Apple CEO Tim Cook rejected the idea of using RCS messaging to end the green bubbles surrounding messaging when iPhone users are texting someone on an Android device.
“I don’t hear our users asking that we put a lot of effort into that right now,” Cook said when asked how Apple founder Steve Jobs would feel about using the RCS standard in iMessage at Vox Media’s Code 2022 event on Wednesday night. Instead, Cook said, “I’d like to convert you to an iPhone.”
Video of the panel is now available on YouTube, and you can watch it by click here or where it is embedded above and sent to the query at the 1 hour 15 seconds point.
But the person who asked the question, LiQuan Hunt of Vox Media, came back with a valid complaint, saying his mother can’t see the videos he sends her. It all comes down to a lack of interoperability between iMessage and RCS, both messaging systems that would allow for higher quality images and videos — if they worked together. If you’ve tried to send a video from Android to iOS (or vice versa) using your regular texting app, then you know that your videos will get all blurry on the other side. Cook’s suggestion to fix this annoying problem? “Buy your mom an iPhone.”
While it may seem silly, the bubble color in iMessage that differentiates Android users (green) from other iPhone users (blue) has become a point of contention. Google’s campaign to publicly shame Apple into adopting the standard has clearly had no effect on Cook, who is publicly targeting opinions of people who own an iPhone. Of course there are other reasons not to add RCS. Emails unearthed during the Epic trial showed that Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, said, “iMessage on Android would just serve to [an] obstacle for iPhone families giving their children Android phones.”
Update September 16, 15:50PMET: added video of the event from YouTube.
