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by binkHN 216 days ago
If Apple wasn't forced by the EU, they would try to preserve their walled garden as much as possible. iMessage is the prime example of this.
1 comments
raw_anon_1111 215 days ago
Can another company federate with WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger?
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littlecranky67 215 days ago
Yes, because the EU mandated them to. Just no one seems to want to federate.
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raw_anon_1111 215 days ago
And you are perfectly capable of interacting with iMessage users now through SMS/MMS/RCS
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monocasa 215 days ago
Their RCS implementation is so incredibly broken, and I can tell as an Android user.

It seems like every other message gets downgraded to SMS.

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xethos 215 days ago
That's because SMS is a horribly broken, hacky standard, and RCS has to inherit and deal with all the horrifying edge-cases of SMS, MMS, and legacy cruft going back prior to the turn of the millenium.

Then it has to accomodate every other intersted party, many of which hate each other. Apple has always been a bit of an odd duck ("Think Different" has been internalized for some time), but Verizon actively hates OTT messaging as they can't charge for it. Samsung would rather run their own RCS implementation to create and advertise "Samsung RCS", and Google can't push too hard without getting EU attention for antitrust (again).

RCS has been stuck in limbo-hell for years for multiple reasons, none of which are easy.

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monocasa 214 days ago
The specific issue I'm talking about is how Apple for some reason ties the presence of RCS persistently to a contact that requires the user to manually go in and adjust, otherwise the conversation switches back and forth between SMS and RCS as each participant texts back and forth.

This is a problem no other vendors have, and is solely caused by Apple.

https://www.androidauthority.com/android-iphone-rcs-messagin...

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array_key_first 215 days ago
Yes, except that SMS/MMS sucks major ass, and RCS is really, really bad too. Not as awful as SMS, but close, and missing various barebones features.

That's not Apple's fault per se, but of course, they contribute to it. They should open up the iMessage protocol.

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raw_anon_1111 215 days ago
So what you are saying is that for Apple to create a better experience, they have to add to the industry standard - the same as AirPods.
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array_key_first 215 days ago
Yes, that would be mutually beneficial both for Apple customers and people who are not Apple customers.
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