The long fight to make Apple’s iMessage compatible with all devices has raged with little to show for it. But Google (de facto leader of the charge) and other mobile operators are now leveraging the European Union’s Digital Market Act (DMA), according to the Financial Times. The law, which goes into effect in 2024, requires that “gatekeepers” not favor their own systems or limit third parties from interoperating within them. Gatekeepers are any company that meets specific financial and usage qualifications, including Google’s parent company Alphabet, Apple, Samsung and others.

  • @SinTacks
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    English
    57 months ago

    This is just false, it’s sent over carrier networks and the carriers decide whose infrastructure to use. Google is one of several options. RCS is an open standard and it is the industry standard for SMS. It’s literally why every other non iphone can send high quality pictures to each other. Apple not adopting it is anti competitive.

    • kirklennon
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      fedilink
      27 months ago

      it’s sent over carrier networks and the carriers decide whose infrastructure to use.

      The carriers never bothered to implement RCS; they just outsourced the whole thing to Google.

      RCS is an open standard

      That nobody uses.

      it is the industry standard for SMS.

      It’s meant as a replacement for SMS. It’s not just some new version of SMS that Apple hasn’t upgraded to, which is what you were basically saying earlier.

      It’s literally why every other non iphone can send high quality pictures to each other.

      It’s a messaging service used exclusively by Android phones. iPhones all support iMessage; Androids (mostly) all support RCS. All of those iMessages go over Apple’s servers; all of those RCS messages go over Google’s servers.

      For what it’s worth, iPhones have supported sending full-quality pictures to everyone over a legitimately open protocol since launch day. It’s called email.

      Apple not adopting it is anti competitive.

      Google’s attempts to legally force Apple to adopt its proprietary platform is transparently anticompetitive.