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“It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

android.com

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Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#861

Post by pca006132 »

altairprime wrote: post #59

Most businesses, consumers, and developers universally continue to ignore the primary reason that iMessage is a closed platform, rather than an app on every platform as iTunes is: Apple is using device serial numbers for anti-spam, supported by a fully-authenticated hardware and software stack that does not allow user modification. This permits Apple to simply “console ban” any Apple device that spams on iMessage. Th…

Or this is because more iTunes users means more potential customers to their iTunes store, i.e. more revenue when it is cross platform. While opening up iMessage will not incease their revenue but makes people easier to switch to other platform such as Android.

It is not like other platforms cannot deal with spam...

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#862

Post by stevewatson301 »

egwynn wrote: post #88
frizlab wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most operators do cellular over wifi now (because 4G/5G sucks indoor). Not all of them though.

I’m curious about how this works, can you link me someplace where I can read more about it? I tried searching for “cellular over wifi” but wasn’t about to find anything promising. EDIT: I searched harder and found “VoWiFi”. It looks like this can support SMS and is supported by iOS. TIL.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generic_Access_Network

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#863

Post by unilynx »

kelnos wrote: post #116
altairprime wrote: post #59

Most businesses, consumers, and developers universally continue to ignore the primary reason that iMessage is a closed platform, rather than an app on every platform as iTunes is: Apple is using device serial numbers for anti-spam, supported by a fully-authenticated hardware and software stack that does not allow user modification. This permits Apple to simply “console ban” any Apple device that spams on iMessage. Th…

I'd rather live in a world with spam than a world where corporations get to decide what I run on my devices, and cripple a bunch of critical applications if I decide I want to, y'know, actually do whatever I want with the hardware I own. I'm not unsympathetic to Apple's difficulties and goals here (assuming this spam problem is actually the reason, though I'm skeptical that there aren't also self-serving reasons that…

> actually do whatever I want with the hardware I own.

But you don't own the hardware running iMessage.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#864

Post by mikl »

tempsy wrote: post #430
kelnos wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd rather live in a world with spam than a world where corporations get to decide what I run on my devices, and cripple a bunch of critical applications if I decide I want to, y'know, actually do whatever I want with the hardware I own. I'm not unsympathetic to Apple's difficulties and goals here (assuming this spam problem is actually the reason, though I'm skeptical that there aren't also self-serving reasons that…

SMS spam is real.

But costs real money to send and is severely limited in what it can do. RCS would open the door to lots of new ways to spam and troll people.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#865

Post by execveat »

dcow wrote: post #817
altairprime wrote: post #59

Most businesses, consumers, and developers universally continue to ignore the primary reason that iMessage is a closed platform, rather than an app on every platform as iTunes is: Apple is using device serial numbers for anti-spam, supported by a fully-authenticated hardware and software stack that does not allow user modification. This permits Apple to simply “console ban” any Apple device that spams on iMessage. Th…

What do you mean Android doesn't have an analog? It has both secure boot and device attestation. It has multiple APIs that can be used to design applications requiring varying levels of trusted computing context. There's the high-level SafeyNet API which essentially lets you assert that you're running on a non-modified device running non-modified software in the context of a verified boot: * https://developer.android…

There are multiple public bypasses for SafetyNet. Many 3rd party roms provide them out-of-the-box. Granted, Apple's attestation is bypassable as well.

Furthermore, others mentioned that a large portion of SMS-spam originates from the FluBot infected Android devices. Well, the only reason FluBot does not infect iPhones is laziness - it is perfectly doable at scale using custom configuration profiles.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#866

Post by rahkiin »

aaaaaaaaata wrote: post #617
stusmall wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't about opening up iMessage. The article is about using RCS instead of SMS/MMS as the fallback. It's a pretty reasonable ask that will raise the quality of service when texting with the majority of the market. They can continue to lock down iMessage however they want.

It's not a "reasonable" ask if you're Apple, selfish, and therefore want iMessage to remain superior to SMS at all costs, because it's part of your luxury appeal.

It also not reasonable because a lot of countries, also in europe, do not have RCS support on their networks. Or the right version of RCS.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#867

Post by username223 »

Pathetic, Google. Just pick a single chat app that uses data on top of SMS.

WhatsApp and the other Facebook messaging apps won in Latin America because they’re zero-rated, like SMS effectively is within the US. If you want to make a popular chat app, pay those telcos.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#868

Post by bearmode »

altairprime wrote: post #59

Most businesses, consumers, and developers universally continue to ignore the primary reason that iMessage is a closed platform, rather than an app on every platform as iTunes is: Apple is using device serial numbers for anti-spam, supported by a fully-authenticated hardware and software stack that does not allow user modification. This permits Apple to simply “console ban” any Apple device that spams on iMessage. Th…

You're talking as if spam via text messages is a common occurence? I've had maybe one spammy text message on Android in the last 10 years, even though most websites I use have my phone number. Spammy phone calls are constant, but Apple doesn't do anything to prevent that.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#869

Post by bearmode »

tempsy wrote: post #430
kelnos wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd rather live in a world with spam than a world where corporations get to decide what I run on my devices, and cripple a bunch of critical applications if I decide I want to, y'know, actually do whatever I want with the hardware I own. I'm not unsympathetic to Apple's difficulties and goals here (assuming this spam problem is actually the reason, though I'm skeptical that there aren't also self-serving reasons that…

SMS spam is real.

I've had maybe one or two spammy text messages in the last decade. My phone number's already in many spammer's databases based on the number of spam calls I get.

Re: “It’s time for Apple to fix texting”

#870

Post by rat9988 »

KaiserPro wrote: post #855
thomasahle wrote: post #779

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't want to use yet another messaging service that they've built. You literally wouldn't be. You would keep using iMessage. All that would be different is that you could now send images and videos to Android users. Right now you have to switch to another app to do that. This is not a '"standard" they've created', this is a GSM Association standard, and it would be Apple, not Google, implementing it.

Are you saying that Apple doesn't send MMS? because from my experience, it totally can. I know because I've got the bill for it. But to go back to the original point, I don't want google near my chat history. I don't really like Apple having it either.

Apple turns texts between iPhones and Android phones into SMS and MMS, out-of-date technologies from the 90s and 00s. But Apple can adopt RCS—the modern industry standard—for these threads instead. Solving the problem without changing your iPhone to iPhone conversations and making messaging better for everyone.

At some point we should require people to tell us whether they have read the link or not so we can know if it's worth taking their opinions into account.

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