[distrill]

it's pretty frustrating how "apple people" just don't care that it's apples fault. i routinely hear my wife mutter "i hate google so much!" when a google maps integration is being intentionally hobbled to keep her using apple maps. or when she has trouble managing rcs conversations because somebody in our social world has the gall to be on an android phone.

[ch4s3]

I am aware that apple blocks certain functionality to maintain a cohesive and secure experience. It is THE reason I buy their products, I want the curation. Otherwise I'd buy an android device.

[Lio]

> I am aware that apple blocks certain functionality to maintain a cohesive and secure experience.

The argument is that they don't do it to maintain a secure experience but to stop competitors having feature parity with their products.

Personally, I find it annoying that my Garmin watch cannot reply to text messages on my iPhone.

I also find it annoying that my iPhone nags me to cut access to my watch to stop it getting weather updates. It doesn't even nag me the once but repeatedly.

It would be one thing if Apple even competed on features with Garmin but they don't.

[captainmuon]

That's their justification. I never had security problems on Android, and I actually find Android to be more cohesive. Just a few things where iOS is uncohesive to me: You can customize the keyboard, but it will not work everywhere the same. Apps will send you randomly through hoops to click some permissions things in settings. App settings are sometimes centralized, sometimes in the app. There is no single way to "back" to the previous screen.

I actually switched to an iPhone some time ago and was expecting it to be like you said. But I was shocked that iOS is actually less coherent and a mess in some places, and the App store could be curated better. To be honest the reason I still use it is because the hardware is really good and because it is pretty.

[ch4s3]

That’s fine then, there clearly exists an open alternative that works for people.

[Volundr]

That's all well and good. Opting into that knowingly is a reasonable decision. Hopefully knowing you've opted into that you aren't then cursing Google when they don't support some functionality blocked by Apple, or when RCS is poorly supported, but instead recognizing this as a trade-off you made opting into the Apple closed garden.

[basisword]

The reason Apple Maps even exists is because Google intentionally crippled their Maps app on iPhone in order to benefit their own OS.

The reason Google loves RCS is because they spectacularly failed 4 or 5 times at introducing their own iMessage competitors.

Competing companies often act in their best interests. And both Google and Apple offer OS’s which have very different value systems. I think that’s good for consumers. If I want open (and all the pros and cons that come with that) I can buy an Android phone. If I want closed (and the pros and cons that come with that) I can buy Apple. If they Apple starts to open up a bit and Google locks things down a bit we get the worst of both worlds and no true options.

[bloppe]

The "closed" approach is way better when it involves guardrails rather than handcuffs. Pixels offer guardrails; they're just as secure as iPhones but offer a lot more freedom to power users. Android is a lot more than just Pixels though and some of the other OEMs don't provide security updates quite as timely, creating a bad reputation

[basisword]

I’m not sure I agree. I’ve seen tech illiterate family members screw up Pixels and Samsung devices in the same way they screwed up Windows systems in the past. Even the most tech illiterate family members have done nothing bad to their iPhones. In fact I know one that was still using an iPhone 7 until last year and it was very functional. Two year old top of the line Samsung phones are crawling after two years. All anecdotal of course.

[pbhjpbhj]

What do you mean by 'screw up'?

[frollogaston]

Except forget the Apple ID password, then it's game over

[distrill]

i had the same problem with this behavior from google as i do from apple. i would be just as critical of google zealots blaming apple for google shortcomings as i am for apple zealots blaming google for apple shortcomings.

this is definitely an apple culture thing though. it's such a clear product choice to get apple users to pressure their friends into buying apple products.

[sbuk]

RCS is supported per the standard. Google's implementation uses proprietary extensions. It's not the ivory tower you seem to think it is.

[bloppe]

RCS on iPhone just sucks though. All I have is anecdotal evidence, but it feels like I only get late or out-of-order delivery from iPhones.

Plus iMessage doesn't allow you to send RCS messages from your laptop, whereas it's easy to do that with Google messages. That makes people with iPhones think RCS is worse than it really is. It's just iMessage that's intentionally hobbled. Not to mention the hostile UI decisions made by Apple, which seems to be the main knock against anything non-blue.

[sbuk]

Arguably, that's more to do with the standard and Google's proprietary extensions. The colors thing has been discussed ad nauseum. SMS messages have been green from day one - see https://youtu.be/G8d7E26WLsY?t=1723. If colors were reversed, there'd be the same complaints. If the difference between iMessage and SMS were highlighted any other way, there'd be complaints too.

[bloppe]

The standards issue is only relevant to E2EE. It has no bearing on the usability issues here. The E2EE issues should be fixed soon according to Apple. I'd bet a good amount of money the usability issues will remain.

It used to be black text on green: https://mobiforge.com/files/iphone-sms-1.jpg

The white-on-acid-green color combination would not make it through any accessibility review. It's literally impossible for a lot of color-impaired people to see, and objectively unpleasant otherwise.

Apple gets plenty of complaints about it. Just look at the Apple forums. Their literal advice to fix it is "make your friends buy an iPhone".

[cosmic_cheese]

My personal stance on this is that while I’m open to making iOS, etc more flexible, it needs to be done in a way that cleanly avoids the whole “grandma accidentally installed a pile of browser toolbars yet again” problem. I’m confident I can manage added flexibility myself but there’s a very real need for a truly foolproof, social-engineering-resistant option to point friends and family without such aptitudes toward.

[ch4s3]

I totally understand that perspective, but I think in terms of opportunity cost I just don't think it would ever be worth the effort.

[skyyler]

What kind of trouble does she have managing rcs conversations? It works fine for my partner on their iPhone.

[distrill]

the thing i hear most frequently is naming group chats with mixed device users

[skyyler]

Weird, that seems to work for my partner. I wonder what's breaking for your wife.

[distrill]

perhaps i'm out of date! this may have resolved with the recent increased support of rcs and i maybe haven't heard this complaint lately, it's worth checking into again.

[frollogaston]

I don't like that iMessage = lock-in, but everyone else needs to make a better standard first. We got cross-platform encrypted covid chat before we got this. RCS has an FBI "do not use" warning on it because there's no E2EE. And the reason people don't want green bubbles is cause they always screw up the group chat.

[dr_kiszonka]

The E2EE situation will hopefully change soon: https://www.theverge.com/news/629620/apple-iphone-e2ee-encry...