[kagenouta]

Not within the spec. Which was sort of the point I was (poorly) trying to make - that it's a huge caveat, but otherwise a decent fallback if and when that changes.

Google is adding an implementation into Messages, and it's honestly not a critical problem if OS vendors are supporting it at that level, but there's still too much we don't know about it imo. Will that be supported by iOS, if and when it supports RCS at all? Will it work for third-party clients, if and when Android gets APIs?

I'm not sure how much optimism I have that this will be anything other than a fragmented mess in the short term.

[toast0]

The only thing getting RCS any real traction is Google seems to be pushing it in their SMS application, and is now running an RCS server for everyone (or something).

Which basically means, instead of having a federated mess as designed to replace the federated mess of SMS and MMS, we'll get a Google mess, maybe. But if Google was any good at making messenger apps, maybe enough people would use one of them that it wouldn't be killed.

[kagenouta]

Which just sort of loops back to how if Web-based chat had a spec with meaningful user traction we wouldn't have any real use for RCS in the first place.

Also how XMPP could have been that spec, if Google hadn't decided when launching (the first version of) Hangouts to go full Ayn Rand while doing it.