Microsoft somehow brings iMessage to Windows – will it last?(9to5mac.com)
9to5mac.com
Microsoft somehow brings iMessage to Windows – will it last?
https://9to5mac.com/2023/02/28/microsoft-imessage-windows-support/
167 comments
Having switched back to Android, it can be infuriating dealing with iPhone users. I get slammed with "messages" when someone reacts to a message and oftentimes, messages just don't show up or messages go to my iPad and not my phone. Apple makes this extremely confusing. The iPhone users never know of their message goes through or what they're actually sending to (my iCloud account or my phone number).
Having lived all over the world, but not the US, I don't think I've sent or received an SMS/text message once in the last decade (except for bad 2FA implementations).
Apple's weird and semi-transparent (to the user) hybrid system of mixing a proprietary web protocol and SMS in the same app is obviously problematic, and the rest of the world moved on to other messaging services, but it's weird that the US is still stuck on this.
Apple's weird and semi-transparent (to the user) hybrid system of mixing a proprietary web protocol and SMS in the same app is obviously problematic, and the rest of the world moved on to other messaging services, but it's weird that the US is still stuck on this.
It is a little odd that the US is so iMessage-heavy when the rest of the world isn't but IMO relying on another proprietary protocol (i.e. WhatsApp) really isn't great either. I kind of think everyone is in an awful place.
As much as I don't like WhatsApp for other reasons, at least it's honest in a way that you know that messages sent over WhatsApp will be sent and received using WhatsApp, and not some confusing half-backed combination of SMS and another App that you can't control.
iMessage is not the only one at fault here, Google Messages (or how they call it today) is not better. It's the first thing I disable when switching to a new phone.
iMessage is not the only one at fault here, Google Messages (or how they call it today) is not better. It's the first thing I disable when switching to a new phone.
If that's the configuration you want, it's more or less available in iMessage. You can either disable SMS fallback (and you will always use iMessage to talk to contacts with iPhones) or you can disable iMessage (in which case you will obviously always use SMS).
Of course they do not offer to split these up into two apps, which may be what you want.
Of course they do not offer to split these up into two apps, which may be what you want.
iMessage also does not have multiplatform clients for its proprietary protocol, which would be more useful than the either of the scenarios you presented. To me, that is the distinguishing feature between iMessage and every other non-SMS message app.
WhatsApp can also be confusing. It's a message client but yet is tied to your phone number. I recently logged into a backup phone that has WhatsApp on it. The reason WhatsApp is in the backup phone is because you cannot backup between iOS and Android. So I left it there. i recently got a new phone, so I tried to back up WhatsApp, but it claims no such backup exists, which is not true. So I log into the backup phone and see that WhatsApp has discontinues support for that phone or version of Android. That was a change that occured over just a month or so of not logging in, and I received no warning. There's no way to get around it. And I think that action is potentially what deleted my Google Cloud backup of WhatsApp. It's a mess, and I have potentially lost years of messages.
> The reason WhatsApp is in the backup phone is because you cannot backup between iOS and Android. So I left it there. i recently got a new phone, so I tried to back up WhatsApp, but it claims no such backup exists, which is not true.
You can migrate between iOS and Android, but I think Android > iOS is a very recent feature.
iOS backs up to either iTunes as part of a phone backup, or separately to iCloud within its own app container; and Android backs up to Google Drive. I'm very surprised that WhatsApp on iOS doesn't support Google Drive either, given that it's the more "open" of the two.
[1] https://faq.whatsapp.com/1295296267926284/
[2] https://faq.whatsapp.com/686469079565350/
You can migrate between iOS and Android, but I think Android > iOS is a very recent feature.
iOS backs up to either iTunes as part of a phone backup, or separately to iCloud within its own app container; and Android backs up to Google Drive. I'm very surprised that WhatsApp on iOS doesn't support Google Drive either, given that it's the more "open" of the two.
[1] https://faq.whatsapp.com/1295296267926284/
[2] https://faq.whatsapp.com/686469079565350/
Signal was starting to gain some traction here IMO because it was open source and therefore a bit more trustworthy, and it gracefully fell back to SMS so people could adopt it without risk and interruption to their existing network. Then they decided they were going to shoot themselves in the foot and drive off a cliff. Unbelievably frustrating.
> Then they decided they were going to shoot themselves in the foot and drive off a cliff. Unbelievably frustrating.
Wait I missed this, what did Signal do?
Wait I missed this, what did Signal do?
Removed SMS support from the app
It seems counterintuitive to use SMS in the first place if your users expect end to end encryption.
It did in fact support even that. That's how the whole thing started, as TextSecure which encrypted SMS.
Yeah, as an iPhone Signal user, the concept that you'd ever use want to use it for anything other than explicitly encrypted messaging never even occurred to me. I learned about this feature that the Android version had when they announced it would be discontinued. I would even consider the "graceful" fall back to SMS to be potentially an anti-feature/security flaw, as it opens you up to downgrade attacks.
Maybe, but confusing iMessage and SMS doesn’t seem to be a problem for iOS users who use both in the same app. The bigger problem was going to be RCS. 3rd party apps can’t use it, so as SMS conversations moved to RCS the SMS support in the Signal app would become less useful or even confusing.
I think text massages (SMS) are much more popular in US than in some other countries (obviously there are a lot of places where people still use SMS besides US).
Not sure how accurate is the data but this seems interesting:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1263720/mobile-messaging...
Not sure how accurate is the data but this seems interesting:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1263720/mobile-messaging...
Seen from my window, Whatsapp gained traction as free international messages and voice - which are only attractive for usage across international boundaries, which is uncommon in the USA... Maybe that partly explains why SMS lasted longer in the USA.
Did it? My recollection was that it was more due to the wider usage of prepay, at least in my country. With more prepay, there were more people paying per message for SMS so once data got low enough people first went to IM clients (MSN, Facebook Messenger), then to the new wave of phone apps (Viber, Line, Whatsapp) of which Whatsapp was the eventual winner in the local market.
Accounts with per SMS billing were unlikely to have mobile data for comfortable Whatsapp usage, so I doubt that was the substitution.
To call between France and various African countries in the early Android era, I remember first using Viber - but after a while everyone switched to Whatsapp in a few months: somehow, through some sheer black magic, Whatsapp had nailed voice quality over the lossy high-latency links that were the norms then, and users noticed.
To call between France and various African countries in the early Android era, I remember first using Viber - but after a while everyone switched to Whatsapp in a few months: somehow, through some sheer black magic, Whatsapp had nailed voice quality over the lossy high-latency links that were the norms then, and users noticed.
> Accounts with per SMS billing were unlikely to have mobile data for comfortable Whatsapp usage, so I doubt that was the substitution.
Care to quantify that? PAYG SMS was/is consistently way more expensive than PAYG data[1] in every country I have visited; granted I haven't been to many countries, but I've visited most continents. IIRC, there's a 2-3 orders of magnitude difference in the costs-per-140-bytes sent.
Per WhatsApp message, which ends up being a few KiB per day for text only
Care to quantify that? PAYG SMS was/is consistently way more expensive than PAYG data[1] in every country I have visited; granted I haven't been to many countries, but I've visited most continents. IIRC, there's a 2-3 orders of magnitude difference in the costs-per-140-bytes sent.
Per WhatsApp message, which ends up being a few KiB per day for text only
At the time of the rise of Viber and then Whatsapp, for people in Africa or communicating with Africa the messaging substitution wasn't an important question at all: we were burning so much money with international calls (and SMS) that any other tradeoff was a rounding error.
In the window where Viber then Whatsapp took off in my country it was €1 for 200mb of data on prepay but €0.15 per SMS. So if you sent more than 7-8 texts in the day the data was cheaper, and I think MMS were like €0.60 each.
Can't say people, to this day, have much of a culture of using whatsapp video calls. Skype was the majority in the Whatsapp takeover time and today it's a mix of Zoom and Skype. International calls also weren't that common.
So sounds like there may have been different motivations in your country than mine.
Can't say people, to this day, have much of a culture of using whatsapp video calls. Skype was the majority in the Whatsapp takeover time and today it's a mix of Zoom and Skype. International calls also weren't that common.
So sounds like there may have been different motivations in your country than mine.
> Accounts with per SMS billing were unlikely to have mobile data for comfortable Whatsapp usage, so I doubt that was the substitution.
But I could jump onto coffee shop WiFi to negate that.
But I could jump onto coffee shop WiFi to negate that.
SMS are not always free, even locally. They are not convenient for a group chat. Apps allow group communication and is "free" over wifi.
The US has had stupidly overpriced cellular data, while unlimited texts have been a standard thing since like 2005 on even the cheapest plans.
SMS was more reliable for delivery with poor cellular connections, and many people learned to use it for that reason. The US (had) many rural areas with poor reception. So maybe that plays into it?
That theory would seem disproved by Mexico which is also pretty rural, but I believe their cell infrastructure sprung up pretty quickly and later than the US so "old school" sms didn't get the same traction.
That theory would seem disproved by Mexico which is also pretty rural, but I believe their cell infrastructure sprung up pretty quickly and later than the US so "old school" sms didn't get the same traction.
US historically was much more into "unlimited" plans vs pay-per-use was/is more of a common thing in poorer countries. That may explain the prevalence of SMS in the US.
It is a little odd that the US is so iMessage-heavy when the rest of the world isn't
It's not odd at all.
Lots of iPhones in the US because of high incomes, and high iPhone availability. Lots of non-iPhones in the rest of the world because of comparatively low incomes, and significantly less iPhone availability.
I see no mystery.
It's not odd at all.
Lots of iPhones in the US because of high incomes, and high iPhone availability. Lots of non-iPhones in the rest of the world because of comparatively low incomes, and significantly less iPhone availability.
I see no mystery.
I think the real reason is that in the early 2000s, pre-iPhone, texting was ridiculously expensive in the US and much cheaper in the rest of the world.
Also, Americans were using awful phones while the RoW was using much better phones like Nokias thst even in their non-communicator series made texting far easier thanks to stuff like T9.
So the rest of the world used SMS and texting far more than Americans Pre-smartphone.
When smartphones came out and WhatsApp was released, the RoW was far more willing to pay the dollars needed to buy WhatsApp (it wasn’t free before FB bought it) because they would easily save on their low but still not free SMS charges.
Whereas Americans were not as willing to pay for an app to do something they didn’t do anyways, and anyways by this time phone carriers in the US made SMS free for the most part.
As a result WhatsApp became entrenched in the RoW well before iMessage was released (2011), so non Americans continued using WhatsApp, even as Americans started using the free available iMessage instead.
Also, Americans were using awful phones while the RoW was using much better phones like Nokias thst even in their non-communicator series made texting far easier thanks to stuff like T9.
So the rest of the world used SMS and texting far more than Americans Pre-smartphone.
When smartphones came out and WhatsApp was released, the RoW was far more willing to pay the dollars needed to buy WhatsApp (it wasn’t free before FB bought it) because they would easily save on their low but still not free SMS charges.
Whereas Americans were not as willing to pay for an app to do something they didn’t do anyways, and anyways by this time phone carriers in the US made SMS free for the most part.
As a result WhatsApp became entrenched in the RoW well before iMessage was released (2011), so non Americans continued using WhatsApp, even as Americans started using the free available iMessage instead.
It's kind of the opposite of this, actually. Unlimited texting plans became widespread in the US in the 2000s because texting was incredibly popular. When I was a young teenager it was common for kids to get in trouble for racking up hundreds of dollars worth of texts each month so when carriers started offering affordable unlimited texting plans families switched to them en masse. By the time I went to college unlimited texting was a ubiquitous feature of American family phone plans. Mobile data remained extremely expensive, however, and free public wifi was pretty scarce in the US (and still is compared to Europe). At the same time free public wifi was becoming widespread in the rest of the world while unlimited texting plans remained expensive, so non-Americans started using internet-based messaging apps while Americans continued using SMS until Apple started mixing the two automatically via iMessage.
Americans definitely used Nokia phones in the 2000s btw, not to mention Asian ones like LG, Sony, etc. I never saw a cell phone in the US that didn't come with T9 word and by ~2008 full QWERTY keyboard phones were extremely popular. Texting was very easy in America in the 2000s and we did a lot of it.
Americans definitely used Nokia phones in the 2000s btw, not to mention Asian ones like LG, Sony, etc. I never saw a cell phone in the US that didn't come with T9 word and by ~2008 full QWERTY keyboard phones were extremely popular. Texting was very easy in America in the 2000s and we did a lot of it.
> Also, Americans were using awful phones while the RoW was using much better phones like Nokias thst even in their non-communicator series made texting far easier thanks to stuff like T9.
Worth mentioning the unique phones sold in the Japanese market by domestic manufacturers prior to smartphones, which were some of the most advanced in existence at that point and had been for many years. People in Japan were doing things on their phones in the late 90s and early 00s that most of the rest of the world wouldn’t for another 10-15 years.
Worth mentioning the unique phones sold in the Japanese market by domestic manufacturers prior to smartphones, which were some of the most advanced in existence at that point and had been for many years. People in Japan were doing things on their phones in the late 90s and early 00s that most of the rest of the world wouldn’t for another 10-15 years.
Eh, my mid 2000s cell phone was pretty cheap and could do live streaming video, internet, email, "apps" including facebook etc, it's just that nobody used any of these features in the US because it was at least 100$ a month to do ANYTHING that used the internet.
> When smartphones came out and WhatsApp was released, the RoW was far more willing to pay the dollars needed to buy WhatsApp (it wasn’t free before FB bought it) because they would easily save on their low but still not free SMS charges.
The dollar was often waived. They were never serious about charging non-business users.
The dollar was often waived. They were never serious about charging non-business users.
> Lots of iPhones in the US because of high incomes, and high iPhone availability
The US is not the only country with a wealthy populace which tends to use mostly iPhones. The UK, Germany, Switzerland, the Baltics, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan are all roughly equally as wealthy (if not more so) per capita. However, in literally everywhere else but the US, people almost exclusively use third-party apps like WhatsApp, Telegram, WeChat, etc. iMessage is completely ignored, and the Messages app on iPhones is used solely for SMSes from carriers, 2FA OTPs, and random spam that is ignored.
Furthermore, several flagship Android phones rival iPhones in cost now.
The US is not the only country with a wealthy populace which tends to use mostly iPhones. The UK, Germany, Switzerland, the Baltics, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan are all roughly equally as wealthy (if not more so) per capita. However, in literally everywhere else but the US, people almost exclusively use third-party apps like WhatsApp, Telegram, WeChat, etc. iMessage is completely ignored, and the Messages app on iPhones is used solely for SMSes from carriers, 2FA OTPs, and random spam that is ignored.
Furthermore, several flagship Android phones rival iPhones in cost now.
> equally as wealthy (if not more so) per capita
Are you thinking of GDP, perhaps? I think that household income (and individual) is highest in the US (adjusted for PPP).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...
Are you thinking of GDP, perhaps? I think that household income (and individual) is highest in the US (adjusted for PPP).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...
One of reasons WeChat and WhatsApp became popular in low income countries first, was that in those countries SMS were/are charged PER MESSAGE
International SMS charges and ability to send photos without very high MMS charges were also a big driver of WhatsApp uptake - in the UK individual SMS charges had basically gone before WhatsApp came along but those two reasons were why my friendship group moved to it.
This was the case in the US as well until the early 2000s. Texting before then could be as much as a quarter per 160 characters!
I don't have WhatsApp or iMessage; anyone who wants to communicate with me can use email or Signal. Signal lets me sign in with VoIP numbers, so it works fine for my uses, and is reasonably secure.
If I drew that line I would have approximately zero people communicating with me.
It must be sad to realize that people don’t want to communicate with you all that much. ;)
This is the fear that keeps people serving as the honey in the trap of these surveillance apps.
If someone can't be assed to download a zero cost and surveillance-free, ad-free app to talk to you, how much do they really value communicating with you?
If someone can't be assed to download a zero cost and surveillance-free, ad-free app to talk to you, how much do they really value communicating with you?
It’s not fear. Asking others to use a special (from their pov) app just to talk to me is me imposing a burden and an inconvenience on them. I don’t care enough about iMessage’s cons to annoy others around me.
Subjecting friends to surveillance without their consent is more of an imposed inconvenience than downloading an app.
I agree that proprietary protocols suck and users are harmed long term, iMessage due to reasons described is by far the worst : it doesn't even bother to tell senders reliably if recipients received it, not even going into read status.
Due to Apple's desperate need to keep all their inventions to themselves only regardless of long term effects (lightning port say hi and bye in quick succession), its worse than useless and actually harms communication between people. I don't know a single person/haven't met a single one in Switzerland in past 13 years who is using it, everybody is on some other competition (while working in IT and bank and quite a few folks here sport mostly older apple devices).
Due to Apple's desperate need to keep all their inventions to themselves only regardless of long term effects (lightning port say hi and bye in quick succession), its worse than useless and actually harms communication between people. I don't know a single person/haven't met a single one in Switzerland in past 13 years who is using it, everybody is on some other competition (while working in IT and bank and quite a few folks here sport mostly older apple devices).
> it doesn't even bother to tell senders reliably if recipients received it, not even going into read status
Huh? That's exactly what iMessage does, and one of the key reasons people prefer it over SMS.
Huh? That's exactly what iMessage does, and one of the key reasons people prefer it over SMS.
https://support.apple.com/guide/messages/change-imessage-set...
> Send read receipts
> Turn on read receipts so that people who send you messages see when you’ve read them.
> You can also send read receipts for a conversation only. The per-conversation setting overrides the global setting.
---
Note that some people don't enable this. One member of my family has read receipts off and I don't see anything on that one. Another member has them on and I can see 'delivered' and 'read' show up.
Many people who are security conscious have that setting off by default because, well, security conscious.
I would contend that not having read receipts as an option is important functionality for some.
> Send read receipts
> Turn on read receipts so that people who send you messages see when you’ve read them.
> You can also send read receipts for a conversation only. The per-conversation setting overrides the global setting.
---
Note that some people don't enable this. One member of my family has read receipts off and I don't see anything on that one. Another member has them on and I can see 'delivered' and 'read' show up.
Many people who are security conscious have that setting off by default because, well, security conscious.
I would contend that not having read receipts as an option is important functionality for some.
Even if the other person in the conversation has read receipts turned off you will still get a delivery receipt that shows it made it to their phone. I turn off read receipts because it's nobody's damn business if I read their message or not.
I think you might be confused why Apple exists. Apple exists to make money for its shareholders.
Lightening port will bring in more revenue than USB-C.
iMessage creates social pressure for people to buy iPhones to match their friends.
iMessage access to non-Apple products doesn’t increase their revenue.
Apple is not an altruistic not for profit organization.
Lightening port will bring in more revenue than USB-C.
iMessage creates social pressure for people to buy iPhones to match their friends.
iMessage access to non-Apple products doesn’t increase their revenue.
Apple is not an altruistic not for profit organization.
> the rest of the world moved on to other messaging services
Speak for yourself. I'm not in the US and still prefer SMS, simply because you can port over your contacts and don't have to share them with shady businesses on a fscking platform, for freaking text messages, something we already did 30 years ago (not counting emails almost double as old).
Speak for yourself. I'm not in the US and still prefer SMS, simply because you can port over your contacts and don't have to share them with shady businesses on a fscking platform, for freaking text messages, something we already did 30 years ago (not counting emails almost double as old).
Good for you if you don't see your telecom provider as a shady company.
So you'd rather pay extra to send completely unencrypted messages?
They're not completely unencrypted - they are encrypted with A5 between the handset and the tower.
They are certainly not e2ee.
They are certainly not e2ee.
They are completely unencrypted, just on the initial and the last "mile" the TRANSPORT layer is (sort of) encrypted.
[deleted]
pay extra ? I live in France, and SMS have been free for a long time here.
France is most certainly not the world.
[deleted]
Why is it weird that people expect the default preinstalled message app to work?
Especially when it is from Apple, famous for it just works, and being the largest company on the planet.
Especially when it is from Apple, famous for it just works, and being the largest company on the planet.
Google has an app that mixes SMS and messages as well transparently. They put this in the android SMS app at some point.
Then they started to ask me daily to switch to using their messaging thing whenever possible.
That's when I went on f-droid and downloaded the first SMS app I found. I can't understand why the SMS app should send anything else than SMS.
After all, I'm aware that using any messenger made by google means constant migration.
Then they started to ask me daily to switch to using their messaging thing whenever possible.
That's when I went on f-droid and downloaded the first SMS app I found. I can't understand why the SMS app should send anything else than SMS.
After all, I'm aware that using any messenger made by google means constant migration.
A lot of people have forgotten that iMessage was really the original killer app for the iPhone, as a side effect of how terrible US carriers were in the late 00's early 10's. You used to get a handful of txt messages a month, basically no MMS messages a month, and if you went over you got an overage fee, and still had to buy the 20 message package. MMS messages were more than a dollar each! But WiFi had become common both in the office and at home, and there wer unlimited data plans (with no SMS or MMS) that could be bought for reasonable prices.
iMessage bypassed the carrier tax, It's that simple. That's why it became popular, and that's why the network effects working against Whats App, Signal, and others are so strong. And it's why there's skepticism towards the standards that Google and carriers are pushing for, because a lot of people don't remember the carriers' business practices very fondly.
iMessage bypassed the carrier tax, It's that simple. That's why it became popular, and that's why the network effects working against Whats App, Signal, and others are so strong. And it's why there's skepticism towards the standards that Google and carriers are pushing for, because a lot of people don't remember the carriers' business practices very fondly.
SMS is an old and dated protocol that we strangely use for security 2FA too. There needs to be an updated protocol, there is one in the works, but the carriers AT&T and it's spawn, are really trying to set it up so they can nickel and dime users.
I'm starting to get SMS spam.. (my favorite from banks I don't have an account at..)
I hate being nickel and dimed, but if this is one case where if sending me a message cost a few cents, and it ends up stopping SMS spam, it might be worth it..
Back when I stated using a phone, we used to have to pay for texts...
I hate being nickel and dimed, but if this is one case where if sending me a message cost a few cents, and it ends up stopping SMS spam, it might be worth it..
Back when I stated using a phone, we used to have to pay for texts...
I think most companies DO have to pay per message for texting phones, I know we do. Largely companies consider it worth it because Americans spend a ton on marketing and it largely works on us.
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I also use WhatsApp and WeChat. The problem is getting everyone to agree on a personal or friend group preference.
Sounds like you need to deactivate iMessage:
https://selfsolve.apple.com/deregister-imessage/
https://selfsolve.apple.com/deregister-imessage/
You can do that a dozen times and if other people pick up an old thread you participated in by iMessage -- you don't even see the message. It's just lost to the ether! You have no control over how those other people group text, and unless they pick up a new green bubble group text, you're just left out. Absolutely infuriating. Because so much of my extended family is on iPhone/iMessage, this issue -- alone -- has kept me chained to iPhone for years, despite repeated attempts to escape.
I'm pretty excited about this development and am saddened there appears to be no way to get it immediately.
I'm pretty excited about this development and am saddened there appears to be no way to get it immediately.
The feature in this article won't be of any use to you if you don't have an iPhone.
> The new version of Phone Link for Windows uses Bluetooth to link a user’s iPhone to their Windows PC. It then “passes commands and messages” to the Messages app on that paired iPhone.
> The new version of Phone Link for Windows uses Bluetooth to link a user’s iPhone to their Windows PC. It then “passes commands and messages” to the Messages app on that paired iPhone.
If I didn't have an iPhone, I wouldn't need it. I do have an iPhone for the reasons mentioned above, and I'm excited to have this new tool as a way of texting from my work Windows PC. While I would like to use a Pixel phone, I cannot escape iMessage.
I see no reason why that wouldn't work with any phone, even an old BlackBerry. It's just using standard Bluetooth protocols.
The 'participating in iMessage' part doesn't work on any phone.
And sometimes the problem lies with the receiving idevice.
It's all quite absurd that Apple has hijacked the protocol like this and made it completely separate from the user.
My parents have a perfectly good phone that can't receive my text messages because it somehow still thinks my contact is an imessage contact.
All this BS Apple has been doing is why my family and friends have largely switched exclusively to WhatsApp, although unfortunately that’s a little more troublesome now with Meta’s privacy issues.
I wish there was a way we could tag threads so that I can have threads tagged with "iMessage bubble colour" automatically collapsed. I can see both sides of the argument but I'm totally bored of reading it for the 100th time by this stage.
My biggest gripe is when iPhone users share video or images, they are grainy nonsense. If Apple just moved to RCS this would be solved, but they refuse simply because they know it handicaps their competitor. The react thing has largely been fixed by Google on newer versions of messenger. It's impossible to fix the video stuff. People outside the US don't get it. They say everyone should switch to Whatsapp, etc, but getting millions of people to do that across tons of fractured messaging apps when there is one protocol that everyone can use...isn't easy or even viable at this point.
Apple hasn't moved to RCS because it's not an actual industry-accepted standard, despite what Google will trick people into believing. The version of RCS that's on Android is Google's own fork of RCS and is primarily routing messages through Google's own servers. And therein we have the reason why Google keeps pushing these smear campaigns about how Apple isn't "getting on board with the new standard," -- Google wants to become the new standard. If Apple did what Google wanted, Google basically gets to be in the same position they are with controlling web standards with the Chrome near-monopoly.
Yep. And when I see Google running ads [1] around RCS it signals to me not to touch it with a 100ft poll. If it were a good protocol you wouldn't have to run ads (like USB-C).
[1] https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/09/google-new-campaign-pressu...
[1] https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/09/google-new-campaign-pressu...
> They say everyone should switch to Whatsapp
Anyone who advises me to switch one of my most important phone functions over to Facebook instantly loses a great deal of credibility. I can appreciate that the network effect makes it look very appealing when you're stuck inside, but if you are not already stuck in that garden, why do it? Just go back to SMS. It is the only standard that is universal.
Anyone who advises me to switch one of my most important phone functions over to Facebook instantly loses a great deal of credibility. I can appreciate that the network effect makes it look very appealing when you're stuck inside, but if you are not already stuck in that garden, why do it? Just go back to SMS. It is the only standard that is universal.
> if you are not already stuck in that garden, why do it?
Because SMS is a nightmare for international messaging and travel due to existing carrier policy?
I used to agree with you. Then I moved from the US to the UK, and now my phone's messaging is a fractured mess. International texting is expensive, but my parents and siblings are on Android and I'm on iPhone, so we can't bypass SMS by using, e.g., iMessage. As a result, I use Google Voice for my US phone number, which lets me send messages over a Web services instead of using SMS.
But my wife is here with me on an iPhone, like me, so I use iMessage with her, and I get SMS from, e.g., delivery companies.
People over here in the UK mostly use WhatsApp, so I have that for communication with people in the UK. This is also free, and I can use it with people who have foreign phone numbers!
Because SMS is a nightmare for international messaging and travel due to existing carrier policy?
I used to agree with you. Then I moved from the US to the UK, and now my phone's messaging is a fractured mess. International texting is expensive, but my parents and siblings are on Android and I'm on iPhone, so we can't bypass SMS by using, e.g., iMessage. As a result, I use Google Voice for my US phone number, which lets me send messages over a Web services instead of using SMS.
But my wife is here with me on an iPhone, like me, so I use iMessage with her, and I get SMS from, e.g., delivery companies.
People over here in the UK mostly use WhatsApp, so I have that for communication with people in the UK. This is also free, and I can use it with people who have foreign phone numbers!
It's equally frustrating for iPhone users. iMessage sends and receives and full, beautiful quality. Meanwhile an Android user will send a photo and it comes through with about 10 pixels total. Don't even bother with video it's not worth trying, impossible to watch.
To be fair, received videos from iPhone are extremely low resolution and blocky. Pictures are better, but still downscaled.
Google Messages has worked around this issue a bit by allowing links to videos in Google Photos to be sent instead of some sort of pixelated MMS garble.
It will be interesting to see if the day eventually comes when legislation is introduced to mandate an open messaging standard. They did it for USB-C chargers.
Google Messages has worked around this issue a bit by allowing links to videos in Google Photos to be sent instead of some sort of pixelated MMS garble.
It will be interesting to see if the day eventually comes when legislation is introduced to mandate an open messaging standard. They did it for USB-C chargers.
just wanna point out here, there are limitations to the size/length of videos and even the pictures sometimes get downscaled to the other imessage user
But apple seemingly purposely sends 100x100 px videos to non iMessage contacts. The phone can handle more. My step mom once sent me 50 full pictures in one legacy EMS message. It worked just fine. Apple is purposely handicapping things and I don't believe for a single second any of their excuses. The rest of the phone industry has no problem texting videos and pictures.
I wouldn't doubt it... I think EMS message size limitation is higher than MMS, but iPhones decode it differently. Even iPhone <> iPhone compresses the image/video
> People outside the US don't get it
Oh we get it. It's like trying to get everyone off WhatsApp to Signal.
Oh we get it. It's like trying to get everyone off WhatsApp to Signal.
The privacy argument has helped move some of my friends over to Signal, but yeah, we'll be putting up with multiple messaging apps for some time longer.
If you still have your iPhone, you can turn off iMessage so the system tells other users you’re no longer using it.
I have a pet theory that everything Apple produces is deliberately made slightly unusual for the purpose of (a) vendor lock-in and (b) enhancing the feeling in their cult that they are above non-Apple users because Apple products do things in "smarter" ways.
Those blinded fools have no idea what abuse they are putting up with, they rationalize every inconvenience and will happily evangelize the Word of Apple.
(Disclaimer: In principle, I love all people regardless of their use of OS/product/whatever ^_^)
Those blinded fools have no idea what abuse they are putting up with, they rationalize every inconvenience and will happily evangelize the Word of Apple.
(Disclaimer: In principle, I love all people regardless of their use of OS/product/whatever ^_^)
From what I recall when you switch to Android best practice is to disable Imessage. You shouldn't ever get messages on your IPAD after doing that.
I refuse to use iMessage for many reasons, but one is that it is super not-robust when it comes to messaging other iPhone users who have a different iMessage setting. If I have it enabled and you don't, many times the message will simply get lost in transit or into the aether. Vice-versa: same deal.
This will improve once the EU's Digital Markets Act takes full effect on 2024-03-06 and will force Apple to cooperate with other chat providers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act
Ah, just like the famous EU cookie policy suddenly made the internet a better place, right?
Just like websites, which have become a pain in the ass, making the opt-out just painful enough so that 99% of users just click "track me anyway", this will have exactly zero positive influence. The EU just doesn’t "get" the internet.
Even worse, most websites now even have explicit consent to actually track visitors.
Apple is surely going to find the point of where they comply with the law, but create so much friction, that nothing changes at all.
Except that smaller services will have a very hard time complying with the EU bureaucracy (same as the GPDR, with has been nothing but a PITA for small- to medium sized businesses).
Just like websites, which have become a pain in the ass, making the opt-out just painful enough so that 99% of users just click "track me anyway", this will have exactly zero positive influence. The EU just doesn’t "get" the internet.
Even worse, most websites now even have explicit consent to actually track visitors.
Apple is surely going to find the point of where they comply with the law, but create so much friction, that nothing changes at all.
Except that smaller services will have a very hard time complying with the EU bureaucracy (same as the GPDR, with has been nothing but a PITA for small- to medium sized businesses).
Smaller services are not affected because they are explicitly not included. Unless you define 7.5 billion Euro annual revenue in the EEA as small.
The cookie law is good, it's the websites that are either actively non-compliant or lazy. There is no need to request permission to track users. Just don't do it and any cookie banner is obsolete.
The cookie law is good, it's the websites that are either actively non-compliant or lazy. There is no need to request permission to track users. Just don't do it and any cookie banner is obsolete.
Are you really complaining about GDPR? The cookie law is a farce, but the protections that GDPR provides to consumers are by no means onerous to businesses.
For what it's worth, those reaction messages are a problem in both directions. I get separate text messages with reactions on my iPhone from my Android-using parents.
I’m the opposite. There’s always one PITA android user breaking text threads for teams or school things.
The worst was one of the crappier phones that would send a half dozen differently scaled pictures.
The worst was one of the crappier phones that would send a half dozen differently scaled pictures.
Wouldn't be the first time that Microsoft has tried to integrate with a third party chat service against said chat service's wishes: https://www.theverge.com/2014/4/21/5635488/msn-messenger-vs-...
And Microsoft has been on the other side of this with third party skype users, too.
And Microsoft has been on the other side of this with third party skype users, too.
After nearly 24 years we have come full circle: Here is an episode of Silicon Spin featuring John C Dvorak (yes that John C Dvorak) from ZDTV (yes that ZDTV) discussing the issue. I remember seeing this live when I was in elementary school lol
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcJBXgmdX44
Wonder what happened to all these 'pundits' :)
[EDIT]: LOL @ 5:50 "Coming up on Silicon Spin, streaming is free but how long will THAT last?!"
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcJBXgmdX44
Wonder what happened to all these 'pundits' :)
[EDIT]: LOL @ 5:50 "Coming up on Silicon Spin, streaming is free but how long will THAT last?!"
Dvorak is at least still around doing "stuff". I have never listened to his podcast.
https://www.noagendashow.net/john-c-dvorak
https://www.noagendashow.net/john-c-dvorak
Did you guys read the article? It just transmits messages the same way your car would when connected to Bluetooth.
Sure, Windows is using an API designed for cars rather than reverse engineering the protocol.
It's still true that Apple do not want iMessage on competitor platforms. There's a non-zero chance they lock down this API further in response.
It's still true that Apple do not want iMessage on competitor platforms. There's a non-zero chance they lock down this API further in response.
And that means Microsoft is the problem, not the third party chat service!
I believe this is just using the Bluetooth features meant to sync with car infotainment systems. I don't see that going away, but I also don't see this as performing like anything more than a clunky hack.
This seems similar to the limited messaging integration in some cars (e.g. Teslas). You can send and receive SMS and iMessages, but no media or group texts. The latter is a serious limitation in practice.
This is mostly a Tesla problem. Almost every other car produced today supports CarPlay and Android Auto. It is a regular source of frustration for me when I'm driving our Model 3, sending/receiving text messages using the Tesla voice interface is an exercise in frustration.
Refusing to implement a closed-box proprietary connection like CarPlay, and experiencing a degradation of service because the service provider limits the capabilities of cheaper, simpler, and more open protocols, isn't a Tesla problem; its an Apple problem. Imagine if Google suddenly started forcing people to use the Gmail app to send multi-recipient emails, such that the Apple Mail app over IMAP could only send to one person.
My frustrations with the Tesla app are 100% about the poor UI and voice interaction, not the inability to send multi-recipient text messages from the car. The degradation has nothing to do with any limitation by Apple or its API, but rather Tesla's choice to lock users out of two well-established mobile platforms. Why do you feel like Tesla is the good guy here, they have the smallest, most exclusive, least open garden in this conversation.
> degradation has nothing to do with any limitation by Apple or its API, but rather Tesla's choice to lock users out of two well-established mobile platforms
Tesla made no such choice. They built their own platform, and now Apple doesn't want to work with them. You can decide for yourself whether that's right or not, but that's the side-effect of reinforcing walled gardens. It's no different than Apple forcing developers to work with them proactively.
> Why do you feel like Tesla is the good guy here
Because Apple is the bigger company, but they still act like the little guy. I'll never buy a Tesla out of principle, but it's your fault for backing yourself into a situation where you see corporations as good guys and bad guys. Both Apple and Tesla worship the same dollar, there is no lesser evil to speak of here.
Tesla made no such choice. They built their own platform, and now Apple doesn't want to work with them. You can decide for yourself whether that's right or not, but that's the side-effect of reinforcing walled gardens. It's no different than Apple forcing developers to work with them proactively.
> Why do you feel like Tesla is the good guy here
Because Apple is the bigger company, but they still act like the little guy. I'll never buy a Tesla out of principle, but it's your fault for backing yourself into a situation where you see corporations as good guys and bad guys. Both Apple and Tesla worship the same dollar, there is no lesser evil to speak of here.
I don't feel Tesla is a good guy. Landscapes like this aren't binary, and your insinuation is expanding the context of this discussion further than originally intended, then drawing false conclusions. In the specific issue of remote text messaging protocols: yeah, Tesla should support Android Auto and Apple CarPlay; but this absolutely also has everything to do with limitations in Apple's bluetooth text message access APIs, or at minimum their lack of industry leadership in moving these open standards forward to support more capabilities.
Maybe, perhaps Tesla‘s infotainment is actually usable, I haven’t touched a Tesla, so I can’t tell.
But for all infotainment systems I have touched, which is most VW, BMW, Mercedes and Audi systems, CarPlay is a godsend, and I refuse to even consider recommending any car that does not ship it.
But for all infotainment systems I have touched, which is most VW, BMW, Mercedes and Audi systems, CarPlay is a godsend, and I refuse to even consider recommending any car that does not ship it.
I don't have the best opinion of Teslas as a whole after owning one for a year, but I will say the infotainment system is one of the most usable of any I've tried. I didn't really find myself wishing I had CarPlay too much.
This is the same mechanism utilized by Tesla and their "iMessage" integration.
It won't be patched (any time soon at least); however, it is severely limited. No prior history is able to be loaded; no sending/receiving/viewing of pictures, group chats don't function... the list goes on.
It won't be patched (any time soon at least); however, it is severely limited. No prior history is able to be loaded; no sending/receiving/viewing of pictures, group chats don't function... the list goes on.
Yea, when I saw these limitations, the first thing I thought of was Tesla. And Tesla makes it very clear with their messaging, when you first pair your phone, something like 'Due to limitations by Apple, you won't be able to participate in group chats.'
It seems obvious to me Apple always wants to keep one critical thing inaccessible for iMessage, to lock people into using their platforms. They'd rather Tesla use car play, that way they can lock the integration down so others (like Windows) can't use the same integration.
It seems obvious to me Apple always wants to keep one critical thing inaccessible for iMessage, to lock people into using their platforms. They'd rather Tesla use car play, that way they can lock the integration down so others (like Windows) can't use the same integration.
If someone at Apple is reading this, please, for the love of god, let me pay to have iMessage on my windows machine. I'd easily pay $100/year.
I can't see them loosening access to iMessage willingly. It's like the App Store: a moat to keep users confined to the Apple ecosystem. Allowing users choice and freedom is anathema to Apple's business model.
Apple seems to be on friendlier terms with Windows these days. Their apps are getting better on Windows, and they are looking to support their PassKey infrastructure on Windows. With paid subscription services like Apple TV and Apple Music they have an increasing reason to support all of a user's devices and mixed ecosystem devices are statistically the norm.
iMessage is not its own subscription service yet, but the days where it was explicitly an Apple hardware moat may be drawing to a close the more that Apple finds increased relevance (and shareholder appeal) in software as a service. I expect that if that were to happen, Apple might try to make a good marketing effort of "works best on Apple hardware" and Apple might never support iMessage on Android, but Windows support sounds oddly plausible in 2023.
iMessage is not its own subscription service yet, but the days where it was explicitly an Apple hardware moat may be drawing to a close the more that Apple finds increased relevance (and shareholder appeal) in software as a service. I expect that if that were to happen, Apple might try to make a good marketing effort of "works best on Apple hardware" and Apple might never support iMessage on Android, but Windows support sounds oddly plausible in 2023.
The strongest arugement I heard that Apple will not open iMessage to other platforms at this point is spam-prevention. When was the last time you received a spam iMessage compared to an SMS? That spam prevention hinges on real Apple hardware.
I would at least be content with Apple allowing an iPhone to be tethered to a Windows iMessage app through an official channel, similar to how Signal Desktop works.
Outside of political spam, I receive far more iMessage spam than SMS spam.
A year or so back there was an HN discussion about a service that offered an all-in-one messaging app for most of the major services (including iMessage), but for the life of me I'm having trouble remembering their name. As I recall, they were using a pile of older iPhones that could still be jailbroken and a custom shim to get messages from the phone to their server. Clever, though that method would eventually hit a wall if jailbreaking stopped being feasible.
That was Beeper. https://www.beeper.com/
There are a few others like AirDroid out there now too. All are still not really great as if you were on the native platform
The jailbreak way is more an easy way for you to do it if you want to host it yourself. When you have them do it you're Apple account is signed in on a Mac Mini hosted in a datacenter (not sure if it's theres or through one of the many services to do that through). This is not only much easier to scale but is done in macOS where you can just straight up disable OS security if you tell it you really want to.
My iMessage bridge is hosted on "Beeper Mac #84" according to my Apple account page which shows logged in clients.
My iMessage bridge is hosted on "Beeper Mac #84" according to my Apple account page which shows logged in clients.
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Ok. This does not happen very often, but: nice job MS!
For once, a feature added to Windows is actually a feature that people may find useful.
For once, a feature added to Windows is actually a feature that people may find useful.
To be fair implementing iMessage support is not entirely within their control, the joy of the walled garden.
Yes because all other messaging protocols allow any random third party to attach to their service. Microsoft is using an 8 year old documented iOS API.
Which API? (Genuinely curious, thanks in advance!)
I just know there is one that smartwatches used before the Apple Watch was introduced. It allows third party watches to receive notifications.
Others are thinking MS is just using the standard BT profile for messages that all modern cellphones support
Others are thinking MS is just using the standard BT profile for messages that all modern cellphones support
But that API doesn't allow for replies. Only notifications. So they aren't doing it the same way as Fitbit or Garmin and other smartwatch companies.
That’s why I’m leaning toward the Bluetooth protocol for messages.
https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/message-acces...
https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/message-acces...
I think this is a trojan integration.
MS will promptly appeal to the regulators (and possibly litigate) as soon as Apple breaks this.
MS will promptly appeal to the regulators (and possibly litigate) as soon as Apple breaks this.
You realize that MS isn’t using some type of secret hack? iOS has supported sending messages and notifications over BT forever. It’s how third party watches were able to display notifications before the Apple Watch was introduced.
Why would Apple try to break it? It poses zero risk to their product line, and in fact might help a little. You still have to buy an iOS device to do iMessage.
Because that's what Apple has been doing for it's whole existence. Creating barriers to their devices outside of anything Apple. Honestly it's better to just not use Apple at all for these reasons.
I agreed with you until I stopped and wondered...why? If Windows Phone were still around, this would make sense. Since it's not, I don't see Microsoft's incentive to get bogged down in litigation on messaging.
What made you agree in the first place? It's an unfounded claim that (to me) appears to be rooted in Apple's "us against the world"-style marketing. Microsoft has written apps for Apple for decades - why would they betray them for poorly-made iMessage integration?
I'm legitimately trying to understand how someone could come to this conclusion. Either Apple is complicit in allowing Microsoft's backdoor, or it's not trojan horse. It is obviously not the former.
I'm legitimately trying to understand how someone could come to this conclusion. Either Apple is complicit in allowing Microsoft's backdoor, or it's not trojan horse. It is obviously not the former.
Based on what, exaxtly?
Likely the new EU Digital Markets Act, which requires interoperabilty from messaging applications.
I'm more curious what they mean by "Trojan integration". Considering how Microsoft has been a trusted Apple app developer for over 20 years, that's a pretty heavy accusation.
And seeing that MS is using publicly available APIS that have been built into iOS since at least 2014
Weirdly enough Dell has had this tech since ~2018 but you had tk spoof your computer as a Dell to use it on non-dell computers. Looks like Intel bought the company that made it in 2021 and the Dell app is being discontinued.
Good find! Here are some links for anyone interested:
Dell Mobile Connect on Windows Store: https://apps.microsoft.com/store/detail/dell-mobile-connect/...
Dell Mobile Connect and Alienware Mobile Connect End of Service Announcement : https://www.dell.com/support/kbdoc/en-us/000199082/dell-mobi...
Dell Mobile Connect on Windows Store: https://apps.microsoft.com/store/detail/dell-mobile-connect/...
Dell Mobile Connect and Alienware Mobile Connect End of Service Announcement : https://www.dell.com/support/kbdoc/en-us/000199082/dell-mobi...
I'll echo the other top-level threads and say it's the same technology as what happens in your car and it reads/replies to your messages.
Sidenote: Can someone school me and tell me how Apple got this iMessage thing "right" when Blackberry/BBM didn't?
Or is iMessage eventually going to go the way of BBM? I suspect it's more than just iMessage, like Apps (pre-BBM days) and tighter integration, but I'd like to start a dialogue here.
Sidenote: Can someone school me and tell me how Apple got this iMessage thing "right" when Blackberry/BBM didn't?
Or is iMessage eventually going to go the way of BBM? I suspect it's more than just iMessage, like Apps (pre-BBM days) and tighter integration, but I'd like to start a dialogue here.
I don't think it was so much a Apple getting it right in a technical sense, rather that when it debuted US carriers were still charging real money for texting and Apple stopped tip-toeing around the issue when they had enough partners. Recall the iPhone was originally exclusive to AT&T, then AT&T + Verizon, then Sprint, T-Mobile, etc. Sure, many people were on omnibus family plans for $X00s/month, but those people grew up to get their own plans, actual fast data was becoming a thing, and priorities just shifted. Why would you pay $$ just to text, if it's just text? I'm having a hard time looking up what the average costs were for Blackberry, but by the time they were in the hands of the masses, kids to adults, the iPhone and iMessage had too much momentum.
I've been on the BB ecosystem and usually was between the major carriers. If I recall correctly, some carriers charged a small $10 premium for the Blackberry Data plan versus the normal data plan -- for others it was the same.
BBM if you recall was the cool, exclusive phone (think early Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton), but then iPhone came along and had cool apps. They were Blackberry exclusive until they started losing share to Android and iPhone. By the time it was too late, you could use BBM on iPhone and Android.
To me, iMessage is the same, (maybe even less than BBM was more like a chatroom too) but has reigned supreme for longer.
BBM if you recall was the cool, exclusive phone (think early Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton), but then iPhone came along and had cool apps. They were Blackberry exclusive until they started losing share to Android and iPhone. By the time it was too late, you could use BBM on iPhone and Android.
To me, iMessage is the same, (maybe even less than BBM was more like a chatroom too) but has reigned supreme for longer.
iMessage succeeded because the iPhone maintained market share. BBM failed because people stopped buying Blackberries.
I don't think any of iMessage's unique features materialy contributed to it's success.
Similarly to the iPhone (and Android) dethroning Blackberry, will there be a new "iPhone" -- and will we finally see iMessage on Windows/Android by then?
Apple's grip on the messaging space is pretty tight but I have hopes that the EU's DMA regulation will force to loosen it's grip.
I've been using iMessage on Android, desktop and the web using Mautrix-iMessage and Beeper for a while now.
Interesting... A while back there was a store about running MacOS X in a VM and I believe you could sign into iCloud. I had an idea that someone could do a startup to sell iMessage as a service on other platforms by wrapping the iMessage app on a VM into an API/service. If that failed, you could buy up olf iPhones/iPads and automate them with an custom app to do the same maybe?
You can sign a vm into iCloud.
I have a ridiculous system for backing up photos where a VM downloads them and then the machine uses a script at various intervals with Rsync to get them out the vm. I disable messages on it, but by default they arrived.
Guides on running macOS VMs always seem to involve downloading some EFI build with opaque origins. Is there a safer option?
Check out Blue Bubbles (self hosted, open source), Beeper, Sunbird, and texts.com.
Fascinated to know what API enables this. Is there some sort of Bluetooth access to notifications, perhaps? Wouldn't explain non-participation in group messages, though.
It is probably using the Message Access Profile[1], commonly used by cars. Its likely very stable, but is very limited.
1: https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/message-acces...
1: https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/message-acces...
I believe that's an API used by non-Apple smartwatches that allows basic notification access and I guess text replies. I assume they just parse out the text messages from the notifications?