Google announced a number of updates to the Messages app on Thursday, including a direct reply feature to reply to individual messages and the ability to highlight or set a reminder on a text. Some of the best new features require users to have RCS enabled, and that seems to be exactly the point: Google is working harder and harder to get carriers and developers to make RCS the standard, even if that means some complicated compatibility issues in the meantime.
RCS is a long-standing standard that aims to replace SMS as a basic mobile messaging infrastructure. Since it works over the Internet and not mobile network bandwidth, it can support a large number of additional features: encryption, multimedia, more interactive features, and much more. Sanaz Ahari, who manages Android and business communications for Google, said Google’s ultimate goal is to move SMS to full RCS as soon as possible. “From a Google perspective, we believe every Android user should have Wi-Fi messaging,” she said.
Ahari stopped short of saying that Apple is the main reason why RCS isn’t ubiquitous yet. And then she kind of said that: “The truth is there’s also a lot of conversation happening across Android and Apple.” She said the SMS had its time and served its purpose well. But now it is time for SMS to disappear in favor of replacing it. “But it takes the entire ecosystem to move forward.”
Some of the new Messages features aren’t specific to RCS but instead Google is just doing a better job of integrating other tools into the Messages app. Android users will now be able to watch YouTube videos in Messages without having to leave the app, for example, and the app will also automatically suggest adding a reminder or calendar event if it detects timely information in a message. If you’re using a recent Pixel device, Samsung Galaxy S22, Fold 4, or Flip 4, you’ll also be able to get automatic voice messages transcribed. Google is also updating icons for its Messages, Phone, and Contacts apps to better suit the rest of the apps ecosystem.
Google also continues to experiment with commercial messaging and is adding a new inbox to Messages that collects all of your official text communications. “It’s very comforting that a lot of these business conversations are being started from Search and Maps,” Google Messages Product Manager Jan Jedrzejowicz said briefly before the announcement. “So users kind of naturally go to Messages to complete that conversation and get that interaction.”
However, the best new features in messaging require RCS. In addition to the reply feature — you can swipe a message to reply to it directly, and it appears in chat similar to what you see in WhatsApp or iMessage — RCS-enabled users can also text on Wi-Fi during flight on United Airlines thanks to the partnership between the two companies.
For many years, Google has tried very hard to play nice with Messages. Caught between its own desires and the needs of carriers and Android partners, Google has never controlled its messaging experience, and thus has fallen behind more closed systems like iMessage and WhatsApp, which can launch features quickly. Now, Google is getting bolder in pushing the issue.
For many years, Google has tried hard to play nicely with Messages
Google has touted that 500 million people now have access to RCS, but the ecosystem is far from complete. RCS is only useful when everyone else is using it, which means it needs to get all carriers — and Apple — on board with the standard.
This is why Google is picking fights with Apple and trying to get the company to adopt the standard, even when Apple CEO Tim Cook said users simply aren’t asking for RCS. Google is now going to change that: the Messages app now allows Android users to reply to SMS messages with emojis, which will send that horrible “So and so heart reaction to emojis” sounds great see you there! “Every time… (If all participants in the conversation are using RCS, the emoji will appear on the message as it should.) “And whether iMessage does something to analyze that or make it look different,” Jedrzejowicz said, “is up to them.”
Ultimately, Apple’s version of this feature forced Google to hack these tapback interactions in Messages; Google is clearly hoping to annoy iPhone users enough to convince Apple to buy into RCS. “We would very much prefer that everyone adopt a remote control system,” Jedrzejowicz said, “which has the potential to support appropriate feedback, but in case that is not possible or has not yet happened, it seems like the next best thing.”
At the same time, Jedrzejowicz preached patience for RCS. When asked about Signal dropping SMS support on Android because it doesn’t support encryption, he said that opening RCS to everyone is “a matter of timing and maturity.” And encryption across devices is a particular challenge, he said. RCS is on the right track, but “we don’t think we’re yet at a stage where the RCS ecosystem is stable and mature enough with all the foundations in place to have this ready.” He also declined to specify when or whether Google Voice would have RCS support, except to acknowledge that Google Voice exists and possibly should have RCS support.
“At the end of the day, connectivity is a primary use case for why we have phones,” Ahari said. Google feels committed to supporting old ways of communicating, but it also has an increasingly clear vision of what’s next, and is increasingly willing to pick battles to make it happen. Even though it’s feuding with Apple in the court of public opinion, just starting to build the RCS ecosystem, the compatibility issues are damned. Apple can keep up or face the consequences.
Originally published at San Jose News Bulletin
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