Apple unlikely to bring RCS support to iPhones, suggests CEO Tim Cook

Apple CEO Tim Cook said that the company is not considering adopting RCS messaging on its iPhones. This could mean that there is no end in sight to the “green bubbles” that surround text messages from an Android user when you use an iPhone. Cook made the comments at the annual Code 2022 conference.
As reported The Verge, Cook said “I don’t hear our users asking that we put a lot of energy in on that (RCS messaging) at this point. I would love to convert you to an iPhone,” when asked about using the RCS standard in iMessage during Vox Media’s Code 2022 event.
The lack of support for RCS standard on Apple’s iMessage has received criticism from Android users. More recently, the issue escalated further with Google’s very own campaign to publicly pressurise Apple into adopting the standard.

Raise your hand if you’ve ever had a green bubble vs. blue bubble debate in the group chat.
Texting with friends shouldn’t be complicated. That’s why it’s time for Apple to #GetTheMessage. Learn more ↓ https://t.co/guGdlHT2k8
— Google (@Google) August 9, 2022
Vox Media’s LiQuan Hunt, retorted with a valid complaint and told Cook that his mother can’t see the video he sends to her. This happens because iMessage and RCS are not interoperable, leading to a loss in quality of images and other media sent between the two platforms. However, the complaint was met with a “Buy your mom an iPhone” response from Cook.

Apart from the problem with videos and the green bubble that dinguishes Android users from iOS users, the lack of RCS support on iMessages means that conversations between Android and iOS users lack read receipts, typing indicators and the ability to text over WiFi, among other issues.
According to a court filing from the Epic Games trial in 2021, an Apple employee commented in 2016 that, “ the number one most difficult [reason] to leave the Apple universe app is iMessage. iMessage amounts to serious lock-in [to the Apple ecosystem].”
According to the same court filings, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering Craig Federighi said, “iMessage on Android would simply serve to remove [an] obstacle to iPhone families giving their kids Android phones.” This could explain why Apple is hesitant to make iMessage compatible with RCS.
Meanwhile, this is not a bone of contention in India as a large number of internet users use Meta’s WhatsApp to communicate with each other. The instant messaging service has over 400 million active users in the country.