iMessage Quickies: EU, Beeper Mini, and FCC

O iMessagethe exclusive instant messaging app on devices from Apple, has been the center of attention in recent days, both in the United States and in the European Union. At home, the apple must face an investigation by the FCC (Federal Communications Commission, a body equivalent to Anatel), while in the Old World, the messenger will not be obliged to talk to any competitors.
iMessage has been the center of attention in recent days (Credit: cottonbro/Pexels) Let's take a look at the latest developments involving iMessage:

EU: iMessage without interoperability

The Digital Services Law (DMA) established a category for companies, called gatekeeper, for those that exceed the value of 75 € billion (~R$ 397.62 billion, price of 14/02/ 2024) in market capitalization, or achieve an annual gross revenue exceeding 7.6 € billion (~R$ 40.3 billion), and that provide at least one category of service internet, which can be connection, search, streaming, storage, etc. Apple, Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft and ByteDance/TikTok, the 6 companies included, must follow the following rules if they want to operate in the 27 EU member countries: Prioritize products and services using their own hardware and solutions is prohibited; Pre-installed apps must offer the user the option to remove them, without exceptions; Instant messengers must all talk to each other, and are prohibited from limiting resources to specific platforms and hardware; External companies must have access to all data generated in the services provided by gatekeepers; Data from European users cannot be used for targeted display of advertisements, unless they expressly authorize it. Let's focus on the second clause, which discusses instant messengers. Under the DMA, only Meta apps, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger are obliged to talk to each other in Europe, which does not represent any problem for Mark Zuckerberg's company. However, Google defended the inclusion of iMessage in the list, even though it was below the threshold defined by the EU, of 45 million individual users per month, and 10 thousand corporate users per year. Reason: Google has been advocating for years the adoption of RCS, a messaging technology created to succeed SMS, as the standard protocol for instant communication, but Cupertino, although it has considered In the past, she did not adopt it because she would not be the one to dictate how it would be implemented. Therefore, communication between iMessage and standard Android Messages is deprecated on purpose. Apple has always been against submitting to the RCS, for three reasons: not wanting to blend in with the riffraff, at the expense of weakening its Walled Garden (as absurd as it may seem, iMessage justifies the purchase of an iPhone for many people, and Apple defends this seriously), does not wish to compromise the encryption of messages, and it is not in control of the protocol, led by Google, which has its own version, the preferred by telephone operators. Apple intends to implement the protocol, but not within its flagship app.
Google hates Apple's treatment of RCS in iMessage (Credit: Disclosure/Apple) In communication between Apple devices, messages are displayed in blue balloons and support all modern protocols of the app. If the message comes via RCS, the iPhone displays it in green balloons and Machiavellianly converts it into an SMS, resulting in truncated texts, media files detonated to fit the MMS format, and charges to the receiver. In the US, where iMessage dominates the sending of instant messages (WhatsApp who?), green balloons are a laughing stock among iPhone users (and it has become a song, more than once), and many they block RCS/SMS messages on their devices mercilessly. In the EU, Google joined local operators Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, Telefónica and Orange, to try to convince the European Union, which is in favor of RCS as a communications standard, that Apple should be a force Ready to implement interoperability in iMessage, even with it below the required threshold. Unfortunately for everyone involved, the Commission has concluded its investigations and decided that Apple cannot be forced into anything, because, again, iMessage has not exceeded the user limit, therefore, it does not qualify as a gatekeeper service; others investigated such as the Edge browser, its aggregated advertising service, and the Bing search engine, all from Microsoft, were also released, as they were considered non-dominant in their respective sectors, led by Google, in which the Chrome, Search and Google Ads were all framed. To the search giant, you can continue cursing a lot on Talk G+ Allo Voice Buzz Hangouts Wave Duo Meet Chat RCS, but your complaints will continue to reach iMessage in green balloons.

Apple vs. Apple Beeper Mini: FCC may investigate

If in Europe Apple can enjoy a small victory, at home the story is different. In December 2023, a startup called Beeper by Migicovsky, founder of Pebble (that smartwatch company with an e-ink screen, bought by Fitbit in 2016), revealed that it had reverse engineered iMessage, which allowed it to develop an application for Android , called Beeper Mini, which chatted with the instant messenger and with all media features enabled, through a US$2/month subscription plan. Apple, of course, didn't like it one bit, and blocked communication between the apps, which Beeper promptly bypassed and released. A game of mouse and mouse then began, with Cupertino going so far as to block users' Macs, who for a while were unable to use iMessage on their desktops. In the end, Beeper threw in the towel and accepted the block, saying that the effort wasn't worth it. What no one expected, however, was the FCC getting involved in the beef in favor of the Beeper Mini.
FCC did not like blocking the Beeper Mini, as it was more accessible to PCDs than iMessage (Credit: Reproduction/Beeper) In a post no of the apple. Carr explains in the message, somewhat curiously, that his argument is based on accessibility features and quality of communication between different applications, which, based on the FCC's code of regulations, Apple does not o had the right to block the Beeper Mini. Even though iMessage has a series of adjustments for people with disabilities (PCDs), this only concerns those with iPhones, iPads and Macs, and excludes, according to the commissioner, those on Android. These are relegated to the truncated, limited, and low-quality communications of SMS and MMS, rather than RCS, which supports the advanced media features of iMessage, but again, Apple has no intention of to implement it in your main app. This is not the first time that Apple's treatment of Beeper has drawn the attention of the United States government. In December, a bipartisan panel called for an investigation by the Department of Justice (DoJ) for “anti-competitive practices”; before that, Senator Elizabeth Warren (DEM/Massachusetts), who hates big tech, also expressed against blocking the Beeper Mini, as well as also senators Amy Klobuchar (DEM/Minnesota) and Mike Lee (GOP/Utah), and representatives Jerry Nadler (DEM/New York) and Ken Buck (GOP/Colorado). In fact, operators would love for iMessage to be forced to recognize RCS, there is most likely lobbying involved in the pressure exerted by the political class, but the fact is that when Steve Jobs launched the iPhone, he did picking fights with everyone, in order to not let anyone touch the distribution of smartphone apps, which, in return, allowed it to establish a messenger that only works at its best on its own products . Unless Apple is legally forced to implement RCS (Google's, preferably) in iMessage, those on Android will be forced to continue making do with SMS; Anyone who wants a better experience should buy an iPhone. Source: Bloomberg, TechCrunch