this post was submitted on 15 May 2025
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Yea, RCS requires both the carrier and Google's systems to inter-operate. Meanwhile, Apple's iMessage only requires Apple to work with themselves.
Google could theoretically build a Google Messages counterpart to iMessage and skip the Carrier as the middleman, but then it wouldn't be interoperable with iPhones since it wouldn't be an "open standard"
Google did that, in 2013. Hangouts was briefly the default SMS client on Android, and it would upgrade conversations from SMS to its protocol when available. It was available for iPhone, but couldn't be an SMS client there.
Rumor has it, carriers whined about it, and Google caved out of fear they would promote Windows Phone devices instead. I think that was a foolish move on Google's part, but I think I'm glad Google doesn't own a dominant messaging platform.
It doesn't need a carrier to be an open standard.
The current standard requires carriers to make it work.
Maybe someone needs to make a new RCS without needing carriers to also do anything. Because if we are relying on carriers to implement something, its likely they'll not get implemented for decades.