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Tim Cook Shoots Down Idea of iOS Adopting RCS Messages: 'Buy Your Mom an iPhone'
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This is the wants of their own users. I use an iPhone. I want (expect) a better experience when messaging non-iPhone users. This is not up to Google to address. It’s happening on my iPhone, that makes it Apple’s responsibility. There’s already an inter platform standard they can use and even modify, but they could just as easily provide a different solution or work with Google on something encrypted and up to their standards. They’re just choosing not to.
How so? It's Apple's OS. It's an exclusive feature meant to entice some one to buy an iPhone if they care about that.
Sure she might, but to me it sounds like Tim was trying to be snarky and promoting Apple/iPhones at the same time (which as the CEO is kind of his job)."Buy your mom an iPhone"
Wow, maybe his mom has an opinion of her own about which phone she wants. Apple is so arrogant sometimes, and it clearly starts at the top
Hates? Aren't they part of several industry standard creation groups? PassKey ring a bell?
That's not entirely correct. Group chats don't, at the moment.
How end-to-end encryption in Google Messages provides more security - Google Messages
Google Messages supports end-to-end encryption when messaging other users using Google Messages over Rich Communication Services (R
support.google.com
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That Ars Technica article sums it up perfectly. It's not a standard, it's a Google-Controlled proprietary platform (one of 14 they've had over the years) that Apple is under zero obligation to adopt.
Since people around here like to use this analogy alot, telling Apple they "must adopt RCS" is like telling Walmart they need to start telling Target-branded products because it's inconvenient for a customer to to not be able to buy them there.
Wow. Disgusting, arrogant response. Apple already supports SMS. RCS is just the spiritual successor to that. Apple knows exactly what it’s doing.
It’s not about Android, it’s about a proprietary messaging platform (iMessage) versus a universal messaging protocol. iMessage is a solution (and a problem) created by Apple, not the other way around.
edit - I see that RCS is actually a protocol owned by Google, per @Naraxus’ post. Still, I stand by what I said. I feel that this is the successor to SMS (which Apple supports) and Apple is only holding back support to keep artificial friction there between iPhone and non-iPhone texting.
It's not an industry standard. It's Google's proprietary implementation on top of RCS.
It's like Apple's H-chips built on top of Bluetooth.
So you didn’t actually read what I wrote, huh?
Tbh I don't really care about this issue, or what kind of experience Android users have. The fact that Android users complain so much about this makes me want them to suffer even more so I can laugh at them. iPhone users shouldn't complain about this either. You do get the words across either way. Just text, dude. If you don't like it, don't text. I am not buying my mom an iPhone either.
It's not an industry standard. It's Google's proprietary code and services on top to get it to work properly.
RCS doesn't really work unless you have Google's Android and/or services complementing the carriers' different RCS implentations.
But shouldn't that just work if it's a standard?
Where in the RCS standard is encryption documented for (group) chats?
It's their users who use insecure SMS.
Apple also allows unencrypted web traffic and unencrypted e-mails if you as a user wants that.
How else am I meant to message someone with a different brand of phone? Please explain how this is the user’s fault when Apple is the one refusing to provide offer an alternative to SMS that has encryption.
This is the correct answer. RCS "could" have replaced SMS and Apple would have naturally supported it, but the carriers have almost entirely abandoned it and Google bastardized it to form their own proprietary messaging services exclusive to them. Google hasn't even enabled RCS support in any of their iOS messaging apps like Voice which is also stuck on the insecure SMS standard. Right now, its not possible to use RCS to send a message between two independent carriers without using Google's services and I doubt it ever will be.
The problem, as a few others have noted, is that RCS as google wants Apple to use it isn't a standard based successor to SMS, it's some standard with a whole bunch of google bolt-ons and their own servers in the mix because of inconsistent carrier support. The carriers are honestly the biggest problem here - in the US, where this problem is most prevalent because other services are dominant in most of the rest of the world, they've dragged their feet on any standard consistent replacements or updates to SMS, in large part because of the desire to MiTM message traffic and the data mining it provides, as well as load on their own servers.
If RCS as google wants it used was truly a rolled out fully supported standard I don't think Apple would take such a hard line.
This is not the correct answer. If they aren’t happy with RCS, proposing an alternative would be the right answer. This is something that affects their users and mars their stance on privacy. They need to do better than hoping we’ll just shill the problem away.
The fact that regulators are in a position to make marketing decisions for companies is the problem. Let the issue drive iPhones into oblivion. It won’t, though.
Think of it as a way for Apple to protect consumers from Google’s pervasive invasion of privacy, if they use Android devices.
Android also provides several good systems for messages, aka more than one. At this point I think than even Telegram has more active monthly users than iMessage(and I'm not surprised it's a very good messaging app). I think it's 700 million the latest estimate. iMessage is only really popular in the US, in the rest of the world very few care about it.
RCS is a newer and better standard than SMS that doesn't belong to Google. Also the suggestions here that "RSC is Google's favorite standard" are nonsense, its not like there are multiple messaging standards at the Carrier level and Google very suspiciously picked RCS as their "favorite".
Apple doesn't want to adopt a superior messaging standard because they want to keep(on purpose) the communicating experience between their users and Android users in the US as bad as possible, is a cynical and anti-consumer behavior, but I guess for a lot of users here it's fine, because apple does it.
Consumers have dozens of secure, cross-platform messaging services to choose from if they are concerned with privacy. Apple has no obligation to worry about the user experience on devices from other manufactures as their only obligation is to their customers. Especially since Google's RCS implementation is being built as a gateway for businesses and, more recently, outright spammers to access individuals outside of federal regulations that oversee services like SMS and cellular voice calls.
Of course it's anticompetitive. If iPhones are truly the better product, then Apple shouldn't need to pressure people to keep using them by making them incompatible with industry standards.