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I wouldn't categorize it as anti-consumer. Apple is not under any moral, legal, or ethical obligation to provide access to iMessage to users outside of their ecosystem.Apple is intentionally degrading the experience of sending messages to non-Apple devices for the explicit purpose of driving iPhone sales. This is anti-consumer, full stop.
"They must provide access to iMessage outside of the ecosystem" unnecessarily restricts the possible ways that Apple can address this issue, and is only one of many solutions to the problem.
My point and stance is not that Apple should be forced to implement iMessage on Android, but that the intentional and artificial restrictions baked into the Apple <-> Non-Apple experience is unacceptable to me as a customer.
I've commented at length about this elsewhere in the thread, but they could:
- Implement RCS (which they're finally and reluctantly doing due to regulatory pressure, but we have no idea how much they'll hamstring it, and it's borderline ridiculous that they haven't done something yet. Too little too late)
- Allow 3rd party apps to surface messages in a unified interface like they do with other iOS capabilities (e.g. the unified voice call experience from various non-Apple apps/services)
> In another thread, you say "They’re selling a general purpose communication device that is incapable of exchanging run of the mill content with other general purpose communication devices, and using that poor experience to drive iPhone sales." which is a demonstrably false premise.
The premise is demonstrably true, and can be experienced by trying to send someone a text containing an image or video using the phone's native capabilities.
I think it's worth reiterating here that Apple has explicitly restricted the messaging experience while allowing other categories of app (Mail, Contacts, Calendars, Phone calls) to natively interact with 3rd party services from a single interface. The argument that "just use another chat app" would be a lot stronger if Apple actually supported other chat apps in their native experience.
Zoom out and stop focusing on "iMessage on Android", and it becomes extremely obvious how anti-consumer this stance is based on comparing it to Apple's own design philosophy and other capabilities across iOS.
> iMessage on Android is moot.
On this I tend to agree. But this doesn't get Apple off the hook, or make the dark patterns acceptable.
As I've said elsewhere, Apple may have every right to do this, but customers have every right to be pissed about it, especially because there are ways to solve this that don't require Apple to open the floodgates to iMessage.