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Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

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Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not seeing it. I can text phones running Android just fine. I can't use new carrier-dependent features when texting Android phones, but Verizon Android users couldn't use those new features either until a couple of months ago, so I'm not sure how upset I should be about Apple still not supporting that. I don't think I would call it "cumbersome," let alone "extremely cumbersome." I see no artificial restrictions o…

> I can text phones running Android just fine. I don't agree. Waiting ten plus seconds for each text to send is not a viable way to have a conversation. Anything beyond 5 or so texts becomes unbearbale.

That is very much not my experience. At all. I just tested it again, in case something had changed recently without my notice, and a friend with whom I only use SMS responded within five seconds of me hitting send, so clearly there was no delay of any kind when sending the message, let alone a ten-second-plus delay! That sounds very broken, and you might want to contact your phone service provider about it.

Unless...are you perhaps talking about when someone with whom you previously used iMessage is offline, or switches away from iOS, and the Messages app first tries iMessage, and only when that fails, falls back to SMS? Because that process includes a delay (while it tries to establish an iMessage link). But that should only happen in very limited circumstances for a very limited period of time. That's the only thing other than service issues I can think of that you might mean.

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can text phones running Android just fine. I don't agree. Waiting ten plus seconds for each text to send is not a viable way to have a conversation. Anything beyond 5 or so texts becomes unbearbale.

That is very much not my experience. At all. I just tested it again, in case something had changed recently without my notice, and a friend with whom I only use SMS responded within five seconds of me hitting send, so clearly there was no delay of any kind when sending the message, let alone a ten-second-plus delay! That sounds very broken, and you might want to contact your phone service provider about it. Unless...…

Oh, duh, don't need to rely on a generally-available remote friend. I disabled iMessage on my phone and send SMS to my partner while watching their phone. Had them respond. In both cases, sub-second delivery.

There is normally no delay for SMS messages for me. Again, I can text phones running Android just fine.

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like a stretch to claim that Apple’s position in either market is truly dominant given a similarly sized competitor.

From the article: Former marketing chief Phil Schiller famously said that porting iMessage to Android "would hurt us more than help us," and another former Apple exec said in an email that "iMessage amounts to serious lock-in."

I read that but I don’t think it changes my position. It’s lock-in if you buy software for your Xbox but does that mean that Xbox has a dominant market position?

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#204

Thankfully, shit like this will soon be illegal in the EU when the Digital Markets Act hits. Hopefully they'll plug all the loopholes and actually enforce it. I don't understand how anyone can defend business practices like this, which are exclusively there for the purpose of platform lock-in.

Since when did Apple have any obligation to provide iMessage to Android users? 10 years ago? Now? I think Tim Cook is spot on here. Get an iPhone for your grandma if she wants the user experience that iMessages provide. Otherwise, you can get her signal or snapchat or one of the 4,225 secure messaging ecosystems.

Apple cripples SMS for unrelated users with their extend-extinguish approach. I used my wife's old iPhone for a few weeks when I smashed my Android phone in an accident. Then I switched back to Android (I thought iPhones were merely mediocre phones before, but actually using one for 3 weeks change my opinion to "atrocious" ;)).

Then, suddenly, no iPhone user could send messages to me anymore, because Apple remembered that I was on iMessage and all the SMS messages sent to me would be redirected to iMessage. Android users were obviously unaffected. I'd send SMS to someone with an iPhone, they would reply, and it would go into a black hole. Took several weeks to resolve. My opinion of Apple as "company making stuff for basic people, like Justin Bieber" shifted towards "incompetent and/or evil lock-in, like North Korea" ;)

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#205
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What will be illegal, exactly? There is actually nothing stopping iPhones from communicating with Android phones. iMessage, a proprietary messaging app, colors data messages blue and SMS messages green for the user's benefit. There is an entire world of messaging apps that aren't iMessage. The main gripe from Android users seems to be a mere social issue. Also, isn't it my understanding that in EU most people use oth…

> What will be illegal, exactly? "During a close to 8-hour long trilogue (three-way talks between Parliament, Council and Commission), EU lawmakers agreed that the largest messaging services (such as Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger or iMessage) will have to open up and interoperate with smaller messaging platforms, if they so request. Users of small or big platforms would then be able to exchange messages, send files or…

So what will be illegal, are things iMessage does not do. Got it.

(iMessage can interoperate with Android, it just changes the formatting. Show me where the EU lawmakers determine CSS policy).

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh I have a decent handle on that I think:) I mean if your mom is texting with SMS, she’s in North America. If she’s texting with a lot of iPhone users your family is in a certain economic position already. If you are on this site you are in a certain economic position and get called in for a lot of family tech support. If your mom has an android, supporting it is probably not worth your time in terms of the hourly r…

No GP is right. You say: > It’s objectively better unless you are harboring some irrational grudge. That seems absurd. I'm in NA, and economically could buy an iphone. Most of the text messages I send are automated in a ruby script that runs in termux. I also have a few apps that I use that make my life easier, but require being side loaded as well as rooted. Are you really saying that iphone would be objectively bet…

What do you need a ruby script for? Please enlighten me.

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#207
post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No GP is right. You say: > It’s objectively better unless you are harboring some irrational grudge. That seems absurd. I'm in NA, and economically could buy an iphone. Most of the text messages I send are automated in a ruby script that runs in termux. I also have a few apps that I use that make my life easier, but require being side loaded as well as rooted. Are you really saying that iphone would be objectively bet…

What do you need a ruby script for? Please enlighten me.

As I mentioned, I use it to send text messages using the termux API. I can type out a text once and use the script to iterate over a list of recipients (adding a 1 second sleep in between so my carrier doesn't block/throttle it). It can also be used to read and respond to messages in an automated fashion, with branching logic based on whatever I want.

I've also used it for other things like automating the downloading/unzipping of audiobooks, pushing photos/videos (or metadata about those) to my web service, and more.

Basically, I use it for whatever I want to automate. I don't think of my phone as an "appliance." To me it's a general-purpose computing machine that conveniently can sit in my pocket and go with me everywhere.

I've never understood why people want to embrace the idea of them as appliances. They are fully capable of being general purpose, they are just (intentionally) limited. Makes me think of a bird (born with wings), where someone intentionally ties the wings down so they can't fly even though they have all the hardware needed for it.

Re: Tim Cook's response to Android texting compatibility: 'buy your mom an iPhone'

#208
post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you need a ruby script for? Please enlighten me.

As I mentioned, I use it to send text messages using the termux API. I can type out a text once and use the script to iterate over a list of recipients (adding a 1 second sleep in between so my carrier doesn't block/throttle it). It can also be used to read and respond to messages in an automated fashion, with branching logic based on whatever I want. I've also used it for other things like automating the downloading…

Damn, that's so cool. My phone has termux and is rooted as well but I never tried automating anything in it. Can you interact with other apps using termux, because I don't use sms/mms?

I currently use it to access my PC via Tailscale and ssh.

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