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US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

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Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#161

Post by txcwpalpha »

asclepi wrote: post #55

I do notice a pattern of misunderstanding that I've also observed when talking with Android users IRL. iMessage is very different from Whatsapp. For starters, there is no dedicated iMessage app. iMessage is managed from the iOS Messages app, which handles both iMessage and SMS. It's very good at managing both from one unified interface. In fact, it's so good that it uses arbitrary coloring of messages so you can see…

I think you're drastically misunderstanding the issue here. Everyone knows how Messages works in regards to the switchoff between iMessage and SMS. It's not like it's some secret that the Messages app is capable of also sending SMS. The problem is that it's also not a secret that SMS is objectively a worse experience than iMessage, especially for group chats.

Why do you think the kids don't like it when a thread is green? Do you think that the kids just don't like the color green? That's not it. They don't like it because the thread being green is an indicator that nearly everything about the group chat experience is going to be worse. Messages will be drastically slower, they will have a higher failure rate, pics/videos sent over that chat will be lower quality, there will be no typing indicators or read receipts, there is no ability to label the chat, likes and other message indicators are more cluttering, etc.

It isn't just high school kids, either. I've seen people at work intentionally exclude android users on group chats because we needed fast responses from people and the 2-3 second delay each way on MMS (and that's best case. sometimes it can take minutes for a single message to go through, if it goes through at all) is intolerable when you're trying to have a fast paced conversation with many people. I've had my friend group (people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s) intentionally exclude android users because they were tired of always worrying if one of their MMSes wasn't actually received by everyone in the group (in groups with android users, MMS failures happened enough to have multiple ruined plans because some people in the group never got all the messages being sent).

This is not just a human problem. These people aren't excluding Android users just because they think blue is a cool color and they want to bully green people. They're doing it because there is a very clear technical issue with SMS where it is very lacking in features compared to iMessage. The colors just happen to be a very easy way to signal whether or not you will be using the superior iMessage or the inferior SMS/MMS.

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#162

Post by jdofaz »

RickS wrote: post #81
azinman2 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but group chat over SMS is crap. Lots of Android phones as well don’t operate group SMS well, you get reduced resolution in photos and videos, can’t like/heart messages in the same way, no typing indicators, etc etc. Losing iMessage features sucks when you’re otherwise used to it.

> reduced resolution in photos and videos This and group names are the absolute killers. It's tough. My understanding is that SMS is at fault under the surface, requiring that images and videos be compressed to fit a size limit (right?). My preferred solution would be mandated adversarial interoperability. Absent that, I wish android could bundle images into a dead simple hosting site that send me a link to all the i…

SMS doesn't support pictures at all. MMS is layered on top, where a hidden sms is received telling the phone to fetch the media via http. That is why you can receive text messages without data, but not pictures.

I don't know the details of the MMS spec, but I know the mms picture quality improved when I switched carriers several years ago.

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#163

Post by e40 »

mattmcknight wrote: post #125
Kadin wrote: post #64

I switched to iOS (via a used iPhone on a BYOD plan) primarily for iMessage. I was tired of being the odd man out, missing out on things that were being planned via group messages, etc. Nobody was going to switch to an entirely different mode of communication just for my sake, so the existence of theoretical alternatives doesn't really matter. (And I do try to use Facebook Messenger for group chats, so as not to lock…

Google's abandonment of Hangouts was phenomenally stupid, and it should itself really have just been an evolution of Google Talk. It's a symptom of something very wrong in the incentive structure and product portfolio management there where you have to roll out a new application to add a feature, and the various applications cannot interoperate. Perhaps the underlying issue is that none of these made money directly.…

It's even more stupid when you find out that Hangouts is still alive and well for Google Fi customers. I'm one and I haven't stopped using Hangouts, even though most of the people I know on GFi use something else because they read it was being turned off.

The fact is, Google doesn't yet have a replacement for something they stopped developing years ago. It is completely insane.

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#164

Post by rootusrootus »

asclepi wrote: post #108
grawprog wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not because they had to switch to another app to reach him, but "because he was on Android and turned the thread green" (sic). That's a sneaky odd bit of social engineering. Wonder how many iphone sales they've actually gotten because of this.

83% of US teens have an iPhone according to Piper Jaffray in April 2019 [1]. That number is biased, however, as 1) it's solely based on a survey done in high schools, and not every teen will feel comfortable admitting they have something else than an iPhone 2) the surveys are performed by DECA Inc. which is more affiliated with private schools and public high schools in affluent neighborhoods. Still, I estimate that…

I can't speak for anyone else, but my kids are likely to end up with iPhones at some point (the oldest is 9, so not anytime soon) because Apple's child/family controls for iOS, while far from perfect, are miles ahead of anything I can find on any Android devices. So now they have iPads, and the ecosystem just works for us so it will be natural for them to stay within it when they graduate to phones.

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#165

Post by HNcantBtrustd »

mbowcutt wrote: post #129
Kadin wrote: post #64

I switched to iOS (via a used iPhone on a BYOD plan) primarily for iMessage. I was tired of being the odd man out, missing out on things that were being planned via group messages, etc. Nobody was going to switch to an entirely different mode of communication just for my sake, so the existence of theoretical alternatives doesn't really matter. (And I do try to use Facebook Messenger for group chats, so as not to lock…

> But really this is Google's problem, not Apple's. I'm not sure we agree on what the problem is? If Google monopolized years ago, the story would play the same - only now it's the kid without Hangouts/Gmail. Sure, you're not locked into a physical device, but you're still locked into a service, and that's not guaranteed to hold true forever. IMO we need a modern messaging standard that's vendor agnostic. SMS/MMS wer…

Users that promote priority network effects are bad for everyone else.

This isn't Google's fault. It's low education users who get whatever phone their parents bought.

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#166

Post by HNcantBtrustd »

pcmoney wrote: post #6

It is interesting that the comments on the Twitter thread are "Just use WhatsApp". Which is basically iMessage but from Facebook. Comparing two, the vendor lock-in from Apple seems much preferable to the one with Facebook in light of the data scandals Facebook has and their ongoing effort to backdoor WhatsApp and integrate it with FB messenger etc. Also a group message is only as secure as its most weakly encrypted m…

Apple vs Facebook? I'll stick with sms

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#167

Post by jancsika »

asclepi wrote: post #97
Kadin wrote: post #64

I switched to iOS (via a used iPhone on a BYOD plan) primarily for iMessage. I was tired of being the odd man out, missing out on things that were being planned via group messages, etc. Nobody was going to switch to an entirely different mode of communication just for my sake, so the existence of theoretical alternatives doesn't really matter. (And I do try to use Facebook Messenger for group chats, so as not to lock…

> Nobody was going to switch to an entirely different mode of communication just for my sake Please elaborate. No iPhone user has to switch from the "iMessage" app to the "SMS" app to reach an Android user or include an Android user in a group chat. While it does indeed involve a different mode of communication, it's all handled seamlessly in the background from the same app. In fact, if it wasn't for the coloring, t…

From that same twitter thread:

> The SMS protocol makes "tap backs" and stickers and other stuff work differently (and worse).

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#168

Post by klondike_ »

Embrace, Extend, Extinguish

1. Apple embraced SMS with the original iPhone

2. Apple added encryption and other enhancements to messages which were not compatible with any other phone

3. Extinguish users who use traditional SMS/MMS by downgrading quality of service and disabling enhances features

What we really need is a universal internet messaging protocol like Email, something that everyone agrees on and can deliver the rich experiences people expect today

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#169

Post by ryandrake »

If friends decide to exclude you from their group because of what messaging technology you use, then I have some bad news for you: They're not really your friends. That kind of behavior is not compatible with what most of us would expect of a healthy friendship.

Re: US Gen Z and the iMessage Lock-In

#170

Post by anoncareer0212 »

asclepi wrote: post #55

I do notice a pattern of misunderstanding that I've also observed when talking with Android users IRL. iMessage is very different from Whatsapp. For starters, there is no dedicated iMessage app. iMessage is managed from the iOS Messages app, which handles both iMessage and SMS. It's very good at managing both from one unified interface. In fact, it's so good that it uses arbitrary coloring of messages so you can see…

There isn't a misunderstanding – this is classic embrace and extend 90s Microsoft.

iMessage is ActiveX, not a gift from a benevolent dictator, especially not a gift to the world

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