After all of these years, I'm surprised that Google hasn't just made their own clone of iMessage and called it a day.<p>iMessage (being an SMS / chat system with a native desktop client) is the only reason I went back to iOS. As much as I miss and android community, my top priority is avoiding the physical use of my phone whenever possible.<p>So while this is on the right track, its still not there. Leaving encryption off the table, at least to me, doesn't make a lick of sense.<p>Combining Google Voice and an iMessage-like service would have been closer to the game-changer they keep marketing their chat apps as... but it looks like we're still going to wait.<p>A BGR article [1] is assuming that they'll use a browser extension for the desktop client, which is good for cross-platform work, but the ones I've tried in the past (PushBullet, MightyText, etc) all fell short.<p>Long story short, its a shame to see someone as big and powerful as Google struggle with something as seemingly simple as a good SMS / RCS client to properly compete in the space.<p>[1] <a href="http://bgr.com/2018/02/09/imessage-vs-android-messages-sms-texting-pc/" rel="nofollow">http://bgr.com/2018/02/09/imessage-vs-android-messages-sms-t...</a>