Finally, Google calls RCS an industry standard. Which it isn't, not even close. Google hasn't even adopted RCS across all of its disparate messaging platforms.
To set a few things straight: SMS is a telecommunication standard, defined in 1986 as part of the GSM standards, and since 1999 managed by 3GPP, which is a standardization body that manages all the mobile telecommunication standards from 2G up to 5G. Because SMS is a telecommunication standard (and not a data communication standard), it has some telecom characteristics: it is device agnostic (it is sufficient to swap the sim card to a new device), it can be legally intercepted (like all telecom services) and the telecom operator can charge for SMS messages. It took a while before SMS messages could be sent between phones of different telecom operators in different countries, but eventually the SMS standard was universal
Every vendor of a mobile phone (smart or dumb) must implement the SMS standard, as SMS is a compulsory part of the 3GPP defined standards. If SMS were not implemented, the telecom regulator in a country might refuse a mobile phone to become active. (No mobile vendor ever tried it, but this option exists)
All current messaging applications like iMessage and Whatsapp, use their own data communication protocol on the data channel in a mobile phone. For me this a sad thing as as Whatsapp message cannot be sent to a iMessage receiver or vice versa.
As part of 5G standards, the 3GPP has defined a successor of SMS and this new standard is called RCS. RCS is again a telecom standard, which means that again it is device agnostic (it could be implemented on dumb phones) , legal intercept must be possible and the telecom operator can charge for the use of RCS. So Apple Insider is wrong when it claims that RCS is not an industry standard, but that is about all there is to say. RCS is not so popular as the telecom operators and Google want it to be, and only popular standards make sense.
Currently RCS is not a compulsory protocol of 5G networks. If it were the case, no iPhone would be allowed on the any 5G network.
SMS is no longer the most used message standard for person to person communication, but it still very useful for system to person communication like for the 2nd factor of 2 factor authentication. The fact that a telecom protocol is used as the 2nd factor (and not a data communication protocol) enhances considerably the security, even when we realize that SMS is not that secure at all. Migrating this kind of application to RCS makes a lot of sense. This is perhaps the main reason Apple should support RCS in the future.
Even Android fans and Tech sites like AndroidAuthority Talks about RCS and why it's to late and what Google did and how much of a mess RCS really is WHy would Apple want to use and Support it? Its default for RCS is SMS, so that still doesn't go away.
It is an interesting read. Even their own poll which asks if RCS stands a chance, 49% say NO! Apple came out with iMessage and stuck with it. Google like always, moved form one app to the next. Not settling onto anything.
Quote from the link above, "Google had not one, not two, but many, many, oh-so-many chances to get messaging right. Google Talk, Hangouts, Voice, Allo, Chat, Messages, not to mention the countless integrated chat features in other apps (YouTube, Photos, Pay, Maps, and so on). I’m sure I’ve forgotten dozens more."
Even over a year ago, Google is been trying to force Apple to use RCS. It's nothing new and it only benefits Google, not Apple. I know Google and Android users don't like the green Bubble for some reason in iMessage. It's not like they can see the colors anyway. It's just to let someone know it's going over SMS as some people may still be paying for that per message, and you don't have all the features like you do in iMessage. It's never been something I even cared about. I get Blue or green text, and I don't think, oh, an Android user, that person sucks!!! It doesn't cross my mind. Of course, I don't do all the other things you can do in text messages that kids are doing.
I don't see RCS as the solution. I think we are already bast that point. Just like with BlackBerry Messages finally coming out to iOS and Android when they were about dead. It was just too late at that point to matter and no one uses that either. Bye, Bye!! The rest of the world is using WeChat and others. I'M not a fan of that solution. So you need 3-4 other Chat apps installed on your phone to deal with? I just use iMessage. 1 App and keep it simple. That is all I need.
As part of 5G standards, the 3GPP has defined a successor of SMS and this new standard is called RCS. RCS is again a telecom standard, which means that again it is device agnostic (it could be implemented on dumb phones) , legal intercept must be possible and the telecom operator can charge for the use of RCS. So Apple Insider is wrong when it claims that RCS is not an industry standard, but that is about all there is to say. RCS is not so popular as the telecom operators and Google want it to be, and only popular standards make sense.
You say "legal intercept must be possible", but the newest implementation of RCS is end to end encrypted. This means that unless Google is lying, there is no possible way whatsoever to intercept RCS messages sent through the Google Messages App.
Google is as evil as Facebook/Meta, if not more so. I trust nothing from the company in terms of not monetizing the data of its users in surreptitious ways. It even destroyed its own best-in-class search engine so it could serve up sponsored results posing as most relevant to your search.
It seems you forgot to mention that google explicitly marked sponsored results as such. So how is it destroying its search engine?
Finally, Google calls RCS an industry standard. Which it isn't, not even close. Google hasn't even adopted RCS across all of its disparate messaging platforms.
To set a few things straight: SMS is a telecommunication standard, defined in 1986 as part of the GSM standards, and since 1999 managed by 3GPP, which is a standardization body that manages all the mobile telecommunication standards from 2G up to 5G. Because SMS is a telecommunication standard (and not a data communication standard), it has some telecom characteristics: it is device agnostic (it is sufficient to swap the sim card to a new device), it can be legally intercepted (like all telecom services) and the telecom operator can charge for SMS messages. It took a while before SMS messages could be sent between phones of different telecom operators in different countries, but eventually the SMS standard was universal
Every vendor of a mobile phone (smart or dumb) must implement the SMS standard, as SMS is a compulsory part of the 3GPP defined standards. If SMS were not implemented, the telecom regulator in a country might refuse a mobile phone to become active. (No mobile vendor ever tried it, but this option exists)
All current messaging applications like iMessage and Whatsapp, use their own data communication protocol on the data channel in a mobile phone. For me this a sad thing as as Whatsapp message cannot be sent to a iMessage receiver or vice versa.
As part of 5G standards, the 3GPP has defined a successor of SMS and this new standard is called RCS. RCS is again a telecom standard, which means that again it is device agnostic (it could be implemented on dumb phones) , legal intercept must be possible and the telecom operator can charge for the use of RCS. So Apple Insider is wrong when it claims that RCS is not an industry standard, but that is about all there is to say. RCS is not so popular as the telecom operators and Google want it to be, and only popular standards make sense.
Currently RCS is not a compulsory protocol of 5G networks. If it were the case, no iPhone would be allowed on the any 5G network.
SMS is no longer the most used message standard for person to person communication, but it still very useful for system to person communication like for the 2nd factor of 2 factor authentication. The fact that a telecom protocol is used as the 2nd factor (and not a data communication protocol) enhances considerably the security, even when we realize that SMS is not that secure at all. Migrating this kind of application to RCS makes a lot of sense. This is perhaps the main reason Apple should support RCS in the future.
That's not technically correct. Dumb phones can receive RCS messages because RCS defaults to SMS, if the phone can not process the RCS message. But one can not send messages in RCS with a dumb phone because RCS requires either data or Wifi to access the internet. While SMS only requires the carrier own cellular network.
RCS was suppose to replace SMS as the messaging standard on mobile devices 12 years ago, but the carriers could never come to an agreement on how to make it work across all the carrier networks. And when better messaging services using the internet became available, more popular and for free, the mobile carriers saw no reason to invest further into RCS, if they could no longer make any money with it. Just because RCS protocol is a standard, it doesn't mean that the mobile industry have made it their messaging standard. SMS is still the only messaging service standard in the mobile industry.
So far, the only way to open a RCS message from any of the mobile carriers that have implemented Google version of RCS, is to use Google Messages (or Samsung messages (on a Samsung phone) because of a deal they made with Google.). This by design when Google bought out Jibe Mobile and made their servers the standard servers all carriers must use when implementing Google version of RCS.
The only way to make Apple adopt RCS is to have the EU bring a Lawsuit stating that Apple is being unfair to Android users there fore everyone is being discriminated against and they force Apple to put the tech on their phones in Europe. Its already been done with side loading so why not this too?
The only way to make Apple adopt RCS is to have the EU bring a Lawsuit stating that Apple is being unfair to Android users there fore everyone is being discriminated against and they force Apple to put the tech on their phones in Europe. Its already been done with side loading so why not this too?
The EU only makes up 23% of Apples revenues, they will peck away at Apple until they get their regional iPhone, while the rest of the world moves on, with the better iPhone.
I don't often come to this site but this has to be one of the strangest articles I've read in the tech space.
The strangest part is that it attacks RCS as if it is a Google product.
"It is Google's problem that Android users don't have the same benefit by default." Android users do have it by default. Not with iOS users though. That's the entire point of their campaign.
RCS does not need to replace iMessage. iMessage just needs to fallback to RCS, which will then fallback to SMS. Apple can modify the RCS UP spec if they wanted to. They collaborated with the GSMA on the eSIM spec. They don't even need to be a member of the GSMA to have a say considering their size and influence. But note that even Amazon and AMD are members, among dozens of other companies.
It's a really naive take that doesn't once mention the GSMA, the Universal Profile spec, and a better solution for issues such as people excluding others because of their device due to the lack of interoperability.
I don't like Google but underdogs often do things that consumers like so that they can make money. Google being an underdog in messaging. I dislike quite a few things about RCS and how Google has implemented it on Android, but on iOS it's only an improvement over SMS.
There's even people comparing RCS to Flash. 🥴 I may be wasting my time here. It's really weird that I'm making a comment like this after googling about this but yeah.
And yes, WebGPU is a good example of Apple working with Google (and Mozilla) for cross platform interoperability!! (even though it has its own issues that I won't go into here lol) - let's not forget that Apple is still full-steam with only Metal T.T
RCS is now the standard for all Android phones, so it's wrong to say that Android users can't share high-res images by default.
Sure, RCS isn't perfect and is still mid-adoption, but you say it's not the solution to fixing cross-platform messaging without offering any other options. What would you rather see happen to improve how iOS and Android communicate? It's easy to criticize, but you don't seem to have a better solution to offer.
Nothing is perfect, so saying RCS isn't perfect doesn't add anything to the discussion.
Your argument here doesn't make any sense and here's why: it's not Apple or Appleinsider that's complaining about cross-platform messaging. So when Google suggests a solution, Apple is free to say "no thanks.' They aren't required to offer their own solution; they aren't the ones complaining.
I owned an iPhone for years and still complained. There is an issue. You're just not affected by it as it's a social one that depends on messaging apps' network effect. Apple is letting down more than just Google, but many Apple customers and Android users. Google's campaign is written in a way that explains green bubbles on iPhones to end-users of both iOS and Android. A high school level analysis, but hopefully you already understood that anyway.
As part of 5G standards, the 3GPP has defined a successor of SMS and this new standard is called RCS. RCS is again a telecom standard, which means that again it is device agnostic (it could be implemented on dumb phones) , legal intercept must be possible and the telecom operator can charge for the use of RCS. So Apple Insider is wrong when it claims that RCS is not an industry standard, but that is about all there is to say. RCS is not so popular as the telecom operators and Google want it to be, and only popular standards make sense.
You say "legal intercept must be possible", but the newest implementation of RCS is end to end encrypted. This means that unless Google is lying, there is no possible way whatsoever to intercept RCS messages sent through the Google Messages App.
That’s not the “newest implementation of RCS”. That’s IP based messaging via Google Messages app. Telephony based messaging must be tappable.
As part of 5G standards, the 3GPP has defined a successor of SMS and this new standard is called RCS. RCS is again a telecom standard, which means that again it is device agnostic (it could be implemented on dumb phones) , legal intercept must be possible and the telecom operator can charge for the use of RCS. So Apple Insider is wrong when it claims that RCS is not an industry standard, but that is about all there is to say. RCS is not so popular as the telecom operators and Google want it to be, and only popular standards make sense.
You say "legal intercept must be possible", but the newest implementation of RCS is end to end encrypted. This means that unless Google is lying, there is no possible way whatsoever to intercept RCS messages sent through the Google Messages App.
That’s not the “newest implementation of RCS”. That’s IP based messaging via Google Messages app. Telephony based messaging must be tappable.
RCS, whether encrypted or not, requires IP based messaging. You cannot send RCS without an Internet connection. I honestly don't see anywhere where RCS uses old school telephony. Without an IP connection, your messages revert back to SMS.
Comments
Currently RCS is not a compulsory protocol of 5G networks. If it were the case, no iPhone would be allowed on the any 5G network.
https://www.androidauthority.com/rcs-google-3090142/
It is an interesting read. Even their own poll which asks if RCS stands a chance, 49% say NO! Apple came out with iMessage and stuck with it. Google like always, moved form one app to the next. Not settling onto anything.
Quote from the link above, "Google had not one, not two, but many, many, oh-so-many chances to get messaging right. Google Talk, Hangouts, Voice, Allo, Chat, Messages, not to mention the countless integrated chat features in other apps (YouTube, Photos, Pay, Maps, and so on). I’m sure I’ve forgotten dozens more."
Even over a year ago, Google is been trying to force Apple to use RCS. It's nothing new and it only benefits Google, not Apple. I know Google and Android users don't like the green Bubble for some reason in iMessage. It's not like they can see the colors anyway. It's just to let someone know it's going over SMS as some people may still be paying for that per message, and you don't have all the features like you do in iMessage. It's never been something I even cared about. I get Blue or green text, and I don't think, oh, an Android user, that person sucks!!! It doesn't cross my mind. Of course, I don't do all the other things you can do in text messages that kids are doing.
I don't see RCS as the solution. I think we are already bast that point. Just like with BlackBerry Messages finally coming out to iOS and Android when they were about dead. It was just too late at that point to matter and no one uses that either. Bye, Bye!! The rest of the world is using WeChat and others. I'M not a fan of that solution. So you need 3-4 other Chat apps installed on your phone to deal with? I just use iMessage. 1 App and keep it simple. That is all I need.
‘’loser company upset at winning company for not surrendering a successful differentiator in favor of the loser companie’s dung heap.
So how is it destroying its search engine?
RCS was suppose to replace SMS as the messaging standard on mobile devices 12 years ago, but the carriers could never come to an agreement on how to make it work across all the carrier networks. And when better messaging services using the internet became available, more popular and for free, the mobile carriers saw no reason to invest further into RCS, if they could no longer make any money with it. Just because RCS protocol is a standard, it doesn't mean that the mobile industry have made it their messaging standard. SMS is still the only messaging service standard in the mobile industry.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/over-and-out-at-t-t-mobile-and-verizon-ditch-rcs-joint-venture/
If RCS is a mobile industry standard, then why did Vodafone have to ditch their version of RCS, when they implemented Google version of RCS?
https://9to5google.com/2023/03/27/vodafone-rcs-messages-android/
So far, the only way to open a RCS message from any of the mobile carriers that have implemented Google version of RCS, is to use Google Messages (or Samsung messages (on a Samsung phone) because of a deal they made with Google.). This by design when Google bought out Jibe Mobile and made their servers the standard servers all carriers must use when implementing Google version of RCS.
https://thenewdialtone.com/google-bringing-rcs-back-to-life/
The strangest part is that it attacks RCS as if it is a Google product.
"It is Google's problem that Android users don't have the same benefit by default." Android users do have it by default. Not with iOS users though. That's the entire point of their campaign.
RCS does not need to replace iMessage. iMessage just needs to fallback to RCS, which will then fallback to SMS. Apple can modify the RCS UP spec if they wanted to. They collaborated with the GSMA on the eSIM spec. They don't even need to be a member of the GSMA to have a say considering their size and influence. But note that even Amazon and AMD are members, among dozens of other companies.
It's a really naive take that doesn't once mention the GSMA, the Universal Profile spec, and a better solution for issues such as people excluding others because of their device due to the lack of interoperability.
I don't like Google but underdogs often do things that consumers like so that they can make money. Google being an underdog in messaging. I dislike quite a few things about RCS and how Google has implemented it on Android, but on iOS it's only an improvement over SMS.
There's even people comparing RCS to Flash. 🥴 I may be wasting my time here. It's really weird that I'm making a comment like this after googling about this but yeah.
And yes, WebGPU is a good example of Apple working with Google (and Mozilla) for cross platform interoperability!! (even though it has its own issues that I won't go into here lol) - let's not forget that Apple is still full-steam with only Metal T.T