alt Hacker News> They may not be able to register with Google, but they can make an RCS app nonetheless.
They can make a "standards compliant" RCS which will be able to connect to literally zero carriers or servers on the planet.
In fact Google Messages "RCS" doesn't even implement the RCS standard. They use a proprietary protobuf api exclusive to Google. Google messages can't connect to any "RCS" servers except Google's.
> Twilio has RCS too
Twilio, Bandwidth etc. are gatekept by Google and are basically just a middleman reselling Google's product.
Replies
> They can make a "standards compliant" RCS which will be able to connect to literally zero carriers or servers on the planet.
I call bullshit. If iPhones can connect to RCS, so can other phones.
Their app does use a weird protobuf spec of their own design, but that's for synchronising messages across devices/their web UI. RCS doesn't really do multi-device the same way iMessage does so they had to add another layer. That's not part of RCS.
> Bandwidth
Still find it endlessly amusing that they run Google Voice for Google and it still doesn’t support RCS.