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>iMessage only lets you send non-sms messages when the other contact is online (blue "send" button)

in theory yes, in practice it tries to send imessage when _i am_ online, but my recipient isn't

Just tested here. It will do that, but after a few minutes without confirmation, it will resend the message as SMS. You can explicitly tell it to do that by holding over a message baloon.

Right, though I would think it checks recipient status right away

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