Sure, but I don’t think personal preferences matter that much in this case, most people just end up using what everyone else is whether they like it or not, which makes perfect sense.
But yeah, I think in most of Europe (not all, they were free/almost free since the late 2000s where I am) this started because SMS messages very relatively very expensive back when smartphones were becoming widespread.
Now WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram, Viber and whatever else there is are quite entrenched so even if Apple and Google get serious about properly supporting RCS it might get tricky to get users to switch back to the default client
Popular non open-source 3rd party messaging apps don’t really have much interest in supporting interoperability due to obvious reasons.
> ..modern texting app that could message literally anyone with a phone number? Without having them download a specific app?
Well on this thread it seems that WhatsApp might be exactly that from the perspective of some people (to the extent that they don’t even believe that anyone in Europe could be using anything else)
All this is fair and your accounting of the reasons for the situation around Europe match my research so far.
I do want to say I've seen some others in this HN story contradict that Europe is as homogenous as your representing here though.
Still though, I looked at Germany's Whatsapp numbers and it's like 68% of the population, ignoring the fact that 1 account is not necessarily 1 person.
That's super dominant compared to the US which is somewhere around 22% with the same account assumption.
True. But it’s hard to say to what extent. Many/most people probably have multiple apps installed and use them somewhat regularly in addition to texting/iMessages.
Sure, but I don’t think personal preferences matter that much in this case, most people just end up using what everyone else is whether they like it or not, which makes perfect sense.
But yeah, I think in most of Europe (not all, they were free/almost free since the late 2000s where I am) this started because SMS messages very relatively very expensive back when smartphones were becoming widespread.
Now WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram, Viber and whatever else there is are quite entrenched so even if Apple and Google get serious about properly supporting RCS it might get tricky to get users to switch back to the default client
Popular non open-source 3rd party messaging apps don’t really have much interest in supporting interoperability due to obvious reasons.
> ..modern texting app that could message literally anyone with a phone number? Without having them download a specific app?
Well on this thread it seems that WhatsApp might be exactly that from the perspective of some people (to the extent that they don’t even believe that anyone in Europe could be using anything else)