Nothing doesn’t have anything real - it’s a Mac in the cloud with some janky scripting puppeting Messages.app. They haven’t figured out how to plug in at a protocol level or anything.
sparky
joined 1 year ago
iMessage is a rich communication layer backed by HTTPS and web sockets so think something like WhatsApp or Telegram; you can send 2 gig files, embed maps and other rich content, etc etc. SMS is well… SMS. So the blue versus green bubble is a dumb reductionist view but the practical impact is visible in say video messaging, where an iMessage can attach a 50mb 4K H.265 clip same as a real messaging app, whereas an MMS will be a 256k 3gpp potato.
In theory anyone can host an RCS endpoint but in practice that means carriers (historically) or OS vendors (in modernity). So in effect yes all RCS messages will pass through Google servers, but mostly because Apple to Apple texts will remain on iMessage. But any texts starting or ending on Android will go through Google. Note that this doesn’t really change much as Google’s privacy policy for Android users already discloses the bulk ingestion, scanning and processing of communications, including text messages.
No different than the situation with iPhones and Android phones, really. Apple has made their money once you buy the device, and views your personal data as a liability. Google is an ad company that happens to make hardware, and views your data as necessary monetisation potential.
Yes but the owners of the OS and app stores are, which is I believe the original commenter’s point. And the text of the bill is not “TikTok you shall pull your app”, it’s “Apple you shall disable the App Store listing”.
I really like Telegram generally, including for voice and video. Having native desktop clients too sweetens the deal, even on platforms like Linux. Plus it feels fairly native on each platform, so that makes it easier to get people to switch, versus “this app feels too foreign/clunky on my OS”. Signal is a pretty lousy experience on iOS for example.
If you needed a nudge to ditch Chrome and its derivatives in favour of Firefox or Safari, this is it.
I think due to the custom designs involved in making it modular / repairable, combined with the niche appeal, it’s expected that these devices will be produced in low volumes and therefore will always cost more than the equivalent Pixel, due to missing out on economies of scale.
Anyone know if this work is tracked anywhere? I’m suddenly really suspicious of continuing to run my own instance.
I really enjoy https://mailbox.org, their custom software can be… esoteric at times, but the company and privacy commitments are top notch, and it has PGP built throughout natively, including an option to automatically PGP encrypt all plaintext emails you receive. I joined it originally as a cheaper alternative to Protonmail but these days I really prefer it.
Some do, but what Google rolled out in Android Messages is their own implementation unrelated to the carriers. Ostensibly so it works regardless of carrier, but what they rolled out is a semi-proprietary implementation that only works on their app. Ergo if you use a third party texting app, no RCS. So it’s a sort of “Android iMsssage” thing anyway. Apple plans to implement Google’s version, again sidestepping the carriers.