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Google Renames Messenger To Android Messages as the Company Pushes RCS (betanews.com) 92

Posted by msmash from the making-do-with-anything dept.
We have come a long way from the age of flip phones and nine-key texting. Even as if group messaging and instant messengers took over, the SMS has largely retained its core standard over the years. Google wants to change that, and for this, it has been working with hundreds of carriers and manufacturers around the world to bring the text message into the 21st century. Using a standard called Rich Communications Services, the group plans to make a texting app that comes with your phone and is every bit as powerful as those dedicated messaging apps. This would make all the best features available to everyone with an Android phone. From a report on BetaNews: Just last week we were talking about Google's championing of RCS (Rich Communication Services), the successor to SMS. Now the company has renamed its Messenger app to Android Messages as it aims to become not just the default SMS app, but the default RCS app for Android users. Part of the reason for the name change is to convey the idea that the app is now about more than just one type of message. Google is betting big on RCS and this is hinted at in the app update description which says it adds "Simpler sign-up for enhanced features on supported carriers."
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Google Renames Messenger To Android Messages as the Company Pushes RCS More

Google Renames Messenger To Android Messages as the Company Pushes RCS

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  • Question (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Who is asking for this?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gnick ( 1211984 )

      Google execs.

    • Actually, it's already there - for anyone who's downloaded WhatsApp and uses it. One can use text, and some hundreds of emojis (even if their looks vary from Android to iOS to Windows) Issue w/ Google is that WhatsApp is owned by Facebook, so people using WhatsApp in no way helps Google

      • Not forgetting that WhatsApp is encrypted, so Google can't get at people's private data - the lifeblood of the organisation.

        So naturally they'll do whatever it takes to mitigate it or move people away, just like they tried with Facebook.
        i.e. if a buy-out doesn't pan out, try to out-do them, if that doesn't work, then try to invade/fish the data by any other mean.

        "We are willing to get it one way or another, with or without their deal!"
        - Eric Schmidt, 2010 [stateofdigital.com] - talking about the failed deal with Facebook and ca

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by lgw ( 121541 )

      Who is asking for this?

      Certainly not the security guys. I like the fact that an SMS is not some Turing-complete language in which malware can be coded - unlike PDF, PS, Word, etc. Even as simple as it is, phones still get it wrong, but it's no where near as bad as PDF.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by msauve ( 701917 )
      It's a conundrum.

      We have come a long way from the age of flip phones and nine-key texting. Even as if group messaging and instant messengers took over, the SMS has largely retained its core standard over the years.

      And that's self-contradictory. We haven't come a long way, in practice. Now that smartphones are ubiquitous, what's the point of SMS? Everyone has fast, easy, mobile access to email, which has none of the limitations of SMS (message size, tied to a device and not a person, etc.). Email, you can ac

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Potor ( 658520 )
        Actually, I try to avoid using wifi on my phone (I have no data plan) , and thus prefer SMS. Also, I fly a lot and having SMS on the tarmac is a great option.

      • Now that smartphones are ubiquitous, what's the point of SMS? Everyone has fast, easy, mobile access to email, which has none of the limitations of SMS (message size, tied to a device and not a person, etc.). Email, you can access on your phone, your PC, your tablet, or even a public web terminal in many cases. It even lets you communicate to someone without a phone!

        Email requires you to have an email server, which either you or someone else (read: google) must host.

        All you need for SMS is a phone number. No middle man.

    • Inquiring mimes want to know.*
      * They are rather heavily dependent on text...

  • Data Harvesting anyone? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I for one am SURE that Google will respect our privacy and not use my personal messages to

      monetize me
    ...or send customized ads to me
    ...or profile me
    ...or track me
    ...or geo-locate me

  • The real reasons ... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by stevez67 ( 2374822 ) on Friday February 24, 2017 @03:10PM (#53925079)

    1. easier to data mine
    2. easier to deliver targeted ads
    3. more control over the ad revenue

    • Re:The real reasons ... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by fred6666 ( 4718031 ) on Friday February 24, 2017 @04:27PM (#53925667)

      you forget:

      4. easier to charge for each message
      5. easier for the police to get the meta data (who you've sent messages to)
      6. easier to block you from keeping your identifier (phone number) when you migrate to another country

      RCS should be killed with fire. The only worse messaging protocol is Apple iMessage, because it is single vendor.

  • As soon as Apple adopts RCS too, everything will be fine!

    Right?

    • They already have (Score:4, Interesting)

      by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Friday February 24, 2017 @03:15PM (#53925115)

      It's called iMessage.

      just in case ou were wondering why Google is pushing RCS now... who knew that the part of iOS 10 many people laughed at, iMessage stickers, would be a smash ht for Apple that had Google scrambling to come up with an answer for?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by lgw ( 121541 )

        Any idea why I don't get text messages (on my Android phone) when my not-tech-savvy elder relatives with iPhones try to text me? Is this some iMessage thing?

        • It sounds like you might have switched from an iPhone, if so de-regsiter your phone number and disable iMessage [howtogeek.com]. Or if it's a new phone, perhaps the number was on an iPhone before.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by lgw ( 121541 )

            I have never owned any device made by Apple (and some phone number forever). Any other guesses? That would have been massively helpful had it been correct.

            • I would still try following the instructions anyway in case your phone number had previously been registered with Apple. If not, I'd start investigating if some kind of custom Android extension is eating the messages.

              Also telling would be if the people sending you messages see a green bubble or a blue bubble when they type. If green, then it's going out from their phone as an SMS and at that point it's up to their and your carrier to get to you.

      • Umm no iMessage doesn't use SMS....it doesn't use RCS either, it uses Apple's own protocol.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by SeaFox ( 739806 )

        who knew that the part of iOS 10 many people laughed at, iMessage stickers, would be a smash ht for Apple that had Google scrambling...

        If Stickers is such a "smash hit" why have I not heard of this feature before now? I know people with iPhones and they never mention it. While I'm not a mobile gamer, I certainly am aware of Pokemon Go, Super Mario Run, and the new Fire Emblem mobile games Nintendo is releasing.

        Is this feature a "smash hit" according to anyone not drunk on Apple Kool-Aid?

    • Like they'll ever give up the huge advantage that iMessage gives them. They've even intentionally crippled their messaging app to drive people onto Apple - you can't send a group text to more than 10 people unless all of them are iMessage users.

  • Goog (Score:3)

    by fluffernutter ( 1411889 ) on Friday February 24, 2017 @03:20PM (#53925167)
    If google ls pushing this, there must be more scanning happening here somewhere that they can profit from. I will stay with plain text and less invasion of privacy thanks.
    • This is why technology is a downer today. Things aren't done just because they are cool anymore. Consumers are led down a path that feels like they are getting some of what they want but it never happens without having strings attached any more.

    • there must be more scanning happening here somewhere that they can profit from

      Not everything is related to scanning. Some things are just about making their existing platform and data collection services more appealing to a wider audience.

  • Hangouts? Allo? Duo?

    Are they getting this same feature?

    It's getting confusing with Google now with them spawning, killing or changing a messaging client so often....

    • ...and does the new app have a Search feature? Hangouts may be the only Google app without a search feature (last I checked)...ridiculous.

    • It's getting confusing with Google now with them spawning, killing or changing a messaging client so often....

      Don't worry, they'll let the marketing team rename those apps a half-dozen times in the next year, like they did with Chromecast, so nobody will have any clue about what apps anybody is using and every bit of documentation will be useless.

      Then people can just settle on Signal or WhatsApp and be done with it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by geek ( 5680 )

      Hangouts? Allo? Duo?

      Are they getting this same feature?

      It's getting confusing with Google now with them spawning, killing or changing a messaging client so often....

      Don't worry they'll release a new one next year just to make things easier for everyone.

  • No end to end encryption? Thumbs down. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ctilsie242 ( 4841247 ) on Friday February 24, 2017 @03:25PM (#53925203)

    I like Google, but this is yet another half-assed "standard". AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon are not on board, there is no endpoint encryption, and it looks like it can be another vector for exploits because of "rich" content (i.e. ads.)

    Heck with this. Give me something like Signal or TextSecure as a messaging app which stores received stuff encrypted.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by H3lldr0p ( 40304 )

      Never going to happen.

      Too many people want to get to that information. For various reasons. Some commercial, some investigative, some malignant.

    • Google, your design of Android has been so phenomenally bad [slashdot.org] that you issued 115 patches for Stagefright/Mediaserver CVEs in 2015. Let's just review exactly how terrible the design of Android's media system really is:

      Don't start me on Stagefright and Mediaserver, I could rant for 2 or 3 hours non-stop! Seriously, the code over there is crap, and has insane concepts, like aborting the whole mediaserver (and all related media decoding of all other applications running at the same time), when it parses a file

  • We have come a long way from the age of flip phones and nine-key texting

    Really? I use a flip phone and nine-key texting. If I've got something more significant to communicate it can wait till I can sit down and compose it with a real keyboard and screen.

  • Unless a messaging systems comes with open federation standard and p2p encryption, it is dead in the water to me. We could have had that with XMPP but Google got their panties in a twist when some of the other federations were only doing one way federation.

    • Unless a messaging systems comes with open federation standard and p2p encryption, it is dead in the water to me. We could have had that with XMPP but Google got their panties in a twist when some of the other federations were only doing one way federation.

      Don't know what "open federation standard" is; but Apple's "Messages" App does use the Open Source "Jabber" protocol, is based on XMPP, supports Sever-Federation (is that the same thing?), and has p2p encryption.

      So is it dead in the water to you?

  • I wonder if this is in response to the updates to "Messages" in iOS 10...

  • From a couple news articles that i saw, certain Cell Providers are islands to themselves. e.g. RCS on T-Mobile doesn't necessarily work with RCS on Verizon and vice versa,.

    In other news, yet another yet another messaging protocol from google. I guess im the one who needs to add the XKCD: Standards Image [xkcd.com]

  • Because Android Messages is so different from Messenger.

    Some executive has way too much time on their hands.
  • Come on Google... It was cool when you get web search or the email and improve it in a way nobody was pushing. But you're talking about improve SMS when since more than 5 years ago we started to use Whatsapp (or Facebook messenger) or whatever. Remind me of the aliens on Simpsons saying they improved our table tennis sport in an electronic way and the result was a game like Pong.
  • Nobody could figure out how to pronounce AlloDuoWave+HangoutsTalkVoice?

  • the return of RCS! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Oh goody, git was too hard to learn. svn was cvs warmed over. Perkins sounds too snooty .... so back to the basics and we'll manage our texts with a traditional RCS version control system.

    That will show the Apple bigots just whose in control!

  • In France, where SMS and MMS are usually free, SMS is the standard for phone-to-phone text communication. SMS is reliable and works on all phones.
    MMS despite being more technically advanced is rarely used except to send the occasional picture. It is less reliable, and not all phones support it well. If that RCS thing is just an evolution of MMS, it will most likely suffer the same fate.
    In countries where SMS/MMS is not free, will RCS be different? If it isn't, people will just keep using WhatsApp.

  • I just had a look at Rich Communication Services [slashdot.org] at Wikipedia. Given the large feature coverage, it is just impossible that this will be implemented without security holes. The attack surface is too large.

  • Plz no (Score:2)

    by PPH ( 736903 )

    I don't want to get stuck in traffic behind someone messaging more than 140 characters at a time.

  • Yet another messenger app along with yet another renaming of service that no one asked for and will be confused at, backtracked as soon as Google realizes that a lot of companies don't want to help them with the new standard and are not willing to open their platforms to an alternative app that will outright kill their own efforts on their own messaging solutions.

    Apple and Apple users won't adopt it because they already have iMessage, people who already uses WhatsApp will keep at it, specially because it al

  • They can call it whatever they want but it's still a horrible messaging app. Did they do any UX testing? The thing is a nightmare. The only good thing about it is that it works; otherwise, it's complete crap.

  • Great, now I'll get even more boobs in my text messages! I'll finally find out that one weird trick to get the search box in Amazon to show the characters I type in real time instead of 3 seconds later. Messengers hate me, click here to find out 15 reasons why.

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