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Comment by spike021 | Hacker News Reader

I live in America and literally nobody I know cares about this.

Unfortunately I think it's just the typical remnant of the old Mac vs Windows haters who come out of the woodwork online to make it sound like a problem.

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1. Kids care about it. Why? Because you can use iMessage via iPad without needing a phone number, and this is how lots of tweens get started with messaging.

2. Any Android users with iPhone friends trying to use iMessage for group chat cares about it. It's impossible to add Android users to an existing group chat... and any time you have a mixed iPhone + Android group chat it degrades a number of the iMessage group chat features normally accessible to iPhone users.

3. Any Android users receiving media over SMS/MMS from an iPhone user cares. They'll be receiving images & videos that look like they were shot with a potato.

The blue vs green color doesn't matter, but the effects mixed platform chatting has on both iPhone & Android users is significant.

These are fantastic points, all of which I have personally experienced as an Android user with many iPhone family members.

Apple adopting RCS won't solve #1, and is unlikely to solve #2, but solving #3 is a great start, and if the Apple faithful continue to give feedback to Apple that they care about fixing #2, we might see it one day.

I agree. Solving #3 is terrific (because it frequently bites you when the sender is someone you don't know particularly well... certainly not well enough to ask them to resend using a third party messaging app). I don't really care about #1, although I guess Google's answer would be "use Chat", which is absolutely ridiculous since it no longer has an interface to SMS/RCS like Hangouts did. This is a gaping hole in their product strategy, imho. #2 could be solved by Apple if they want to, or else we'll just continue to struggle along with a need for several different messaging apps for different social contexts. It's not like Whatsapp, Telegram, Signal, etc don't work.

Another solution Google could perhaps pursue would be to license one or multiple of those to include in the default Android install, but I don't see that happening without regulatory interference.

I have a feeling with the EU's DMA this will just become more prevalent with every messaging platform forced to "open up"

FB Messenger will have a "green bubble" for messages to people using whatever other app they're forced to integrate. Same with Whatsapp, Telegram, etc...

I care, actually a fair bit, but only because I work in a building that has two areas that are complete dead zones for cellular reception, and our IT department blocks WiFi calling (but not iMessage data). Blue bubbles can message me in those areas; green cannot.

It's not at all unusual for my phone to explode in dinging when I leave one of those areas.

I wish they didn't block WiFi calling, because my cellular reception at home isn't great, and I'd use it there. We have an internal WiFi network separate from the public one, with per-user authentication, so you don't have to worry about visitors overloading the infrastructure (it's a hospital, lots of families and patients in addition to the staff).

> Blue bubbles can message me in those areas; green cannot.

They can, but one or both parties is refusing to use any of the numerous alternative messaging options like WhatsApp.

I'm one guy. Six years ago, there were two of us out of ~30 that used Android. Both of us switched in the next year or so because nobody else would use a different app just to talk to us. So we were missing out on fairly critical information, and forget anything time-sensitive.

On Android, it wasn't an issue to use Signal, because it will communicate securely if it can and by SMS if it can't. So you can still text anyone from the app. On iOS, not so much.

I'd stay away from Whatsapp just to keep away from Meta.

> I'd stay away from Whatsapp just to keep away from Meta.

This seems prejudiced. If one company supports end-to-end encrypted chats with everyone, and the other only with people who buy their devices, I think it's clear who cares more about privacy.

It is prejudiced. I assume Meta is going to make me the product.

Signal does E2EE. They have not yet done anything to jeopardize the trust they have earned. Some do not like them, and that’s fine. I have a different view.

Apple is right now making you the product in a way that limits your privacy, telling other people that they have to buy an apple device if they want encrypted communications with you.

Is using Signal on iOS not as secure as using it on Android?

No, they just have to use something other than iMessage. But they won’t.

I care. It's fucking annoying when someone joins a group chat on Android and all of a sudden I can no longer access it from my computer, iPad or over WiFi.

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