As an iMessage user, I'm happy with a closed ecosystem. I know that's a controversial opinion. I have dozens of channels of communication, and iMessage is the only one I don't get spam on. I really, really like that. Anyone without iMessage can still contact me the same way, via SMS, and they're all grouped in the same place. But I love that in 10+ years of using iMessage, I've never gotten a single unwanted blue mes…
How does it matter if the spam message is blue or green when it's going to the same app? I get the most amount of SMS spam on iMessage BY FAR. Have never seen one on WhatsApp, Signal or Telegram.
iMessage motivates people to people buy iPhones instead of Android when everyone else in a social circle has it. Why should Apple give up on that? What will Apple gain from making it ubiquitous? It would in fact disappoint many people as now they can't use their phone to distance themselves from the people who don't have that blue circle. Note that I'm arguing from Apple's perspective here. From my own I believe they…
> iMessage motivates people to people buy iPhones instead of Android Why, though? Does your average iPhone user actually care if the bubbles they see in their chats are blue or green? If so, why? Note that I'm talking about average users. Sure, there are likely a bunch of privacy-conscious users who believe in Apple's commitment to security and privacy and prefer iMessage on those grounds. But otherwise, why? > It wo…
Definitely people care about blue vs green bubbles. Have you ever tried to send videos back and forth between the two? It looks like it was shot on my old Nokia flip phone in either direction. Plus no "typing" bubble, texts seem to take longer to arrive, group chats are degraded if even one green bubble is included, etc. It sounds like Android has finally caught up with RCS, but iMessage was one of my favorite features when I switched years ago.
You know, for a tech site, people sure do love to forget that iMessage is preferred because it brings features instead of mere social status.
Whatsapp brings the same features, if not more. iMessage craze is a purely American phenomenon, the rest of the world has moved on to other IMs
No, WhatsApp does not bring the same features. WhatsApp is very different. You can react to messages in iMessage, which is just one among other features WhatsApp doesn’t have.
You know, for a tech site, people sure do love to forget that iMessage is preferred because it brings features instead of mere social status.
Whatsapp brings the same features, if not more. iMessage craze is a purely American phenomenon, the rest of the world has moved on to other IMs
I think the best reason is explained in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23412067 - ie. how most social circles will exclude Android users. I imagine this is only be the case when only one or two people of the group are using Android though, so if even a few people in the friend group are in that situation you might see more WhatsApp/FB Messenger.
> iMessage motivates people to people buy iPhones instead of Android Why, though? Does your average iPhone user actually care if the bubbles they see in their chats are blue or green? If so, why? Note that I'm talking about average users. Sure, there are likely a bunch of privacy-conscious users who believe in Apple's commitment to security and privacy and prefer iMessage on those grounds. But otherwise, why? > It wo…
For me - it's simply a question of reliability. SMS is not reliable in the US, and I live in an area with poor coverage. My preferred mode of communication is texting but SMS is a no-go.
If it’s of any solace, SMS is not reliable anywhere in the world. It may seem reliable sometimes in some places, but that’s mostly a facade.
Whatsapp brings the same features, if not more. iMessage craze is a purely American phenomenon, the rest of the world has moved on to other IMs
No, WhatsApp does not bring the same features. WhatsApp is very different. You can react to messages in iMessage, which is just one among other features WhatsApp doesn’t have.
Yeah I mean there will little tiny things different on each app, but it's not a big deal breaker for many. Whatsapp is the biggest IM on the planet for a reason. People could easily ditch iMessage in favour of Whatsapp if they wanted to, but for some reason Americans don't do that.
As an iMessage user, I'm happy with a closed ecosystem. I know that's a controversial opinion. I have dozens of channels of communication, and iMessage is the only one I don't get spam on. I really, really like that. Anyone without iMessage can still contact me the same way, via SMS, and they're all grouped in the same place. But I love that in 10+ years of using iMessage, I've never gotten a single unwanted blue mes…
How does it matter if the spam message is blue or green when it's going to the same app? I get the most amount of SMS spam on iMessage BY FAR. Have never seen one on WhatsApp, Signal or Telegram.
> SMS spam
That's just SMS though - unless you mean blue bubbles being spam. I haven't received any of those, but if you do there's always a "report spam" link at the top of the conversation for senders you've never seen before.
If ever Apple needed to open source server and client code for a public good it is with imessages. Yes it has clear limits with a centralized server, but it is realistically how a lot of “secure” messaging happens and it’s very difficult to endorse being tied to expensive hardware. You can say the same about facetime: it is clearly higher quality than competitors in every experiment I’ve tried, but their refusal to i…
Absolutely have been saying this for years. It’s ridiculous for iMessage to be a walled garden. How would it be if emails from iPhone could only go to other iPhones? Yet shrink the email and put a blue bubble around it and that’s just fine.
Anyone know the reason why there's no iMessage for windows? Is it supposed to act as some kind of gateway drug into the Mac ecosystem? Apple seems to have quite a few of these 'unspoken unfeatures'. Perhaps someone can tell me why there are no web browsers allowed on AppleTV devices?
It's the same reason BlackBerry refused to make BBM available on other platforms (although I believe they actually did just that a couple of years ago when no one even remembered what BlackBerry was, perhaps after the company name was sold to a different manufacturer).
BBM was released on Android and IOS in 2014 (six years ago), but it never caught on. It's still around in the enterprise space, but barely.
And the company name was never sold to a different manufacturer. BlackBerry allowed TCL and an India-based company (I can't remember the name) to sell BlackBerry-branded phones running BlackBerry software, but that's all.