What is RCS and how will it improve messaging on Android
RCS is rich communication services and is really a replacement of existing SMS and MMS (is there any MMS these days?) system. RCS is not really new and came into existence in 2007 and industry trade body GSMA took over in 2008. In the later years, it continued to exist but only in 2019, Google came into the picture. Think of a platform that does a lot like WhatsApp – live chat, send photos, videos, documents – and put it in a messaging app on an Android phone and you get RCS.
Why does Google want Apple on board for RCS?
Google Senior Vice President Hiroshi Lockheimer explained in a series of tweets that came after quite openly accusing Apple of ‘bullying’. Lockheimer said Google isn’t asking Apple to make iMessage available on Android. “We are asking Apple to support the industry standard for Modern Messaging (RCS) in iMessage just as they support the older SMS/MMS standards,” he said in a tweet. Google’s argument is pretty solid. As Lockheimer explained, “SMS has evolved, and it gets better. You can see read receipts, typing indicators, better groups, secure 1:1 messages (groups coming soon) etc.” That new standard is called RCS, and it’s available now. He further added that supporting RCS will improve the experience for both iOS and Android users alike. He tweeted, “By not including RCS , Apple is stalling the industry and sabotaging the user experience for not only Android users but its own customers.”
Google’s Bad History With Messaging Apps
Google’s portfolio has had a number of failed experiments over the past decade or so when it comes to messaging. Apple introduced iMessage in 2011 and it has improved a lot since then. Google, on the other hand, was slow to respond to iMessage with Android messaging. WhatsApp came and the Android user base swung and Google was: a) slow to respond; and b) wasn’t really a stand out messaging app. Google has been in the messaging game far longer than any other company. Go back to 2005 when GTalk was introduced and we’re looking at 16 years of building, improving, killing and instead being confused about what this message (pun intended) wants to send to users.
Google Hangouts has probably been Google’s most successful messaging service. And yet it has been modified a lot. So much so that it was ‘killed’ last year to be replaced by Google Chat. Then there was Google Allo – a direct WhatsApp rival – which was launched in 2016. Being a Google app, there was an initial buzz, but it was a bit everywhere, which meant it wasn’t even for a couple. year and was discontinued in 2019. Google has tried to put messaging in many of its apps. There were YouTube messages, Maps messages, Stadia messages – yet none of them really took off. If SMS has been on death row for so many years, it is a big reason why Google is not getting the right messaging for so many years.
Will RCS work for Google and will Apple join in?
On paper RCS seems to be quite a practical and solid thing. But it has a checkered history of getting Google wrong when it comes to messaging apps. A major problem for RCS would be that it was launched in 2008 and some systems cannot be replaced. For example, there is no end-to-end encryption in RCS, a feature that makes a lot of sense to those who value privacy. Google can be confident that with Apple on board, RCS can be rolled out globally and on a large scale. But the chances of Apple coming on board are slim. Apple has made it clear on several occasions how much it doesn’t want people to leave its ecosystem. iMessage is an integral part of that ecosystem. If Apple accepts RCS the ‘exclusivity’ will be gone and messaging with Android users will be easier. The reason for this could be that a lot of iPhone users may be switching to Android and this is a chance that Apple is unlikely to take.
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