This has nothing to do with iOS or iOS8 - somebody's just using Apple's brand (presumably unauthorized) and design language to push traffic to a UI concept they threw together.
Also, his "action button" idea already exists and is implemented (although if he's having trouble knowing that perhaps they need to work on discoverability) - it's the whole notification banner. Click anywhere on it to reply to an iMessage/SMS.
I want my 100 seconds back.