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People are just eating what Google says raw. Apple will just need to implement RCS and everything will be better.

Don't worry that the only universally available RCS relay is operated by Google and encryption is a part of a non-standard Google extension. So Google wants Apple to hand all messages over to Google.

For fun, Apple should propose to implement RCS but only if Google agrees to use the Apple relay. No chance it would ever be accepted.

Amen. Plus, the whole reason RCS was built was to allow carriers to keep charging for messages.

And the included encryption is beyond useless if it is instantly dropped when sent to a device that doesn’t understand the new protocol. That’s such a huge security vulnerability that it is just security theater to encrypt in the first place. Though I’m sure it has to do something with all those messages going through google’s servers.

That's also true for iMessage?

If you actually care about e2ee you'd use Signal.

Actually it’s not true for iMessage. Messages switches to SMS/MMS if the phone doesn’t support iMessage or has it disabled, but if it’s an iMessage it’s an iMessage—encryption and all—and you can see in advance if that is the case.

That said I don’t know what Google’s messenger actually does when it drops the encryption on RCS messages. Is there a visual distinction between encrypted RCS and unencrypted RCS on the sender end if it is just dropping the encryption on the receiving end as a fallback?

Yes, the send icon changes.

Yeah, I'm on android and RCS is not enabled.

> Apple will just need to implement RCS and everything will be better.

I used it for a bit, but learned that RCS is not something I want even a little.

> Similarly, you can install Telegram, Whatsapp, Messenger, Signal, Element X (which I all have installed besides Whatsapp) and communicate with people available through those application at the utterly tiny inconvenience of having to open that app first.

...and the not insignificant inconvenience of knowing which of these apps each of your contacts uses or prefers. There really is a network effect of most people in a particular circle just using one thing. For US iPhone users at least, that thing is iMessage.

I have my family on Telegram as well as some close friends, a single friend on Element, most other people who are less tech-aware are using FB’s Messenger so I can’t ditch that unfortunately. That’s not hard to keep in mind, it is not that many people I actively keep in contact with. Though I am no social butterfly, you may have it different.

Kids. I have never kept so many strangers in my phone until kids. Friends from school. Friends from random parks. Friends from random activities. Parents to coordinate this activity or that. Trying to remember which platform friend of the quarter is on is too much for me. The reduction of children is the worse. Few children in the neighborhood and everyone is an only child, so now we all have to schedule social interaction until they can read at least.

Indeed. WhatsApp has like 99.9% of market share in central/south America? Nobody use SMS or iMessage over there.

Asia too.

Yes, it is a US centric view, but it also explains why iOS market share is nearly unstoppable in the US. It will likely tilt much farther in that direction if there aren't fundamental changes in how people use messaging.

> Like SMS itself is a legacy, insecure tech, it really should not be used at all anymore, unless you really only know their phone number.

I use SMS mostly because the only people I know who don't are using Facebook stuff and I'm not going to do that. But I am nervous about the say when people stop using SMS so much because I don't look forward to having to have multiple messaging apps and trying to remember who is using what.

> You can’t send images/videos through a Short Messaging Service, period.

I do that all the time.