Apple’s secret iPhone lock-in feature?

iCloud doesn't poll your phone every damn minute to check if it still has that number's SIM card inserted

The author even acknowledges it's a bug, and still calls it a "lock-in"

Secondly, iMessage and SMS messages are, with the exception for colourblind people, very distinctive: if you can't tell the difference between blue and green, you have an issue. The fact that it took a director to figure this out astounds me.

Thirdly, the author's insinuation that the senders iPhone "intercepts" a text is false: the phone knows there is an iMessage compatible device associated with this number (consider the recievers service being cut, but they keep the phone on WiFi), and so it sends it as an iMessage. It's not actively going "Oh this user has swapped to an Android device, let's piss him off in every way possible and treat this text as an iMessage, that'll get him!", it's working with the data it has in an attempt to be helpful to the receiver: they've run out of PAYG credit and can no longer sustain a data connection, but are in range of WiFi, so iMessage still stays online. It is trying to be helpful to the user, not a massive wanker

Admittedly, they should check to see if a SIM card is still in the phone on boot, then register with iMessage

In comparison to BBM, the only reason this is considered "lock-in" is because texts and iMessages are in the same place instead of two separate places

Disable iMessage and turn the damn iPhone off for a week, then if that fails, run to an Apple Store

Also, don't assume the worst, you will somewhere along the line regret it, and wonder "what if". You don't want to be on your deathbed with regrets

P.S. if someone reading this has access to Apple's fabled Bug Reporter/Radar, file this behaviour as a "bug", or, if you're in a baiting mood, "lock-in feature". I would if I could.

In other words, this issue only occurs when a user switches away from iPhone as their primary phone but continues to use the iPhone for other purposes.

At that point you will no longer be able to send iMessage's and you will no longer be able to receive them. The thing is that the iPhone when first activated reads the number from the SIM card/carrier and sets that up as an iMessage address. Apple is never pinged when you move your number away from your carrier unless you re-activate your phone with a different SIM card (I still am not happy you can't activate the phone without having a carrier plan ... yay Jailbreaks!).

In the article he mentions unregistering his devices/phone from Apple's website, that will work until the next time that his phone pings the iMessage server and re-registers itself (disable iMessage first ... it unregisters the device). I personally would say that is working as designed, if I unregister all of my devices, if I turn one on to use for texting it should re-register itself automatically.

Now that's a linkbait headline if I ever saw one..

The author lost me when contemplating the switch. Nearly a grand invested in a device after "upgrading" at a cost of $450? If they purchased a 64GB model, the cost would be around that, but they could have had their "IT Director" sell that phone for more than $450. They probably would have gotten into a new Verizon contract with a net iPhone investment of just a few hundred bucks.

Sounds like a pile of excuses leading into some Android-related promotion, and coming from a "VC" it does not surprise.