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Beeper Mini is back

blog.beeper.com

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Re: Beeper Mini is back

#541

Post by zeven7 »

zappb wrote: post #533
zeven7 wrote: post #526

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd have assumed there'd be something more going on in iMessage, like each device has a private key that needs to sign the messages, and Apple can ban any private keys that leak -- but in theory couldn't they even be prevented from leaking by secure enclave? I'm just speculating on what would have made sense, but I'm guessing that's not how it's working since Beeper Mini exists. It begs the question: why isn't that t…

Messages has existed longer than the Secure Enclave has.

Secure Enclave doesn't have to exist for the rest of the system to work as I described. (And once Secure Enclave does exist, it can be used to further secure the private keys generated after that date.)

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#542

Post by RobotToaster »

snakeyjake wrote: post #374
tapoxi wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't 70% of American teenagers on iPhone because of the iMessage network effects? The whole "green bubble" shaming issue.

>The whole "green bubble" shaming issue. Even if that's a real thing and not an imaginary or minor phenomenon hyped up for clicks, it is hardly anti-trust-worthy. 70% of American teenagers may have access to iMessage due to it being on their phones but there is a 0.0% chance that, in aggregate, iMessage is in their top five most-used messaging apps.

> it is hardly anti-trust-worthy.

why?

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#543

Post by ranie93 »

wutwutwat wrote: post #536
kevinsync wrote: post #528

Maybe this came up in the earlier threads (announcement, outage) so I apologize if it's been discussed ... This project is fantastic. The hacker spirit is in full force, and I love a good David and Goliath story. However, all the comments about demanding interoperability and protocols keep confusing me -- I don't consider APNS a protocol (like TCP anyways), it's also not incidental, extra header space to stuff data i…

Uhhhh, what does APNS have to do with any of this? Correct me if I'm wrong, but people want iMessage to be an open protocol. You're talking about APNS, the "apple push notification service", which is something completely different than what beeper is doing and what folks are asking for. The message schema, format, types, encoding, max length, delivery guarantees, etc, like jabber/xmpp [1]. Push notifications are sent…

https://support.apple.com/guide/security/how-imessage-sends-...

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#544

Post by tzs »

stouset wrote: post #445
acaloiar wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a lawyer. But I do believe there's reason to consider Apple's policy relative to iMessage clients monopolistic. Apple's behavior is not significantly different from Microsoft's, which instigated US v. Microsoft [1]. That case largely took issue with Microsoft's mandatory bundling of IE with Windows and the extent to which Microsoft created an inorganic monopoly. In addition to how Microsoft's monopoly came to…

> I'm not a lawyer. > But I do believe there's reason to consider Apple's policy relative to iMessage clients monopolistic. In order for antitrust laws to apply, it’s not enough to exhibit monopolistic behavior. You actually have to be a monopoly and use this behavior to achieve and/or retain it.

That's not the whole story in the United States. Antitrust law prohibits monopolization, which is monopoly power couple with anticompetitive practices, but it also prohibits various practices from companies that do not have monopoly power.

For example the Sherman Act prohibits attempted monopolization. You run afoul of that for anticompetitive conduct and a specific intent to monopolize if there is a dangerous probability that will achieve monopoly power.

The Clayton Act added restrictions on price discrimination, exclusive dealing, tying, and mergers and acquisitions that substantially reduce competition or tend to create monopolies.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#545

Post by [deleted] »

kevinsync wrote: post #528

Maybe this came up in the earlier threads (announcement, outage) so I apologize if it's been discussed ... This project is fantastic. The hacker spirit is in full force, and I love a good David and Goliath story. However, all the comments about demanding interoperability and protocols keep confusing me -- I don't consider APNS a protocol (like TCP anyways), it's also not incidental, extra header space to stuff data i…

[deleted]

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#546

Post by rezonant »

snakeyjake wrote: post #290
lacker wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best case outcome is to get publicity leading to US and EU antitrust regulators to file a lawsuit against Apple, both of which Apple loses. The conclusion of this lawsuit is that not only must Apple allow access to iMessage, they also must allow changing the default for every component of iOS - messaging app, browser, app store, let you replace Siri with other voice assistants - and to lower the 30% app store fee…

How is this an actionable anti-trust issue? iMessage doesn't even register as a messaging platform in the minds of most users globally. In the US is it dwarfed by at least three other platforms. Globally, do any of the other top ten (Apple is nowhere near the top ten) messaging apps allow third parties to spoof their service? The purpose of anti-trust is to increase competition and prevent unlawful monopolies. Apple…

> In the US is it dwarfed by at least three other platforms.

Do you have a source for this?

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#547

Post by wutwutwat »

bdavbdav wrote: post #525
js2 wrote: post #471

> Messages will be sent and received via your email address rather than phone number. [...] Even worse, when iPhone customers added an Android phone number to an existing iMessage secure encrypted group chat, the Messages app would by default switch the entire group chat to using unencrypted, unsecure SMS. These two Messages features combine to create a terrible UX. When someone starts a group chat in Messages and in…

I almost forgot that you could MMS to email addresses. Crazy times of old.

You can also usually send a SMS by sending an email to your provider, ie 9495551212@vtext.com, which is the poor man's way to wire up alerting to text the on call if you've yet to implement or afford a solution with proper sms/twilio support

https://www.verizonwireless.com/pdfs/user_guides/How_To_Txt_...

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#548

Post by dwaite »

ketzo wrote: post #20
rpmisms wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, not the point. The point is to prove that it's possible and relatively simple, and the only reason Apple operates this way is to lock people into the ecosystem.

> and the only reason Apple operates this way is to lock people into the ecosystem. Honest question: is there anyone who doesn't already think that? Even at, like, a legislative level?

There are systems designed to be federated, like email, mastodon, matrix and SMS/RCS.

Signal, WhatsApp, Slack, and iMessage are examples of services which were designed to be run by one company as part of their product. They _might_ have certain SDKs to extend that service (like bots for slack, or app extensions in iMessage) - but generally they aren't excited to shoulder the additional cost and support headaches of third parties using their infrastructure or arbitrarily interacting with the official software clients.

I don't know exactly what you mean by "ecosystem" - I'd argue the first set form ecosystems, while the second set form products.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#549

Post by kuschku »

ethanbond wrote: post #510
gkbrk wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reverse engineering for the purpose of interoperability is explicitly allowed. Also, breaking the TOS is usually not illegal. TOS of a random company is not the law, otherwise you would get into trouble non-stop from random websites and apps making you "agree" to things.

> Reverse engineering for the purpose of interoperability is explicitly allowed. In Apple's iMessage TOS? I don't find that likely but open to being wrong. > Also, breaking the TOS is usually not illegal In general, contracts are legally binding, therefore breaking them is illegal. Sometimes contracts include clauses that can't be legally binding, but I don't think a TOS forbidding this type of behavior would be ques…

> In Apple's iMessage TOS? I don't find that likely but open to being wrong.

In EU law. No contract or license may restrict your right to reverse engineer or decompile for the purpose of interoperability or building an alternative implementation.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#550

Post by maxwell »

kevinsync wrote: post #528

Maybe this came up in the earlier threads (announcement, outage) so I apologize if it's been discussed ... This project is fantastic. The hacker spirit is in full force, and I love a good David and Goliath story. However, all the comments about demanding interoperability and protocols keep confusing me -- I don't consider APNS a protocol (like TCP anyways), it's also not incidental, extra header space to stuff data i…

> Why does everybody feel entitled to use it if they're not using Apple products?

Vertical tying.

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