The SMS/RCS/iMessage/blue bubble-green bubble debate is almost entirely exclusive to the strange market of the US.<p>Almost <i>everywhere else</i> in the world, users have simply adopted a variety of 3rd-party messaging apps that use the phone's Internet rather than GSM connection, like WhatsApp, Telegram, Messenger, Signal, WeChat, etc.<p>EDIT: While I understand the need for a 'universal E2EE messaging standard', we don't have one <i>right now</i>, and all three (SMS, RCS, iMessage) are poor stop-gaps. People need to send their texts, images, videos, and files to people without pain; that's all the average layperson cares about. What <i>does</i> fill this need are said 3rd-party apps, which claim to have E2EE messaging. Whether this is really true remains to be seen.
I'm not sure why this is being framed as an XOR situation? Why would RCS support imply removal of iMessage?<p>Surely RCS raises the lowest common denominator up a bit from SMS, and people are still free to use whatever 3rd party data-based messaging service they want to, be it iMessage, WhatsApp, Signal, Facebook Messenger, or whatever else, even ICQ if that still exists.<p>I don't think I've ever intentionally/deliberately chosen to use RCS, but (on my (Android) phone at least) it does seem to transparently turn itself on the very rare occasion when I send SMS messages (usually in reply to a received SMS), if supported by both phones.
> <i>To use iMessage, all you need is an Apple ID, which you can create for free. To use RCS, you</i> need <i>to have a phone number, which means that you need to have an account with a carrier. You also need to have a phone to use RCS: you can't use it on a tablet alone without LTE.</i><p>I’m under the impression you need Apple hardware to use iMessage, and that even third-party solutions rely upon proxying via real Apple hardware which has to be turned on (I get the impression some basically offer the hardware as a paid service, and others require you to own the hardware?). This tips the balance completely the other direction, as a <i>lot</i> more people have phone numbers than can use iMessage without further expenditure.
So those of us who happen to own iPhones, and have friend who have Android devices, and would like to have (e.g.) group chats can go pound sand? Or try to get all of our friends/family to install yet another app?<p>What is the main argument(s?) against implementing RCS? That it doesn't have E2EE? Neither does SMS, so RCS is no worse in that regard, but seems to have some extra nice things.
We initially tried getting on-board the RCS train about 3 or 4 years ago, to be able to do "rich content delivery" to customers. Specifications and feature-sets were hazy and seemed to be poorly agreed upon, and service providers offering RCS termination to the mobile grid were few. Besides only Android having support for it, it turned out that in all of Europe we found just 4 cellular operators that supported it. Consequently the reach of RCS was extremely limited, so we abandoned the idea.<p>In the beginning of this year we had another look at the situation, and somewhat surprisingly there has been very little progress in terms of operator support. As we would say in Sweden: it appears to be moving slower than a snail on vacation.
Although i'm very much a fanboy of the matrix protocol, i really wish Apple and other big players would at least consider something like matrix...That is, a protocol that is secure, extendible, but still universal enough to be federated; not proprietary. I imagine decades ago there might have been similar (though maybe lower intensity) debates when email was becoming popular. I'm so glad the elders were wise enough (and not money-grubbers like nowadays) and came to an agreement around mail protocols like smtp, imap, etc. Even if its not matrix that is chosen, i really wish we had better choice for a chat/text messaging protocol. I get that lay people may not care about open protocols, or federation as much, etc...but my goodness in this day and age, it astounds me that we have not gotten our collective act together to standardize on secure, federatable, and straight-forward basic messaging.
> Adoption<p>This is a chicken and egg argument.<p>> Security
> Prerequisites<p>Both of these arguments rest on the assumption that RCS replaces iMessage. That's not the point. The data is already unencrypted. You already need a paid phone number. The benefit is that two large groups of users' devices that interact poorly today interact better with RCS. Google isn't asking Whatsapp or Signal to implement RCS, it doesn't make sense that they'd expect Apple to shut down their proprietary service to use a less-featurefull option instead.
RCS is inferior to iMessage simply because it doesn't work on tablets and desktop computers. Since RCS is tied to mobile carriers, who don't want to give up control over those juicy messages, the problem will persist forever.
The author lost me on the assumption that RCS is a carrier-controlled service.
I doubt that carriers have much control over the roadmap of RCS, they haven't had real control over it for years now.
It's basically a service of Google (and to a decreasing extend Samsung).<p>Until 2015 the direction of RCS was for every carrier to setup infrastructure to operate a own RCS server. A few companies offered such RCS infra, but a key player in the center of the whole standardization and interoperability matter was a company called jibe.
Jibe was selling RCS servers (and clients) to network operators, and got a few of the key-carriers as customers from the start.<p>As each device-manufacturer was expected to develop/source his own client, and network carriers needed servers to interoperate as well, alot of interoperability discussions, testing and refinement was needed. As a key server-vendor, jibe was at the heart of all those topics and a strong participant in GSMA RCS.<p>In 2015 Google made a move to enter the RCS space and acquired jibe. It started the trajectory which transformed RCS into the mostly Google-operated service that it is today.
Google integrated RCS-client capabilities into their Android Messages application and offer RCS as a unified cloud-based service to operators.<p>Within just a few years:<p>- All network operators who planned to invest into RCS infrastructure scrapped those plans, entered an agreement with Google to use their cloud-based RCS-service instead and mandated towards device-vendors to adopt Android Messages.<p>- Network operators who had no concrete plans for RCS made the same agreement with Google as it promised revenue-share but required zero investment from them.<p>What remains is a handful of network carriers who #1: already have RCS-infra and #2: Didn't shut it down yet.<p>I'd say that 99% of all Android Smartphones today either use a Google Messages client or a Samsung Message client, with the majority of them connecting either to a Google RCS-server or a Samsung RCS-server.<p>The companies surely still align via GSMA, and the carriers / network operators are still involved in discussions about the specification, but given the direction of the past 5 years I don't see that they have actual control over the roadmap of RCS.<p>---<p>All that said, RCS is the best candidate we have to replace SMS, with a majority of carriers chipping in, so it would be reasonable for Apple to adopt RCS as a replacement for SMS and align with the industry on how this standard should be shaped.
As a not-that-techy person I just sorely miss the glorious days of multi-service IM apps which made your messaging transparent, reliable and fully integrated to whatever you were using. I find utterly ridiculous to have multiple half-baked apps in both desktop and mobile for each service because <i>reasons</i>.<p>I reckon RCS tried to circumvent that to a point (but still saying 'screw you' to desktop users) but alas it seems this horrible too-many-IM-apps won't be ever solved.
"RCS embraces the flaws of GSM, and Apple using it would be a step backwards."<p>Nope. As RCS is better than SMS, adopting it would be a step forward. The whole article can be summed up to "RCS is not perfect, so it should not be used". Which is of course silly as RCS is better than the current option it replaces, SMS.
Like the author, I hope to see some kind of open system get adopted. 3rd party apps are popular in a lot of places but they are the wrong solution because you rely on a company offering a free service to behave. In Japan, the dominant messaging app LINE has been struggling to get spam under control, and has had some recent security scandals with personal information being viewed by a Chinese affiliate and user payment data being leaked on GitHub. Because of these and other issues, some younger users want to drop LINE completely and move to alternatives like Discord and iMessage, which is bringing fragmentation back.<p>If a centralized messaging app became dominant in America, it would likely attract antitrust attention too. These apps have to make money somehow, usually by selling emoticons, charging business users, or adding features like payments. I doubt the current FTC would be pleased if Meta realized their old ambition of creating America's WeChat.<p>RCS may not be perfect but I would rather see Apple adopt it if the alternative is nothing. The messaging experience for America would be a lot better for it. Google's rhetoric around this seems to indicate there's no current interest in collaborating to build a better standard, so it seems to be a far off ambition.
All the problems this article are addressed by using Google's own Messages app. Carrier support is not needed, it supports E2E encryption, it's a Google app so it's available on every Android device, etc. You do need a phone number, that is an accurate criticism.<p>Of course Google's app isn't straight RCS, but it _is_ what everybody actually uses, because RCS failed to gain cross-platform, carrier, and manufacturer acceptance. So Google basically followed Apple's lead and created their own centralized messaging.<p>So this isn't about "Apple should support the open-standard known as RCS", it's "Apple should natively integrate Google's messaging app".
I hope there is an interoperable standard but it needs to be (a) end to end encrypted and (b) controlled by some standards organisation. RCS is neither.<p>And worst of all Google implemented encryption by layering it on top i.e. creating their own proprietary version.
>iMessage uses end-to-end encryption, and Apple has, on multiple occasions, refused to add a backdoor to its systems.<p>The backdoor is that you cannot exclude iMessage from your enabled by default iCloud backup.
Since RCS is a chat standard backed by Google, I wonder which company would spend money and time to support it. I guarantee, regardless of adoption, in two years, Google will have killed RCS or gotten out of it, maybe leaving it to carriers.<p>Google is not in it for the long haul. Companies whose entire modus operandi is providing value to paying customers (e.g. Apple) will do well to steer clear.
iMessages are tied to Apple serial numbers, making spamming a lot harder. RCS would bring the spam protection to sms levels, i.e. absolutely non-existant