Live data from Hacker News

Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

arstechnica.com

231–240 of 665 posts

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#231
post #6

MSN Messenger played a similar cat-and-mouse game with AOL Instant Messenger long time ago. Unlike MSN Messenger which used this publicity to grow their own market share, I am not sure what's the end game for Beeper.

I suspect they're angling to be bought out. Whether they maintain it, or kill it, they're likely just hoping to survive long enough that Apple decides buying them out is easier.

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#232

This seems to be Beeper's insincere attempt at dressing up their grievances to appear as if they were in advantage of the [Apple's] customer. Apple has made it clear that they won't bring iMessage to Android. People who choose to invest in Android phones know they won't get access to iMessage. It seems a bit entitled behaviour for someone to feel like Apple should be forced to bring iMessage to Android for any reason…

How is being able to send iMessages to your Android-user friends from your iPhone not to your advantage as an Apple customer?

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#233

When Ma Bell didn't let people use third-party phones with their service, the government made them change their ways. Why is the government letting Apple get away with the equivalent?

Why are y’all so intent on using iMessage? I (honestly) don’t understand the serious passion behind forcing Apple to open it to everyone.

SMS still gets through, and other apps still work. It seems weird to focus so much on this and not on just using something that fits your use case, but maybe I’m missing something.

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#234
post #202
post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not the equivalent. If the third party phones allowed users access to Ma Bell's network, switching systems, etc, without paying Ma Bell - then it might be equivalent. I'm pretty sure that would be considered theft of communication services.

I feel that's not right either. Apple did not physically build the phone network and nobody is piggybacking on their network, Apple isn't hosting anyone's photos or videos afaict and the user pays for bandwidth, they maybe pay for notification relay to their own users. It's more like phone manufacturer X that accesses Ma Bell's network creates phone with slightly better call quality that only works with other X phone…

What type of infrastructure and operations do you think is necessary to handle 8.4B messages per day. So far, the cost of those systems and teams has come from hardware sales. The benefit is that it is effectively a paid for service and doesn't need external support from advertisers or by selling user data.

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has customers who want to use iMessage. Those customers are not able to use iMessage to securely communicate with Android users. That's pretty clear. If Apple's customers want to be able to use iMessage for such communications then (1) the Android user buys an Apple product, (2) a third party makes a cross-platform iMessage client, or (3) Apple open iMessage to other platforms. Apple is blocking on (2) and (3).

> Apple has customers who want to use iMessage. Those customers are not able to use iMessage to securely communicate with Android users. I as a Signal user want to communicate securely with Facebook Messenger users. Therefore Facebook must allow me to reverse engineer their services and make unauthorized systems to allow me to create a service to send messages to Messenger users from Signal.

Sounds good! I would love to be able to do that.

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>t’s really interesting that so many people are defending a corporation stealing from another company Boo-hoo, let me play you the world's smallest violin for Apple's "suffering". Apple is the richest company in the world, it has more money than God, they can fend for themselves just fine, why should anyone shed a tear that someone is stealing from them? People are defending others stealing from Apple because Apple h…

> Though you'll have to enlighten me what exactly it is they are stealing from Apple since Apple doesn't charge money for iMessage for there to be any theft or loss of revenue for them. Unless your definition of theft is "YOU WOULDN'T DOWNLOAD A CAR?!" Apple doesn't charge money for iMessage in much the same way Microsoft doesn't charge money for MS Paint. iMessage is included as part of an Apple hardware purchase. R…

>Apple's device sales subsidize the cost Apple pays to run this system.

And Beeper bought and paid for the Apple devices which they use to route iMessage. What's the problem? Looks fair and square to me.

Apple is legally allowed to try to block me for breaking their ToS, but legally, I bought the device, I can do whatever I want with it since it's my property now, including trying to route iMessage on my device and my account if hat's what I want.

It's still not stealing because I paid Apple for the HW, and stealing means breaking the law, not breaking Apple's ToS which are silly and worthless anyway.

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#237
post #42

I miss the days when chat wasn't fragmented across apps and platforms or could at least be unified in apps like Adium. Having to have a different app installed for myriad different contacts is, at best, irritating.

apple did the "embrace, extend, extinguish" with this.

the original apple messages app did AOL messenger and others.

then it gradually forced you off of them into imessage.

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To unspin your statement, Beeper is providing Apple users with more functionality by way of giving them the ability to send iMessages to their Android-user friends. This is beneficial for Apple users, but Apple has a financial incentive to restrict their users so that the only way for other people to interact with them is to purchase an Apple device, so they are harming their own Apple device users by trying to cut o…

I disagree. Much of the value of iMessage is the high degree of confidence in its security. Apple controls, end-to-end, the delivery of iMessages from device-to-device. This includes how it handles storage of messages, attachments, app diagnostics, crash reports, etc.. Beeper is an unauthorized user of this supposed-to-be closed-system, and I think it's deteriorating the trust users have in the platform entirely.

How do you as an iMessage user, prevent the person you sent a message to from sharing it with others?

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#239

When Ma Bell didn't let people use third-party phones with their service, the government made them change their ways. Why is the government letting Apple get away with the equivalent?

Because Ma Bell was a regulated monopoly, and iMessage is not a monopoly. People routinely use WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, SMS, FB Messenger, etc. Don't get me wrong, I love that these guys are poking the bear. I wish Apple would do something to let me send high-quality photos and videos to my Android-owning friends via "text". But I don't think the government has a place to force that issue. Plenty of alternatives e…

> SMS

Can you change the SMS app on Apple devices now?

Re: Apple partly halts Beeper's iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead

#240

Because of course they did, they like that children make fun of their peers that have a green message vs. a blue, and that's exactly what they want. They're like "ew, are you poor and can't afford a $1200 iphone?" It is now a petty, but prevalent status symbol of being better than others, namely perceived "poor" or otherwise lesser android users.

Android users have been banging this drum about the iPhone supremacists for an actual decade at this point and it so, so goddamn tiring. I buy iPhones for a number of reasons: - Ecosystem which has been explained at length so often you'd have to have your head under a rock to not know what it means - Ease of transfer of data between phones/tablets and replacements, along with constant sync - Excellent build quality -…

What makes your anecdote more valuable than GP's? You may not know anyone who does the "snobby conformist" act, but GP does. Why should I care that you haven't experienced it when someone who actually has experienced it tells me so?

Moreover, since you admit those people exist, why wouldn't you support interoperability between iMessage and other platforms? It would only benefit you as a user since it would allow you to message your friends that are on Androids, and wouldn't be to your detriment at all since you're not doing the "snobby" act yourself. Where is your defensiveness coming from? It sounds like you're on the same team as GP.

Post reply on HN