strategy, no less!) for two similar but separate and incompatible systems. If we all didn't have a decade or so of experience text messaging before Apple built their own messaging platform, maybe this wouldn't be a problem. But here we are.
  - quitit 3y ago
    Then you didn't understand the article. This is a situation when writing a message to a named recipient will default to an iMessage email address and not their non-iMessage phone number (and only for the first message mind you.) The solution: one drop down menu and selecting the phone number, or simply deactiving iMessage if they don't want to use it. Why this matters: The user made the choice to enable iMessage as part of an optional set up process on their Mac. They did this to themselves, and could very easily undo it, but wrote a bullshit article instead. It's a case of "Professional computer person" is either an idiot, or not worth hiring. Also I'm over-joyed at the "very smart" people in here who seemingly think this is very hard stuff.
    - bastawhiz 3y ago
      > The solution: one drop down menu and selecting the phone number, This is why you're wrong. It's not about "using the phone number". You as the sender have no way to know whether they have iMessage on their phone or not. You can't say "use iMessage or SMS?" because if they do have it on their phone, you don't want to use SMS. > The user made the choice to enable iMessage as part of an optional set up process on their Mac. Imagine explaining to your mom that this is her own fault and it's happening because she checked a box during the setup for her computer. You can't get back to the setup, you just have to figure out how to dig through settings to turn it off. How would anyone intuit that the consequence of checking that box will suddenly start making text messages that used to go to your android phone suddenly start going to your laptop instead? That's insane behavior. Moreover, if your suggested fix for this "professional computer person" is to remove the email from the contact, that's not really a fix, is it? Now you just have to hope you remember the email address and that nobody else adds the phone number and email to their contacts. Software engineers build software for people. If you find yourself suggesting that it's the user's fault for experiencing some unhinged software behavior, you've lost your way. These interactions suck because of iMessage, not because the users are "idiots".

jtbayly 3y ago

No. The problem was that it refused to send to her number and instead kept sending to her iMessage email address in my contact. Even when I tried to specify to send it to her number instead of her email address.