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submitted 11 months ago by fne8w2ah@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[-] WhiteHotaru@feddit.de 97 points 11 months ago

Why are US users so focused on iMessage? I have seen rejected date memes because the message bubble had the wrong color. There are tons of alternatives out there. Is this a status thing?

[-] Dudewitbow@lemmy.zip 25 points 11 months ago

vast majority of people use the default app their phone choice comes with.

historically eise, the reason EU uses whatsapp was that there was a time period early on where sms costed money, so people used whatsapp to circumvent that. the U.S didnt have that problem as sms was free for the majority of people in that time period.

[-] echo64@lemmy.world 23 points 11 months ago

This seems a bit revisionist. Everyone had an amount of smses per month that were free in their contract.

People switched to whatsapp because it was better than sms.

[-] Natanael@slrpnk.net 7 points 11 months ago

Not everybody, and not infinitely far back. There was definitely a period where there were no free texts included (although I do think that by the iPhone introduction many did have it, but still not all!)

[-] echo64@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago

its good to be clear that we are talking about a time period when people migrated to whatapp, and the reasoning for migrating to whatsapp. and how the 'text for free' thing wasn't a big motivator, (nor was it a new idea)

[-] lemmyvore@feddit.nl 6 points 11 months ago

And also because Whatsapp was available on every platform, from the dominant ones at the time (Nokia and Blackberry) to the newcomers (iOS, Android, even Windows Phone and more obscure ones like Samsung's whatever it was called).

[-] pewgar_seemsimandroid@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Samsung had bada os then worked with intel and the tizen foundation on tizen

[-] LWD@lemm.ee 6 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)
[-] Stupidmanager@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago

wasn’t it the long distance thing? charged for sending SMS outside of your network or something. I recall whatsapp was the way to text your parents from one country in to another, even in the EU.

I know for a fact my fam adopted almost a decade ago, so we can text from USA to EU to SA to Canada. Family all over and it’s free.

[-] WhiteHotaru@feddit.de 7 points 11 months ago

39 cents/SMS. I remember this time. This does not explain why it has to be that specific protocol, though.

[-] Dudewitbow@lemmy.zip 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

because people were already uaing sms when it was paid beforehand before smartphones were a thing. people just used to whatever the default was, especially since its not like everyone switched to a smart phone immediately after the iphone 3gs' relase. sms was the default method to talk to people who were still using "dumbphones"

[-] gregorum@lemm.ee 4 points 11 months ago

Also, at the time, WhatsApp was pretty much the only option. Nowadays, there are a lot of other options.

[-] Zak@lemmy.world 2 points 11 months ago

A part of it was that they put in the effort to support featurephones. People with smartphones always had other options.

[-] lemmyvore@feddit.nl 2 points 11 months ago

It was the other way around, the feature phones were funny at the time so not supporting them would have made no sense. And iPhones and Androids had just been launched at the time so there weren't actually lots of options for them.

[-] Zak@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago

WhatsApp was available for Blackberry, Symbian, and Nokia Series 40, and I've seen device support cited as an important part of its early success. It actually looks like Skype, AIM, and ICQ had pretty good support for various devices in the early 2010s too so I'm not sure that claim holds up.

[-] Plasma@lemmy.ml 9 points 11 months ago

Yes it's a status thing and I'm aware of people who have been rejected on dates for having an Android.

[-] purplemonkeymad@programming.dev 18 points 11 months ago

Sounds like they are better off that way. Anyone who thinks that is important is probably not worth it.

[-] GilgameshCatBeard@lemmy.ca 5 points 11 months ago

I’ll bet that most of them never happened. But they do make great memes!

[-] cbarrick@lemmy.world 7 points 11 months ago

The average American is not tech savvy.

(Which is surprising, given that the US has arguably the strongest software development industry in the world.)

Most Americans just use the default apps installed on their phones. Facebook Messenger is really the only non-default messaging app with mass market penetration, and that's because most Americans already have Facebook accounts.

Americans just don't want to sign up for new accounts or learn new apps. Therefore, iMessage won by default.

this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2024
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