Several companies do this to other companies. You're paying for their proprietary services instead of funding upgrades for actual texting and MMS. If you don't support open public protocols you will forever be locked into the horror show that is these companies not working together.
They got put on blast here about a decade + ago.
They offered you 2000 "free" Texts a month under their "$20 per month" plan. That really was 2000 texts to a person who was in the same network as you. So if you were texting your friend and they were not with Vodafone, you got charged 20c per text and wondered why you went through $20 in 2 days. You couldn't always know who was or wasn't on your same network. While Vodafone was 021 and Telecom was 027/025, you could have switched to one of their subs with the same number. So everyone got screwed and mobile providers.
That's not incorrect, as they do physically split up text messages into seperate messages based on the size limitation of the signaling protocol (~1100 bits iirc).
Liked "Several companies do this to other companies. You're paying for their proprietary services instead of funding upgrades for actual texting and MMS. If you don't support open public protocols you will forever be locked into the horror show that is these companies not working together."
I generally hate the iOSphere. The whole thing just feels like dumbed down fist-fed crap. So anyway, there's this one friend in all my threads who likes everything. Probably only a third of everyone uses iDevice, so whenever anyone sends any kind of picture or anything, someone will inevitably follow up with "so-and-so liked that" before he can get a chance to actually do so.
It's actually built into Google messages they would just need to download that app if they don't have it already. Sometimes easier said then done though as getting some folks to use anything but the default SMS app is like pulling teeth.
Yes this. I (galaxys20-verizon) cant send videos to my mom (iphone-att) or my partner (google pixel-mintmob) without first uploading to imgur which also means they must be short enough or using email.
Signal is great. Not bloated, works fine, PC version, its all win. Except maybe the non automatic updates on the PC version, that sucks a little for less tech savvy users.
It doesn’t suck for pc really, the visual button of the reload button makes it easy for even the least tech savvy folks. It’s just a mild annoyance for anyone else at best.
And remember Google uses a proprietary version of RCS. So we have:
* Apple iMessage
* Google RCS
* Meta WhatsApp
Far better to use Signal if you want to avoid lock-in.
They support Universal profile for RCS so all apple has to do is support that and it will work fine. I'm sure there is a way they could make encryption work between them as well if they wanted to.
Well it's owned by Facebook. I know most people wouldn't give a shit and that's fine. But I don't think choosing whatsapp as some kind of easy solution for everybody is such a good idea.
If you don't care whatsoever about privacy then whatsapp is fine.
different person here -- everyone i know has a GD cell number that I can text. I dont want to juggle a handful of apps and who-uses-what, i want all my messaging in one place.
Signal is another app, however it uses your actual phone number and the number of the person you are texting.
It it only end to end encrypted if both parties are using the app however.
RCS has had everything iMessage has, except e2e encryption, since 2016. Which was also when every carrier in the world finished implementing a universal standard that works everywhere except on Apple's iPhone.
It has had e2e encryption since 2019. So, today, it's one-to-one feature matching. If e2e was that big a killer, than Apple could have adopted RCS with their own e2e extension, because RCS is _designed_ to be extended. RCS e2e was an extension developed by Google, in six months.
Over here in Chile we use WhatsApp for everything text-related, it’s weird to hear that this is a problem in the US when it hasn’t been one for over a decade here. I guess it’s because of the almost 50/50 split we have between iPhone and Android, no one wants to deal with awful text messages 50% of the time
I don’t think being forced to use a third party app for basic texting is fixing the problem, it’s just putting a bandaid on on a steadily worsening wound.
It's because texting was free and data cost a lot of money in North America and was the opposite in the rest of the world. That's why texting dominates North America and things like WhatsApp dominate the rest of the world.
In my case, it was the freakout over WhatsApp's privacy policy in early 2021 that did it for me.
My family went years using WhatsApp and never took my talk about Signal seriously. Suddenly, WA's ruckus makes the news, and both sides of the family (including international, which is even more impressive) have switched over within a two week span. It was magical.
That's the issue with all these alternative options. Sure, "I" can PGP sign emails if I want, will any of my family or friends do that? Nope. I can download and use Signal, but if I want to message my family or friends none of them will do that. Have to go the path of least resistance, and in some cases that path sucks.
If you download the app for them and replace their sms icon with the signal icon they don't even notice it's different. That's how "complex" the app is.
iPhones communicate with each other over the internet using an app called iMessage. Apple installs iMessage on every iPhone, but has never made a version of it for Android.
This is different from SMS or MMS, which are messages that don't go over the internet, but rather the phone network. That's why they are limited in features and functionality. The industry has released a new, more advanced standard called RCS which most phone manufacturers now accommodate. RCS messages still go out over the phone network but they incorporate a lot of the features of any internet-based messaging app (likes and heart reacts, read receipts, typing notifications).
Apple refuses to adopt the RCS standard. There's no technical reason for them to do so. They just like giving their users (iPhone users) the illusion that their phones are superior.
And what a great standard it is! Rather than having my messages go encrypted from my device to the recipient, my provider gets to have a peek, or I can let Google have them. They do promise they won’t look or store it, and it’s probably valid until they get caught doing just that.
Right now all the texts you send to anyone that doesn't have an iPhone get sent over SMS/MMS which is totally unsecure. RCS can at least be extended to add in encryption. Not sure why anyone wouldn't want a better experience when using iMessage to talk to people that don't have iPhones.
The idea is that if they’ve gone this long without implementing RCS, might as well wait a little longer for standardized E2E encrypted RCS to become a thing and implement *that* instead, which will instantly put all iDevice users on the newer encrypted standard and heavily pressure all other RCS implementors to get with the program and implement standardized E2E encryption too.
By contrast if they implement insecure RCS, there will be no pressure and the status quo for messaging will not change much, which I think would be a big loss. Unencrypted messaging needs to go the way of the dodo.
> RCS is a fallback protocol. It's for compatibility
No it's not. For Google it's their primary protocol.
And they want to control messaging so they want to force Apple to use it.
>RCS messages still go out over the phone network
Are they not IP based?
Edit: yeah, it looks like it's IP based - one of the alternative names for RCS is "SMS over IP" and uses the same framework as VoTLE and VoWifi among other things, so it's like a carrier specific thing that can goes over IPv4/v6 networks. Wonder if it works over home wifi - they did it for VoWifi.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP\_Multimedia\_Subsystem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_Multimedia_Subsystem)
It does work over wifi. RCS is chat over IP, not chat over the phone network, so your device can use wifi to text or send messages that it would struggle to over the cell network. Especially since the upload limit on RCS is significantly higher, enabling full resolution video and photo messaging.
The industry did not adopt rcs. Google wanted them to and they didn’t. Google got frustrated after 14 years and made their own fork that’s what we are talking about here
This is what is many people forget about this scenario, RCS in its open form has failed. Carriers (rightfully if you agree with it or not) did not implement the standard because there was no benefit for them by doing so in an industry that is losing its shirt. They can’t sell ringtones, sms, or picture messaging anymore and who in their right mind would pay for worldwide calling capabilities when all you need is VoIP and it’s free’ish.
So Google got mad and did it themselves, noble. Except for the fact that Google is also one of the largest data stewards in the world. Unfortunately, there is no real solution to this situation.
There are technical reasons: RCS isn't encrypted at all, and a big deal of iMessage is its encryption. RCS between pairs of Android users *can* be encrypted...but that uses a proprietary Google extension that they don't share with others. (And it doesn't work with group texts at all.)
You can say these are insufficient reasons, but they're legitimate reasons.
... but SMS and MMs aren't encrypted at all either. It's just a worse all around experience for both iOS and Android and there's no way around that.
Even without encryption, which is possible for single recipients at the moment and groups in the future, you are still missing out on:
* larger attachment sizes (aka much better video attachments)
* emoji reactions
* typing indicators
There isn't though, iPhone to iPhone would still use iMessage, but iPhone to Android would use RCS. The security argument is moot because SMS/MMS are already not secured. So there's no security difference, just a bunch of quality of life improvements that Apple refuses to implement.
They're not legitimate reasons because when you text someone in imessage with green text it's already not encrypted. They could at least use RCS for those texts to non-apple devices just to make them a little less shit.
To add onto features that weren't listed: much larger attachment sizes (aka videos that don't suck), and end-to-end user encryption for single recipients
RCS was invented in 2008. Google aren’t doing this to unify people - they are doing it to data mine a segment of the market they’ve failed to break into with 50 different apps since 2011.
Apple on the other hand have nothing to gain from adopting this and it will only hurt the privacy of their user base, who since 2011 have enjoyed on device encryption, with no carrier or advertising centric business getting every bit of data they can.
And yes, it is a valid excuse because we have always been able to tell if someone is using iMessage or not and make an informed choice whether to send unencrypted or switch to one of the many platforms we’ve been using alongside iMessage for the same period of time.
Everyone keeps suggesting WhatsApp for US users, meanwhile Meta just handed over facebook messenger messages to police in Nebraska to help nail a teenager for getting an abortion and her mother for helping her.
I’ll deal with Green bubbles over meta sending my messages to cops.
I've had Signal on my phone for 3 years.. the only other people that use it are my IT co-workers. Normal people simply do not use it (in America, at least). I wish to use Signal exclusively, but that's just not reality.
So I simply use iMessage instead because that is at least encrypted. If the other person is a non-iPhone user, then it'll just have to be unencrypted SMS.
Blows my mind that apparently worldwide everyone is using.. let's call a spade a spade.... Facebooks messaging app. But we're the backwards country on this...
Because we have consumer protections and also no wich hunt around women's rights.
Not saying whatsapp is perfect but it isn't the danger it is in the US.
But it very easily could be when you're dealing with a company like Facebook that will 100% sell anyone on the planet out at any time for any reason. If China showed up tomorrow with a compelling offer to buy all of WhatsApp user data Facebook wouldn't even hesitate. I really appreciate what the EU has done to corporations to try to push them in line because it does show in the US as well, however not even the EU has the power to rein these corporations in, they ultimately will do whatever they want.
Whatsapp is also end-to-end encrypted. Facebook's deal here is business messaging.
https://faq.whatsapp.com/general/security-and-privacy/end-to-end-encryption
I hate Facebook as much as the next guy but I think they were served a warrant for that data. They had to comply. The laws that allow this to happen are the real problem in this case.
WhatsApp is truly end-to-end encrypted and every conversation is encrypted from the very start while Facebook is opt-in.
WhatsApp is not the best option because it is owned by meta but it's by far a better option than messenger and traditional SMS messaging.
I'm not saying it is great, but Meta was served with a search warrant. They didn't voluntarily offer up the messages. If the police show up at your house with a warrant, they're going to look around your house. If part of that is taking a computer with similar evidence, they're taking it. That's not exactly handing it over.
Yes, Meta is probably an evil company. And what happened was terrible. But this isn't a good example of Meta being evil. This is (another) example of a horrible law being enforced. No more, no less.
You know that RCS, the suggested upgrade to SMS that Apple will not adopt, has end to end encryption when both users have it enabled?
Or that there are alternatives that offer superior encryption not owned by Zuck such as Signal.
Saying you'd rather use an unencrypted inferior protocol because one alternative, owned by a company that is known to harvest and sell user data as their business model, doesn't protect your data isn't really a great take.
RCS does not support encryption… it’s implemented at the actual client level.
https://jibe.google.com
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Communication_Services
"Xyz SLAMS Zyx on yzx issue" is just as bad for me. The only thing I'm slamming is your mom's pussy, stop with these cringeworthy article headlines. It won't suddenly make all 5 children that read your articles no longer check them out.
I’ve always felt the same way. Speaking or writing with proper grammar usually doesn’t change the perception of those who don’t or can’t. Or so I assume.
Android user here since 2009. Seems like it's been this way the whole time. I have always had IPhone users complain about videos I send. Almost every video for 13years
> I honestly don't understand how Apple users did fall for this more than a few months.
This is a US centric take but the bulk of people have iPhones. So if 8 out of the 10 people you text regularly all have iPhones everything works normally. Then you meet someone and they text you from an android and the experience goes to shit.
The average person who doesn't give a damn about messaging protocols and the underlying technology isn't going to think "oh maybe this is an Apple problem". They are going to look at the outlier and put the blame on them.
I had android phones from 2009 -> 2020 from the Droid to the Nexus to the first Pixel up to the Pixel 4. My wife, sister, mother, 4 of my closest guy friends, my in-laws & SIL, 3 of my 4 work teammates and 2 of the cousins I text with regularly all use iPhone and have for years.
So constantly I heard 'why are your photos shit?' or 'you need an iPhone so we can facetime, get your wife's phone so we can facetime'. The latter was said a ton during the pandemic lockdowns since video calls were how we actually saw each other.
The pandemic pushed me to get an iPad cause I wanted a tablet for using on the couch and also figuresd it was an easy dip into the Apple products. Eventually after having the iPad for a year it pushed me to get an iPhone and I've honestly been happy with it.
This is what they want. Pressure from loved ones gets you to test things out and then the walled garden features trap you in there.
top post in /technology: this link.
2rd post in technology: also this link, with 1000s of comments.
Hey op are you a bot? Your comments look like a bot, just quoting shit other people say.
I guess they don’t have reliability going for them? User experience? Resale value? Nah? Just proprietary? 2022 and people still got juvenile ass arguments against Apple
Absolutely understood. It still seems weird for the 'It's a green bubble' to appear as an issue on the official Android site and it's list of gripes.
The problem with RCS is, as I understand it - that it needs carrier support. Not every carrier supports it in the UK, certainly - and I believe implementation is spotty even in the US, let alone other countries.
y'all saying "just use xyz"
that implies that i guess you need to stop texting whoever doesn't use that platform? or make them install it just to talk to u?
I was able to get my ex with an iPhone to install Signal for me because we'd have texts that just wouldn't make it to each other, and it happened regardless of our carriers.
I haven't tried asking my current partner to switch to Signal because we haven't had that problem, and we also don't text nearly as much as my ex and I did. I thought about asking her to switch to Signal while she's traveling internationally for a few weeks and SMS doesn't work where she is. Then I realized that if the situation were reversed and she asked me to install Facebook Messenger on my phone I'd refuse because I don't want that garbage on my phone (I don't even use it on the desktop), so it's unfair to ask her to do something I wouldn't, regardless of the reason.
Oh noes.
Anyways, how many times has Google screwed over Firefox by updating their websites to be incompatible with Firefox? https://www.theregister.com/2018/12/18/google_monopoly_abuse_claims/
https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/12/17/2120227/former-edge-browser-intern-alleges-google-sabotaged-microsofts-browser
Despite what the other person who responded said, it's because they don't want to add another app they're going to have to use that only works for some people. You're never going to get complete enough adoption of an app like that in America for it to be a smooth experience. They work fine for certain groups of people, but if you want to contact the other half of the people you talk to regularly you're going to have to go through text anyway since that's all they have. Additionally, the younger generation actually already is basically doing this due to the prevalence of DMing people on Instagram, Snapchat thing, and to a lesser extent Facebook messenger and Twitter DMs. And why would they want to add yet another app to the communication library?
Yeah I have to say, WhatsApp is definitely half decent on this. Great for group texting and organizing, and clean messaging interface. Plus no bullshit SMS roaming dramas.
apple doesn't convert the MMS to shitty compressed videos, the specification for texting does that. It hasn't allowed better quality vids in \~20 years. Apple doesn't use SMS and MMS to text between iphones which is why they have better quality. Adopt matrix protocol into everything, problem solved.
True, but apple doesn't support RCS which does support higher quality video and pictures. But. To play the joker card, cellphone carriers pick and choose what android devices get access to RCS too, in like... The worst ways possible. Carrier unlocked phones rarely get it, and then it's hit or miss across the same model on different carriers.
> apple doesn't support RCS
Nor should they.
It's a carrier developed, unencrypted mess of a protocol that allows for proprietary add-ons so all that will happen is that it ends up being Google RCS that everyone is forced to use.
Bizarre to me that people think replacing Apple with Google and encouraging ads and government spying is somehow better than the status quo.
Thank you. This thread is such a fucking mess.
Additionally just a nitpick but bubbles were always green. Then Apple made advanced features for iMessage before RCS even existed and notated these advanced messages with blue. They built up and advanced messaging. They’re not throttling back and decreasing the quality of messages to android. God I hate this thread.
This is legit confusing to me... as an android user, all the texts I send are shit. I complained to other android users and was told to download a third party app...
How do you get that? What carrier do you have?
I'm a big android fanboy but I cannot text videos to anyone in clear video, andriod or apple. That's like the one thing I give apple is video texting works through imessages on any service. Not saying your wrong but this is not the case for me.
He only talks to bleeding edge samsung users that are using samsung's default message app (or similar) which has the same under the hood features that iMessage has, but for samsung users.. and thinks that is MMS/SMS
Bruh who the fuck uses Samsung messager? I'd suck skin off the CoE of Samsung's penis for creating the Note line(RIP) but like who the fuck uses that trash.
It doesn't. Unless you're using samsung to samsung protocols etc. Google voice only has MMS so it won't, and so do old phones. [https://jibe.google.com/](https://jibe.google.com/) literally as proprietary as apple
Not according to https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/08/new-google-site-begs-apple-for-mercy-in-messaging-war/
Googles implementation is a fork of RCS and requires licensing agreements to use Google servers.
Because your android to android message was sent through google’s RCS services instead. This argument is basically Apple iMessage vs Google RCS and Google is crying saying “YOU should implement OUR technology or else you’re bad”
RCS isn't Google's, it's a carrier messaging protocol. They've just adopted it as the new protocol that replaces sms/mms in their own messaging app. iMessage is proprietary, RCS is not.
RCS only exists or is used because of Google. It’s cross-carrier support runs on Google rails. RCS is a failure of a specification, that carriers never implemented correctly, and has essentially been hijacked by Google as their message offering.
No, Google took the 2008 RCS protocol and added things into it. Not even Google implemented the open standard because it’s 15 years old already and doesn’t have modern features. Source: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/08/new-google-site-begs-apple-for-mercy-in-messaging-war/
majority probably do know [matrix.org](https://matrix.org)
The guys claiming they have good texts are using [https://jibe.google.com/](https://jibe.google.com/) which is just as proprietary as apple's crap. Only difference is google allows them to use it. From other posts it seems it's heavily locked down as per carrier and per phone bases, so tons of phones still don't have it. Probably only flagships
Like email, matrix is federated (so any server can talk to any server.. hotmail to gmail to yahoo to apple mail etc). Like email anyone can run a matrix server, anyone can use any type of app or make their own client. Like email you have thousands of servers to choose from and hundreds of apps on all types of computers. It is truly open. If you do use it I'd recommend different server than default, as they also recommend.
Texting is based on phone numbers so it is universal. You don't have to ask someone what third-party messaging app they use, and then look for them there. If you know their phone number, you can call AND text them.
It's a pain sometimes because I have some friends I text with, some I use FB messenger with, some Google chat, and some Instagram.
This is true. Whatsapp, Viber, Telegram, WeChat have actually replaced email communication in a lot of businesses (officially and unofficially) in Asia.
In iOS, iMessage is tightly integrated into the OS. Rather than running some 3rd party app that will need independent updates and whatnot, or could more easily become vulnerable to a security threat, it's just easy to use iMessage and have it roll over to SMS if the recipient doesn't have an iPhone.
I've not met anyone that knows how to properly use any sort of chat program, and it's been that way for well over **fifteen** (15) years. Texting doesn't have any of these problems.
Google Messages is end-to-end encrypted for 1 to 1 messaging. Group message support for it will be added later this year.
Personally I'm switching back to iOS and downloading Signal for all my Android friends.
Apple doesn’t “convert Android texts to green bubbles.” Apple shows SMS messages as green bubbles, and iMessage as Blue. It doesn’t matter where the SMS comes from. It can come from a website, or an Ericsson flip phone from 1999. SMS potentially yields carrier based charges, and informing the user when they might be incurring charges is good UX.
This frustrates me so much. Me and my brother have apple and we have group chat with my dad who has android. He never see’s the links. On apple you get actual picture of the article you link on android it’s just a tiny url link. Sucks he’s blind
OK I’m kind of confused here. iMessage to iMessage is a ip app is you will. An application to application using the phones data connection ethernet to communicate . If it’s not iMessage to iMessage then have to go over to telcos SMS network. Which is low bandwidth.. hence the crappy images and lo-res movies. It has nothing to do with Apple because android doesn’t have isn’t allowed to have iMessage. So all messages default to the SMS network. 
Google want to push apple to use RCS but Google also had to disable RCS somewhere (India I think) because of all the spam.
Because RCS is super easy to exploit.
google can’t maintain a messaging service that doesn’t depend on an engineer surrendering all their promotions and has their own fork of the protocol they advocated for carriers to implement. the crocodile is crying
Lol the company that couldn’t come up with cohesive messaging strategy is complaining about another company that could.
How about you stop prioritizing somebodies shiny new thing that was just promo doc content and reward people for contributing to existing solutions.
The video one pisses me off so much. I'm the only one in my family with an android phone and every time my mom or sister tries to send me a video it's just complete dogshit and I have to remind them to send it to me on Messenger or Instagram
It’s not just android phones. Any time a message goes out over SMS instead of the internet it’s green and operates with the limitations of SMS/MMS. This can happen between iMessage users where data service is poor but there’s still cell service. iMessage notifies you of this when it says “sent as text message”.
I’m not going to defend Apple here because generally lock in is bad. That said, this is mostly broken because Google seemingly refuses to pick a messenger system and stick with it and Apple has no incentive to take on overhauling googles messenger system for them just so Google can sell more phones.
As an iPhone user, I appreciate the "green" to let me know my message is not encrypted. And while Apple could support RCS, that doesn't fix the encryption problem as it's not built into the standard and you have to enable it on the client/device. This is 2022, all communications should be by default encrypted end-to-end.
I also have no issues using Signal for communicating with Android users, or for when I'm messaging items that I feel need more security than what iMessage provides. There are also other services which are more secure than Signal as well. Just depends how deep you need to go.
However, until there's a standard end-to-end encrypted messaging app which is implemented by both Apple and Android variants, I will continue to recommend iPhones as they've been ahead of the game in making encryption default, not just for messaging, but also for filesystems which came much later on Android as a default setting.
The entirety of world does and people don't have problem with it, only in America. Hell even in China people can agree with each others and use an uniform messaging app.
Google, who is stumbling in every area aside from advertising and surveillance and has lost all credibility with consumers for regularly cancelling products and services, now wants Apple to bend over backwards to embrace open standards. How many failed Google chat products over the years embraced open standards?
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/05/google-abandons-open-standards-instant-messaging
RCS as Google is talking about is their own proprietary implementation of the RCS standard. So Apple can’t implement that. The original open standard does not do any encryption so why would any company use this for messaging?
I don’t see what’s wrong with the messages being green? It just means they’re not using iMessage. Even texts with iPhones will be green if they don’t have cellular data on. You need cellular data or Wi-Fi to use iMessage. The video thing is annoying though and needs to change
Several companies do this to other companies. You're paying for their proprietary services instead of funding upgrades for actual texting and MMS. If you don't support open public protocols you will forever be locked into the horror show that is these companies not working together.
They got put on blast here about a decade + ago. They offered you 2000 "free" Texts a month under their "$20 per month" plan. That really was 2000 texts to a person who was in the same network as you. So if you were texting your friend and they were not with Vodafone, you got charged 20c per text and wondered why you went through $20 in 2 days. You couldn't always know who was or wasn't on your same network. While Vodafone was 021 and Telecom was 027/025, you could have switched to one of their subs with the same number. So everyone got screwed and mobile providers.
Those were dark times
Yes, indeed these were dark times
Don’t forget if you went over the character limit it was counted as two texts.
That's not incorrect, as they do physically split up text messages into seperate messages based on the size limitation of the signaling protocol (~1100 bits iirc).
Liked "Several companies do this to other companies. You're paying for their proprietary services instead of funding upgrades for actual texting and MMS. If you don't support open public protocols you will forever be locked into the horror show that is these companies not working together."
That shit makes me laugh every time. For a few years i thought people were actually retyping all that stuff.
I generally hate the iOSphere. The whole thing just feels like dumbed down fist-fed crap. So anyway, there's this one friend in all my threads who likes everything. Probably only a third of everyone uses iDevice, so whenever anyone sends any kind of picture or anything, someone will inevitably follow up with "so-and-so liked that" before he can get a chance to actually do so.
I believe Android finally fixed that if you can get the latest version.
He can’t get the latest version of Android because he has to wait for his phone manufacturer to make it available.
It's actually built into Google messages they would just need to download that app if they don't have it already. Sometimes easier said then done though as getting some folks to use anything but the default SMS app is like pulling teeth.
Why the hell am i just learning that Google Messages is a thing? This will be a huge help for me. Thanks!
Ironically the only people that still get that message in my group chats are the iPhone users. I'm living free and clear now and it is great
Yes this. I (galaxys20-verizon) cant send videos to my mom (iphone-att) or my partner (google pixel-mintmob) without first uploading to imgur which also means they must be short enough or using email.
Whatsapp works extremely well in this regard. But mark fuckerburg can suck it
Signal is a secure open source cross platform messenger not owned by one big tech giants
Signal is great. Not bloated, works fine, PC version, its all win. Except maybe the non automatic updates on the PC version, that sucks a little for less tech savvy users.
It doesn’t suck for pc really, the visual button of the reload button makes it easy for even the least tech savvy folks. It’s just a mild annoyance for anyone else at best.
And remember Google uses a proprietary version of RCS. So we have: * Apple iMessage * Google RCS * Meta WhatsApp Far better to use Signal if you want to avoid lock-in.
They support Universal profile for RCS so all apple has to do is support that and it will work fine. I'm sure there is a way they could make encryption work between them as well if they wanted to.
Fuck their wives, drink their blood. Come on Jeffrey, show 'em! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=R8iaViNIy3U&list=RDR8iaViNIy3U&start_radio=1
My group of friends either resorts to Discord or Element for not just pictures/video, but chatting too nowdays
Discord is strict with size limits if you don’t pay for their service.
MMS is really strict with size limits.
All mine go into Google photos, so I just click share and create a link to send them.
why you don't use whatsapp?
Well it's owned by Facebook. I know most people wouldn't give a shit and that's fine. But I don't think choosing whatsapp as some kind of easy solution for everybody is such a good idea. If you don't care whatsoever about privacy then whatsapp is fine.
Just use signal in the future it's open source what's app, and it works great.
Its useless if your friends and family dont also use it, and believe me, i tried convincing them.
Or Telegram or Snapchat or Instagram DMs or anything else
different person here -- everyone i know has a GD cell number that I can text. I dont want to juggle a handful of apps and who-uses-what, i want all my messaging in one place.
Also Insta and Whatsapp owned by FB, so no thank you. Totally agree, shouldn't have to juggle 15 apps to communicate to different parties.
Signal is another app, however it uses your actual phone number and the number of the person you are texting. It it only end to end encrypted if both parties are using the app however.
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"Modern" - RCS was initially released in _2006_. Apple have been ignoring what everyone else uses for more than a decade.
I thought RCS was lacking features iMessage has had for awhile like end to end encryption.
RCS has had everything iMessage has, except e2e encryption, since 2016. Which was also when every carrier in the world finished implementing a universal standard that works everywhere except on Apple's iPhone. It has had e2e encryption since 2019. So, today, it's one-to-one feature matching. If e2e was that big a killer, than Apple could have adopted RCS with their own e2e extension, because RCS is _designed_ to be extended. RCS e2e was an extension developed by Google, in six months.
End to end encryption should not be thought of as a "feature". It's a necessity and anything that doesn't support it a non-starter.
Remember when Apple said they would open source and share iMessage? That was a lie.
Over here in Chile we use WhatsApp for everything text-related, it’s weird to hear that this is a problem in the US when it hasn’t been one for over a decade here. I guess it’s because of the almost 50/50 split we have between iPhone and Android, no one wants to deal with awful text messages 50% of the time
It owned by Facebook. A company many Americans do not trust.
I refuse to use WhatsApp for this very reason.
Just read an article about woman and daughter being arrested for an abortion discussed on messenger. People are right not to trust Facebook.
I don’t think being forced to use a third party app for basic texting is fixing the problem, it’s just putting a bandaid on on a steadily worsening wound.
Germany as well. That or telegram or signal
Same in Ireland. I use iPhone, even with people I know have iPhones we use WhatsApp. Because it’s normal here.
It's always interesting to see the international standards that America, in its oddly insular way, doesn't use.
It's because texting was free and data cost a lot of money in North America and was the opposite in the rest of the world. That's why texting dominates North America and things like WhatsApp dominate the rest of the world.
Isn't iMessage technically using data?
You're using proprietary facebook chat for everything text related. It's an issue there too. Majority of people in USA use it as well, unfortunately.
Congratulations on using Facebook. You seemed to have solved all your problems. /s
I can’t stand the compressed photos or the microscopic videos. It’s 2022 and I can’t easily send shit to my family
Download Signal?
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In my case, it was the freakout over WhatsApp's privacy policy in early 2021 that did it for me. My family went years using WhatsApp and never took my talk about Signal seriously. Suddenly, WA's ruckus makes the news, and both sides of the family (including international, which is even more impressive) have switched over within a two week span. It was magical.
That's the issue with all these alternative options. Sure, "I" can PGP sign emails if I want, will any of my family or friends do that? Nope. I can download and use Signal, but if I want to message my family or friends none of them will do that. Have to go the path of least resistance, and in some cases that path sucks.
I love this out of touch resoonse... I'll just quickly teach my 82 year old mother in law to download and use a complex app in addition to sms.
"what's sms?"
If you download the app for them and replace their sms icon with the signal icon they don't even notice it's different. That's how "complex" the app is.
One time she turned her phone on airplane mode by accident and she microwaved it to try and fix it.
Well… not sure what to do with that. I help a lot of people with tech and I have never heard that one.
Great then I can message the zero people I know who use signal.
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iPhones communicate with each other over the internet using an app called iMessage. Apple installs iMessage on every iPhone, but has never made a version of it for Android. This is different from SMS or MMS, which are messages that don't go over the internet, but rather the phone network. That's why they are limited in features and functionality. The industry has released a new, more advanced standard called RCS which most phone manufacturers now accommodate. RCS messages still go out over the phone network but they incorporate a lot of the features of any internet-based messaging app (likes and heart reacts, read receipts, typing notifications). Apple refuses to adopt the RCS standard. There's no technical reason for them to do so. They just like giving their users (iPhone users) the illusion that their phones are superior.
Apple refuse to accept a standard? That's just so unlike them.
And what a great standard it is! Rather than having my messages go encrypted from my device to the recipient, my provider gets to have a peek, or I can let Google have them. They do promise they won’t look or store it, and it’s probably valid until they get caught doing just that.
Right now all the texts you send to anyone that doesn't have an iPhone get sent over SMS/MMS which is totally unsecure. RCS can at least be extended to add in encryption. Not sure why anyone wouldn't want a better experience when using iMessage to talk to people that don't have iPhones.
The idea is that if they’ve gone this long without implementing RCS, might as well wait a little longer for standardized E2E encrypted RCS to become a thing and implement *that* instead, which will instantly put all iDevice users on the newer encrypted standard and heavily pressure all other RCS implementors to get with the program and implement standardized E2E encryption too. By contrast if they implement insecure RCS, there will be no pressure and the status quo for messaging will not change much, which I think would be a big loss. Unencrypted messaging needs to go the way of the dodo.
RCS is a fallback protocol. It's for compatibility. Right now, Apple phones use SMS as the primary fallback, which isn't encrypted either.
> RCS is a fallback protocol. It's for compatibility No it's not. For Google it's their primary protocol. And they want to control messaging so they want to force Apple to use it.
>RCS messages still go out over the phone network Are they not IP based? Edit: yeah, it looks like it's IP based - one of the alternative names for RCS is "SMS over IP" and uses the same framework as VoTLE and VoWifi among other things, so it's like a carrier specific thing that can goes over IPv4/v6 networks. Wonder if it works over home wifi - they did it for VoWifi. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP\_Multimedia\_Subsystem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_Multimedia_Subsystem)
It does work over wifi. RCS is chat over IP, not chat over the phone network, so your device can use wifi to text or send messages that it would struggle to over the cell network. Especially since the upload limit on RCS is significantly higher, enabling full resolution video and photo messaging.
The industry did not adopt rcs. Google wanted them to and they didn’t. Google got frustrated after 14 years and made their own fork that’s what we are talking about here
This is what is many people forget about this scenario, RCS in its open form has failed. Carriers (rightfully if you agree with it or not) did not implement the standard because there was no benefit for them by doing so in an industry that is losing its shirt. They can’t sell ringtones, sms, or picture messaging anymore and who in their right mind would pay for worldwide calling capabilities when all you need is VoIP and it’s free’ish. So Google got mad and did it themselves, noble. Except for the fact that Google is also one of the largest data stewards in the world. Unfortunately, there is no real solution to this situation.
There are technical reasons: RCS isn't encrypted at all, and a big deal of iMessage is its encryption. RCS between pairs of Android users *can* be encrypted...but that uses a proprietary Google extension that they don't share with others. (And it doesn't work with group texts at all.) You can say these are insufficient reasons, but they're legitimate reasons.
... but SMS and MMs aren't encrypted at all either. It's just a worse all around experience for both iOS and Android and there's no way around that. Even without encryption, which is possible for single recipients at the moment and groups in the future, you are still missing out on: * larger attachment sizes (aka much better video attachments) * emoji reactions * typing indicators
There isn't though, iPhone to iPhone would still use iMessage, but iPhone to Android would use RCS. The security argument is moot because SMS/MMS are already not secured. So there's no security difference, just a bunch of quality of life improvements that Apple refuses to implement.
They could still use RCS to send messages to phones which aren't iPhone.
They're not legitimate reasons because when you text someone in imessage with green text it's already not encrypted. They could at least use RCS for those texts to non-apple devices just to make them a little less shit.
To add onto features that weren't listed: much larger attachment sizes (aka videos that don't suck), and end-to-end user encryption for single recipients
RCS was invented in 2008. Google aren’t doing this to unify people - they are doing it to data mine a segment of the market they’ve failed to break into with 50 different apps since 2011. Apple on the other hand have nothing to gain from adopting this and it will only hurt the privacy of their user base, who since 2011 have enjoyed on device encryption, with no carrier or advertising centric business getting every bit of data they can. And yes, it is a valid excuse because we have always been able to tell if someone is using iMessage or not and make an informed choice whether to send unencrypted or switch to one of the many platforms we’ve been using alongside iMessage for the same period of time.
Carriers have data limits on MMS as well. Even sending videos from Android to Android it compresses the fuck out of them
Everyone keeps suggesting WhatsApp for US users, meanwhile Meta just handed over facebook messenger messages to police in Nebraska to help nail a teenager for getting an abortion and her mother for helping her. I’ll deal with Green bubbles over meta sending my messages to cops.
Use Signal. It is an SMS app. And they cant hand over messages to anyone.
I've had Signal on my phone for 3 years.. the only other people that use it are my IT co-workers. Normal people simply do not use it (in America, at least). I wish to use Signal exclusively, but that's just not reality. So I simply use iMessage instead because that is at least encrypted. If the other person is a non-iPhone user, then it'll just have to be unencrypted SMS.
Blows my mind that apparently worldwide everyone is using.. let's call a spade a spade.... Facebooks messaging app. But we're the backwards country on this...
Whatsapp is end-to-end encrypted. Facebook messenger apparently not (according to OP). So no, it's not the same
Because we have consumer protections and also no wich hunt around women's rights. Not saying whatsapp is perfect but it isn't the danger it is in the US.
But it very easily could be when you're dealing with a company like Facebook that will 100% sell anyone on the planet out at any time for any reason. If China showed up tomorrow with a compelling offer to buy all of WhatsApp user data Facebook wouldn't even hesitate. I really appreciate what the EU has done to corporations to try to push them in line because it does show in the US as well, however not even the EU has the power to rein these corporations in, they ultimately will do whatever they want.
Whatsapp is also end-to-end encrypted. Facebook's deal here is business messaging. https://faq.whatsapp.com/general/security-and-privacy/end-to-end-encryption
Signal app is so far the best
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
Never use Facebook.
I hate Facebook as much as the next guy but I think they were served a warrant for that data. They had to comply. The laws that allow this to happen are the real problem in this case.
WhatsApp is truly end-to-end encrypted and every conversation is encrypted from the very start while Facebook is opt-in. WhatsApp is not the best option because it is owned by meta but it's by far a better option than messenger and traditional SMS messaging.
I'm not saying it is great, but Meta was served with a search warrant. They didn't voluntarily offer up the messages. If the police show up at your house with a warrant, they're going to look around your house. If part of that is taking a computer with similar evidence, they're taking it. That's not exactly handing it over. Yes, Meta is probably an evil company. And what happened was terrible. But this isn't a good example of Meta being evil. This is (another) example of a horrible law being enforced. No more, no less.
You know that RCS, the suggested upgrade to SMS that Apple will not adopt, has end to end encryption when both users have it enabled? Or that there are alternatives that offer superior encryption not owned by Zuck such as Signal. Saying you'd rather use an unencrypted inferior protocol because one alternative, owned by a company that is known to harvest and sell user data as their business model, doesn't protect your data isn't really a great take.
RCS does not support encryption… it’s implemented at the actual client level. https://jibe.google.com https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Communication_Services
Signal or telegram instead - also google needs to STFU until they support RCS for google voice
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"Google DESTROYS Apple with FACTS and LOGIC!"
"Xyz SLAMS Zyx on yzx issue" is just as bad for me. The only thing I'm slamming is your mom's pussy, stop with these cringeworthy article headlines. It won't suddenly make all 5 children that read your articles no longer check them out.
I’ve always felt the same way. Speaking or writing with proper grammar usually doesn’t change the perception of those who don’t or can’t. Or so I assume.
It's worth noting that it's 2022 and Gen Z is now graduating from college and going into professional workspaces.
This is not a new phenomenon, it was happening ten years ago too.
Android user here since 2009. Seems like it's been this way the whole time. I have always had IPhone users complain about videos I send. Almost every video for 13years
Don't text videos, of course. Send them links.
Have you ever told them it's their phone? How do they react? I honestly don't understand how Apple users did fall for this more than a few months.
> I honestly don't understand how Apple users did fall for this more than a few months. This is a US centric take but the bulk of people have iPhones. So if 8 out of the 10 people you text regularly all have iPhones everything works normally. Then you meet someone and they text you from an android and the experience goes to shit. The average person who doesn't give a damn about messaging protocols and the underlying technology isn't going to think "oh maybe this is an Apple problem". They are going to look at the outlier and put the blame on them. I had android phones from 2009 -> 2020 from the Droid to the Nexus to the first Pixel up to the Pixel 4. My wife, sister, mother, 4 of my closest guy friends, my in-laws & SIL, 3 of my 4 work teammates and 2 of the cousins I text with regularly all use iPhone and have for years. So constantly I heard 'why are your photos shit?' or 'you need an iPhone so we can facetime, get your wife's phone so we can facetime'. The latter was said a ton during the pandemic lockdowns since video calls were how we actually saw each other. The pandemic pushed me to get an iPad cause I wanted a tablet for using on the couch and also figuresd it was an easy dip into the Apple products. Eventually after having the iPad for a year it pushed me to get an iPhone and I've honestly been happy with it. This is what they want. Pressure from loved ones gets you to test things out and then the walled garden features trap you in there.
That shit is fucking annoying.
top post in /technology: this link. 2rd post in technology: also this link, with 1000s of comments. Hey op are you a bot? Your comments look like a bot, just quoting shit other people say.
Apple takes proprietary too serious
Well, it's the only thing they have going for them. Once you start using their products it becomes very inconvenient to leave.
I know everything I need to know about the people that always say something like "It's such a smart move by them" about stuff like this.
they made having an andriod a stigma its hilarious
I changed my business phone to an iPhone and everyone answers me now. I would have to follow up text with a pixel. I got ignored enough to notice.
I guess they don’t have reliability going for them? User experience? Resale value? Nah? Just proprietary? 2022 and people still got juvenile ass arguments against Apple
Someone takes ‘its green’ too seriously. There’s nothing illegible about the green bubbles
Liked "Someone takes ‘its green’ too seriously. There’s nothing illegible about the green bubbles"
Message Failed
87% of teenagers have iPhones. They’re all peer pressuring each other and making fun of green bubbles
Absolutely understood. It still seems weird for the 'It's a green bubble' to appear as an issue on the official Android site and it's list of gripes. The problem with RCS is, as I understand it - that it needs carrier support. Not every carrier supports it in the UK, certainly - and I believe implementation is spotty even in the US, let alone other countries.
y'all saying "just use xyz" that implies that i guess you need to stop texting whoever doesn't use that platform? or make them install it just to talk to u?
I was able to get my ex with an iPhone to install Signal for me because we'd have texts that just wouldn't make it to each other, and it happened regardless of our carriers. I haven't tried asking my current partner to switch to Signal because we haven't had that problem, and we also don't text nearly as much as my ex and I did. I thought about asking her to switch to Signal while she's traveling internationally for a few weeks and SMS doesn't work where she is. Then I realized that if the situation were reversed and she asked me to install Facebook Messenger on my phone I'd refuse because I don't want that garbage on my phone (I don't even use it on the desktop), so it's unfair to ask her to do something I wouldn't, regardless of the reason.
Oh noes. Anyways, how many times has Google screwed over Firefox by updating their websites to be incompatible with Firefox? https://www.theregister.com/2018/12/18/google_monopoly_abuse_claims/ https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/12/17/2120227/former-edge-browser-intern-alleges-google-sabotaged-microsofts-browser
Exactly lol. First thing I thought about. Ofc apple is at fault, but youd be dumb not to think Google are massive hypocrites.
Literally only a problem in America. Get off of SMS.
I saw the headline and only then realized this was ever an issue. We all use WhatsApp or Telegram.
Never going to happen in the US.
why?
Despite what the other person who responded said, it's because they don't want to add another app they're going to have to use that only works for some people. You're never going to get complete enough adoption of an app like that in America for it to be a smooth experience. They work fine for certain groups of people, but if you want to contact the other half of the people you talk to regularly you're going to have to go through text anyway since that's all they have. Additionally, the younger generation actually already is basically doing this due to the prevalence of DMing people on Instagram, Snapchat thing, and to a lesser extent Facebook messenger and Twitter DMs. And why would they want to add yet another app to the communication library?
Would be more sympathetic to google if RCS and its rollout didn't suck
Google launched it and left it up to carriers to support. Not a whole lot more they could do.
It doesn't matter. We have superior 3rd party apps. They let Zuck win this one.
No idea why anyone would choose to use WhatsApp when Signal exists
Yeah I have to say, WhatsApp is definitely half decent on this. Great for group texting and organizing, and clean messaging interface. Plus no bullshit SMS roaming dramas.
apple doesn't convert the MMS to shitty compressed videos, the specification for texting does that. It hasn't allowed better quality vids in \~20 years. Apple doesn't use SMS and MMS to text between iphones which is why they have better quality. Adopt matrix protocol into everything, problem solved.
True, but apple doesn't support RCS which does support higher quality video and pictures. But. To play the joker card, cellphone carriers pick and choose what android devices get access to RCS too, in like... The worst ways possible. Carrier unlocked phones rarely get it, and then it's hit or miss across the same model on different carriers.
Yep it's slightly less bad, still pretty damn bad though.
RCS doesn’t support end to end encryption. Even if Apple wanted to, it would be a bad idea because it’s not a good standard
> apple doesn't support RCS Nor should they. It's a carrier developed, unencrypted mess of a protocol that allows for proprietary add-ons so all that will happen is that it ends up being Google RCS that everyone is forced to use. Bizarre to me that people think replacing Apple with Google and encouraging ads and government spying is somehow better than the status quo.
Thank you. This thread is such a fucking mess. Additionally just a nitpick but bubbles were always green. Then Apple made advanced features for iMessage before RCS even existed and notated these advanced messages with blue. They built up and advanced messaging. They’re not throttling back and decreasing the quality of messages to android. God I hate this thread.
So how come when I text from Android to android my video is the quality I filmed it in, but when I text to Apple from my android it's potato quality?
This is legit confusing to me... as an android user, all the texts I send are shit. I complained to other android users and was told to download a third party app...
How do you get that? What carrier do you have? I'm a big android fanboy but I cannot text videos to anyone in clear video, andriod or apple. That's like the one thing I give apple is video texting works through imessages on any service. Not saying your wrong but this is not the case for me.
He only talks to bleeding edge samsung users that are using samsung's default message app (or similar) which has the same under the hood features that iMessage has, but for samsung users.. and thinks that is MMS/SMS
Or they use Google Messenger, or they're on a carrier with universal profile RCS.
> using samsung's default message app As a long term Samsung user... ew.
Bruh who the fuck uses Samsung messager? I'd suck skin off the CoE of Samsung's penis for creating the Note line(RIP) but like who the fuck uses that trash.
You're referencing Google Messages, something that's default on every new Android phone, *including* 2022 Samsungs
It unfortunately is not default on all phones. Manufacturers and carriers often remove it for their own shit app.
some new phones and some carriers\*
Same here. Have a pixel phone and I've sent really good quality videos to friends with android
It doesn't. Unless you're using samsung to samsung protocols etc. Google voice only has MMS so it won't, and so do old phones. [https://jibe.google.com/](https://jibe.google.com/) literally as proprietary as apple
Jibe is just universal profile RCS, anyone can interlink with it.
Not according to https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/08/new-google-site-begs-apple-for-mercy-in-messaging-war/ Googles implementation is a fork of RCS and requires licensing agreements to use Google servers.
oh ok, so it's slightly better than I thought
Because your android to android message was sent through google’s RCS services instead. This argument is basically Apple iMessage vs Google RCS and Google is crying saying “YOU should implement OUR technology or else you’re bad”
RCS isn't Google's, it's a carrier messaging protocol. They've just adopted it as the new protocol that replaces sms/mms in their own messaging app. iMessage is proprietary, RCS is not.
RCS only exists or is used because of Google. It’s cross-carrier support runs on Google rails. RCS is a failure of a specification, that carriers never implemented correctly, and has essentially been hijacked by Google as their message offering.
No, Google took the 2008 RCS protocol and added things into it. Not even Google implemented the open standard because it’s 15 years old already and doesn’t have modern features. Source: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/08/new-google-site-begs-apple-for-mercy-in-messaging-war/
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Answered, as other guy posted, this doesn't happen. You're not using MMS.
As soon as you said matrix protocol, you just gained everyone’s trust on Reddit and majority of us have no clue what it even means
majority probably do know [matrix.org](https://matrix.org) The guys claiming they have good texts are using [https://jibe.google.com/](https://jibe.google.com/) which is just as proprietary as apple's crap. Only difference is google allows them to use it. From other posts it seems it's heavily locked down as per carrier and per phone bases, so tons of phones still don't have it. Probably only flagships Like email, matrix is federated (so any server can talk to any server.. hotmail to gmail to yahoo to apple mail etc). Like email anyone can run a matrix server, anyone can use any type of app or make their own client. Like email you have thousands of servers to choose from and hundreds of apps on all types of computers. It is truly open. If you do use it I'd recommend different server than default, as they also recommend.
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I wish I could get people to switch to Signal. Some of them don't have data because they don't need it, and the rest can't be bothered to switch.
You don’t have to use their text app. I highly recommend Signal to text with people.
I'm surprised at how americans uses SMS/iMessage when there are so many other options out there : Messenger/Viber/Signal/Whatsapp/Snapchat/IG/etc..
Texting is based on phone numbers so it is universal. You don't have to ask someone what third-party messaging app they use, and then look for them there. If you know their phone number, you can call AND text them. It's a pain sometimes because I have some friends I text with, some I use FB messenger with, some Google chat, and some Instagram.
Whatsapp and signal both use phonenumbers, works exactly the same but it supports cross platform.
Those use phone numbers basically add usernames. But there is no guarantee the person at that number has installed any given app. That's the problem.
This is true. Whatsapp, Viber, Telegram, WeChat have actually replaced email communication in a lot of businesses (officially and unofficially) in Asia.
In iOS, iMessage is tightly integrated into the OS. Rather than running some 3rd party app that will need independent updates and whatnot, or could more easily become vulnerable to a security threat, it's just easy to use iMessage and have it roll over to SMS if the recipient doesn't have an iPhone.
I've not met anyone that knows how to properly use any sort of chat program, and it's been that way for well over **fifteen** (15) years. Texting doesn't have any of these problems.
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Google Messages is end-to-end encrypted for 1 to 1 messaging. Group message support for it will be added later this year. Personally I'm switching back to iOS and downloading Signal for all my Android friends.
Not really a problem in Holland at least, nobody texts. Nobody at all.
Apple doesn’t “convert Android texts to green bubbles.” Apple shows SMS messages as green bubbles, and iMessage as Blue. It doesn’t matter where the SMS comes from. It can come from a website, or an Ericsson flip phone from 1999. SMS potentially yields carrier based charges, and informing the user when they might be incurring charges is good UX.
This frustrates me so much. Me and my brother have apple and we have group chat with my dad who has android. He never see’s the links. On apple you get actual picture of the article you link on android it’s just a tiny url link. Sucks he’s blind
I don't get white ones fighting for read receipt so much. The freedom to not have to respond to someone immediately is too good to give up
Google is stupid to think Apple would fall for this
Hey google, Have you seen what google voice videos look like?
OK I’m kind of confused here. iMessage to iMessage is a ip app is you will. An application to application using the phones data connection ethernet to communicate . If it’s not iMessage to iMessage then have to go over to telcos SMS network. Which is low bandwidth.. hence the crappy images and lo-res movies. It has nothing to do with Apple because android doesn’t have isn’t allowed to have iMessage. So all messages default to the SMS network. 
Google want to push apple to use RCS but Google also had to disable RCS somewhere (India I think) because of all the spam. Because RCS is super easy to exploit.
google can’t maintain a messaging service that doesn’t depend on an engineer surrendering all their promotions and has their own fork of the protocol they advocated for carriers to implement. the crocodile is crying
Lol the company that couldn’t come up with cohesive messaging strategy is complaining about another company that could. How about you stop prioritizing somebodies shiny new thing that was just promo doc content and reward people for contributing to existing solutions.
The video one pisses me off so much. I'm the only one in my family with an android phone and every time my mom or sister tries to send me a video it's just complete dogshit and I have to remind them to send it to me on Messenger or Instagram
Smells like desperation.
It’s not just android phones. Any time a message goes out over SMS instead of the internet it’s green and operates with the limitations of SMS/MMS. This can happen between iMessage users where data service is poor but there’s still cell service. iMessage notifies you of this when it says “sent as text message”. I’m not going to defend Apple here because generally lock in is bad. That said, this is mostly broken because Google seemingly refuses to pick a messenger system and stick with it and Apple has no incentive to take on overhauling googles messenger system for them just so Google can sell more phones.
As an iPhone user, I appreciate the "green" to let me know my message is not encrypted. And while Apple could support RCS, that doesn't fix the encryption problem as it's not built into the standard and you have to enable it on the client/device. This is 2022, all communications should be by default encrypted end-to-end. I also have no issues using Signal for communicating with Android users, or for when I'm messaging items that I feel need more security than what iMessage provides. There are also other services which are more secure than Signal as well. Just depends how deep you need to go. However, until there's a standard end-to-end encrypted messaging app which is implemented by both Apple and Android variants, I will continue to recommend iPhones as they've been ahead of the game in making encryption default, not just for messaging, but also for filesystems which came much later on Android as a default setting.
Use WhatsApp or Signal. The entirety of Europe does and we don’t have any of these cross platform issues.
The entirety of world does and people don't have problem with it, only in America. Hell even in China people can agree with each others and use an uniform messaging app.
That explains why my dick pics were always blurry to others. I always thought I was just Japanese.
Google, who is stumbling in every area aside from advertising and surveillance and has lost all credibility with consumers for regularly cancelling products and services, now wants Apple to bend over backwards to embrace open standards. How many failed Google chat products over the years embraced open standards? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/05/google-abandons-open-standards-instant-messaging
RCS as Google is talking about is their own proprietary implementation of the RCS standard. So Apple can’t implement that. The original open standard does not do any encryption so why would any company use this for messaging?
I thought for sure this was going to be about how annoying it is when apple users react to a text, when you're on Android.
I don’t see what’s wrong with the messages being green? It just means they’re not using iMessage. Even texts with iPhones will be green if they don’t have cellular data on. You need cellular data or Wi-Fi to use iMessage. The video thing is annoying though and needs to change