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Apple Invites

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Re: Apple Invites

#681
post #621

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tbf imessage also allows people to message non iOS users but apparently the ‘color of the bubble’ has been a big thing in the U.S. among youth.

I think calling it just "color of the bubble" downplays the intentional degredation of chat quality for everyone in the chat in order to encourage exclusion, presumably to create FOMO. Incidentally FOMO is a very powerful among youth, but it's still a thing for any group in some capacity. Not that I personally cared, as i see it as an Apple flaw, but in joining a work iMessage group I had people whining about image q…

Poor technical understanding. It's not "degradation."

They will use the iMessage protocol if supported by all clients. If not, they fall back to the next best thing supported by all clients whether RCS or SMS/MMS. In your case (possibly before iPhones supported RCS) the "next best thing" was apparently SMS/MMS.

This is the correct behavior.

I think you're also falling into the common trap of automatically thinking whatever Android supports is like, the correct and open standard.

In reality, RCS's history was an absolute mess of incompatible implementations, pushed and owned by some of by Apple's direct competitors. It's really not any more the "correct" standard than iMessage is and it does not support E2EE outside of Google's proprietary implementation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Communication_Services#De...

Re: Apple Invites

#682
I guess I'm not the demographic for this? I don't see why I'd ever go to the trouble of creating a fancy invite link with a picture and stuff instead of just messaging people directly with the details. "Hey Jim, we're celebrating my daughter's 3rd birthday next Saturday at our house. Let me know if you're able to join us!" Do I really need an app for that?

I guess the RSVP thing can be handy for when you're planning especially large events and need an estimate of the guest count. But those kinds of events are extremely few and far between in my life - and it feels tacky to use this for something as formal as a wedding.

Glad other people find it useful though.

Re: Apple Invites

#683

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of legitimate email (password resets and stuff) gets eaten up by spam filters

We have a family email domain for my extended family, administered by a few retired but very tech-savvy relatives (both had long IT careers) and it’s roughly 50:50 whether a message sent to everyone@ lastname.com will actually show up in people’s inboxes or not. It’s probably 75:25 that a reply all to that list will show up, but modern email is a dumpster fire.

I uses the business version of Office 365 for e-mail. It works well. I never have a problem with e-mails not being delivered or going into a SPAM folder. I am not saying your family did anything wrong. What I am saying is e-mail works well for some people.

Re: Apple Invites

#684

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently Partiful doesn't generate revenue, which is evidence for its quality. As soon as the purse strings get attached, it'll be time to get out. But for now, it's an excellent service.

This tracks so well as an indicator, with many other products. As soon as the company starts making money, their product is going to become awful and it's time to find an alternative. Why can't tech escape this cycle?

The key here is VC-backed. The enshittification rate of bootstrapped products (especially solo or small team) is magnitudes lower. Ironic thing to say while on YC's message board, but there you have it.

Nowadays when I'm looking for a new software product or service with a good number of options, first thing I do is check how they're funded.

Funny thing is that teams are catching on to this! Very recently I've seen two products have a separate "Are you VC backed?" heading in their landing FAQ (both answered with "no"). I can see this becoming a trend - if I were to create a product, I'd do the same.

Re: Apple Invites

#685

I really hope this fails. Apple will use it's dominant position to create lock in like how they did with iMessage instead of cooperating with other platforms on a common standard. Oder friends and family are surprised when they want to video call over Facetime and find it hard to believe other people's phones don't have Apple apps.

Agree. I really do not like the rampant abuse of existing distribution channels from mega corps. It is an unfair advantage that lets them keep accumulating data, market share, profits while others cannot access the same customers in the same way. It’s unhealthy for the economy and startups in particular.

Re: Apple Invites

#686
post #676

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The last I looked into this, iMessage offers end to end encryption and RCS doesn't by default. Apple (rightfully, IMO) refuses to use Googles non open source end to end encryption extension that also would require key exchange on Google owned servers.

> RCS doesn't by default That isn't exactly accurate. The standard doesn't have e2ee, but if you use google messages with RCS with other android phone it is end to end encrypted. But it uses a proprietary google extension to RCS. But I would be surprised if google wasn't willing to work with apple to get e2ee RCS working between iMessage and google Messages, but Apple has no interest in that.

Just so I understand: it's bad for Apple to have a proprietary E2EE solution, but it's good for Google to have one, and additionally it's Apple's fault for not using Google's?

Re: Apple Invites

#687

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article… Guests can view and respond to an invitation using the new iPhone app or on the web without needing an iCloud+ subscription or an Apple Account Sounds like there’s no Apple walled garden lock-in for recipients of the Invites? Only for creating/managing them?

I was actually pretty excited about this until so read it was iCloud+ only. I think it is maybe a long-term strategic mistake to lock this behind iCloud+ and also a bad omen for the direction Apple is going in. In the past this would have been a free app. If Apple did not lock this behind iCloud+ I think it would have quickly become a standard for a lot of users and been another feather in Apple’s cap of why a user m…

I think they needed a new app / feature to make iCloud+ a more compelling reason for some?

Re: Apple Invites

#688

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet, there's nothing iPhone specific about this idea. They didn't have to limit it in the way they did. In the future they can change the approach too and both remove and restrict features, because they will always go iPhone-first. Being able to use this in a restricted way today is just that. I share the "apple (and any corp)-first solution should fail" hope.

In the future they can change the approach too and both remove and restrict features Unlike a lot of product categories... I don't really see a strong lock-in factor here? Example: If you are heavily invested in Apple Music or Spotify, there's a lot of momentum there to keep you from switching. All your stuff is there (songs, favorites, playlists) and it would take a lot of time to re-find it on the other service, if…

You can switch. But now you also need to convince a random person that they should switch, because you can't easily use what they're using. And you may be the only one out of 10 people in the group complaining about it. Instead of their technical problem, Apple can make it a "you" social problem.

Re: Apple Invites

#690

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think calling it just "color of the bubble" downplays the intentional degredation of chat quality for everyone in the chat in order to encourage exclusion, presumably to create FOMO. Incidentally FOMO is a very powerful among youth, but it's still a thing for any group in some capacity. Not that I personally cared, as i see it as an Apple flaw, but in joining a work iMessage group I had people whining about image q…

Poor technical understanding. It's not "degradation." They will use the iMessage protocol if supported by all clients. If not, they fall back to the next best thing supported by all clients whether RCS or SMS/MMS. In your case (possibly before iPhones supported RCS) the "next best thing" was apparently SMS/MMS. This is the correct behavior. I think you're also falling into the common trap of automatically thinking wh…

At least RCS is an attempt at being a cross platform standard, even if it still sucks. iMessage is locked down to Apple devices only. Even if you reverse engineered the protocol you wouldn't be able to get it on Android because Apple will shut you down.

Best option is to just use a different app that just works on all platforms. No RCS, no iMessage.

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