Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Google's RCS Messages and iMessage

People are making this Google RCS Messages thing out to be the greatest thing since sliced bread and I just don't get it. Texting is for sending short text messages to other people, perhaps a pic or a link. If you are doing more than that then you should probably use something else like email and placing large files on servers and linking to them. Sending a 500 Meg video via "chat" is just plain dumb.

I'm a Hangouts user. Why? Because with Hangouts I can:

  • Send short text messages from my phone, from my Linux desktop, from my work Windows machine, my Linux laptop, etc. Typing texts on a phone is vastly inferior to having a keyboard but it's there if I need it.
  • Make VOIP calls, again, from all of those devices
  • Make video calls from all those devices too including holding small conference meetings
  • Connects to my Google contacts
  • Ability to create and text groups
  • Has a convenient little extension to Chrome that I can use to handle this texting and calling without having to take up a full browser window
Yes, I know that Hangouts is dying but it has a lot of functionality that I like. I fear switching to Google's Messages app which:
  • Runs only on my phone
  • Does not run on my Linux desktop nor laptop nor work Windows machines (They say there's Messages for the Web which is clunky to start with, plus doesn't work as they tell you to scan a QR Code by running Messages on your phone, tapping the 3-dot menu and selecting Messages for the Web however Message for the Web no longer appears on that menu so this is broken!)
  • I just found out that Messages uses my cell phone's number, a number I haven't used in 13 years as I use a Google Voice number instead!
But what additional functionality that everybody seems to think is so great will I be getting if I switch to using Google's Messages with RCS?
  • An indicator when somebody on the other end is typing - whoop T do!
  • A green bubble to iPeople - like I give a shit what color the bubble is!
  • Full-resolution photos - gee the photos I've texted so far through Hangouts look just fine
  • Delivered and read receipts - again whoop T do!
  • Works over mobile data or Wi-Fi so you can put your phone in airplane mode and it'll still work - First off, what's airplane mode? I've never used it! Also, Hangouts does this too
  • Ability to send somebody money from your phone - wait a minute... let me check... Nope I've never done that and I won't be doing it anytime soon
  • Stickers! Don't you want to send stickers and emojis? Generally no but Hangouts do that as well.
I mean some of those features would be kinda cool but they are hardly essential and mostly fluff anyway. I really don't understand the hype!