[dt2m]

This is a great point which I haven't heard before in this age-old debate.

But until Apple's dominance starts to wane, there's no chance in hell they will provide iMessage for other platforms unless forced by regulation.

If push comes to shove, they can implement heuristics which run texts from non-Apple devices through a harder spam filter. Spam isn't non-existent on the iMessage network, and there already seems to be a rudimentary spam filter in place.

[altairprime]

Apple could easily charge $1/mo or $10/year for iMessage on secured devices, with automatic refund and prorated cancellation if no secured device is signed in within a given billing period; and then discount $1/mo if one or more Apple devices are signed in and active during a given billing period. They'd make a billion dollars a month off of secured Android users, without exposing themselves to any new spam whatsoever, and showing Android users that Apple users have a better experience. Win-win for platform marketing and cloud services revenue.

iMessage spam isn't non-existent because sometimes someone tries to spam, gets a few messages out, and then their device gets console-banned. The iMessage "unsend" feature doesn't yet exist in any released iOS or macOS, so it can't be used to hide the spam after the fact.

[kelnos]

Hell, they could charge a token amount for un-secured devices, which I imagine could make things prohibitively expensive for spammers.

I would (grudgingly, because the whole thing is just stupid) pay 3 bucks a month or so to be able to message iPhone users from Android without dealing with unreliable message delivery and ordering, and photos and videos pixelated to hell. I have a ton of barely-recognizable videos of my niece and nephews from my sister because she always forgets that sending me video over MMS is a boatload of fail.

[altairprime]

I don’t expect Apple to ever allow unsecured devices into the iMessage network.

[unknownaccount]

iMessage worked fine on Jailbroken iOS devices since.. always.

[altairprime]

Jailbreaking iOS doesn’t affect the OS on the Secure Encoave chip. Crypto attestations of device identity can be protected from alteration by jsilbreakers.

[worthless-trash]

> unreliable message delivery and ordering, and photos and videos pixelated to hell.

Unless I've been an edge case, SMS/MMS has been nothing BUT super reliable on my phones in Australia. Can you provide a demo ? I'd like to see what you're talking about since maybe I do have the photos and videos pixelated, I just don't see this.

[smachiz]

Because the overlap between spammers and unscrupulous people with credit card numbers is 0?

They're just going to use prepaid cards they scammed from people to buy iMessage and absolutely spam the crap out of that.

[jacooper]

Well Apple is going to be forced anyway, the EU's Digital Markets Act will be enforced soon.

And fines are up to 20% of global revenue.

[Seanambers]

As an iPhone user I do not like EU dictating how Apple software should work at all. The same with chargers as well.

Sure we can all have a discussion about how it should work - but having bureaucrats decide is the worst idea ever.

[124816]

There's such a thing as overregulation, but when industry fails to act in an upstanding manner they are playing chicken with regulators. Here's the result. The way to avoid this is create an industry body to develop a standard and 'regulate' themselves. It looks bad when you do that, then also flaunt the standard for greater profit/market position.

[dt2m]

As much as I agree with this in principle, there is absolutely no denying that Apple is abusing their power when it comes to consumer lock-in.

I find it very hard to argue against regulation which is only meant to make devices more interoperable. USB-C for charging is mature enough at this point that it seems reasonable to declare it THE charging port.

An interesting - partially ironic - observation here, is that Apple actually designed the reversible USB-C connector and submitted it to the USB-IF - a team of bureaucrats. Bureaucrats, who of course previously were responsible for blunders such as micro-USB-B 3.0, and more recently, the ambiguous shitshow that is the current state of the USB spec.

I wholeheartedly believe that Apple is such a design-driven company that they would actually engage with regulators again (gasp, even the EU), if they were to come up with a better connector design down the road. Everybody wins.

[kelnos]

> but having bureaucrats decide is the worst idea ever

I agree wholeheartedly, but what's the alternative? The so-called "free market" (not that such a thing actually exists) clearly has not solved this problem for us.

[selectodude]

It's a problem for you only because you want to use iMessage. iMessage is about as far from a monopoly as you can get.

[worthless-trash]

Who else 'sells' imessage ?

[sbuk]

So every app is a monopoly now? This is getting ridiculous.

[aaaaaaaaata]

Signal

[ewhanley]

I couldn’t agree more. I like the walled garden. I don’t care if some messages are green. If I wanted to have granular control over everything, I’d buy an Android phone. I really struggle to see why some regulatory body should be able to force a company to alter their products unless it’s something that impacts customer safety. There are plenty of alternatives in the market.

I suspect most iPhone users are of a similar opinion or no opinion at all. Sure, here on HN you can find plenty of strong opinions, but the average iPhone user doesn’t care and is happy with the ecosystem and hardware.

[ghaff]

Is iMessage a "Number-independent interpersonal communication services (e.g., messengers)"?

It's a messenger but it's based on phone numbers AFAIK--unlike something like WhatsApp.

[frumper]

You can sign up and use an email for iMessage through wifi

[ghaff]

Ah. I've only used it as a default SMS alternative on Apple devices including iPhone.

[rdsnsca]

It is, I use it from my Mac Mini without owing an iPhone.

[GekkePrutser]

Apple is already not even close to dominant in a lot of EU countries. As a result nobody uses iMessage here (I never get any, nor SMS). That never swayed them to open it up.