2017 will mark the 35th year of the short message service (SMS), otherwise known as the “text.” Though much has changed in the world of technology, the SMS remains the same as it was in 1982—around 16 years before the iMac debuted in its colored plastic and 25 years before the first iPhone.
Today more than 68% of Americans have smartphones according to Pew, yet no fresh open standard for texting has been adopted for this modern age even though we text more than we talk on the phone.
Instead came a deluge of apps, each of them with their own strengths and flaws, creating an irritating mess of communication. So far, even the strongest leaders of the post-SMS world have fallen short of becoming anything close to a new universal standard.
Take Apple’s iMessage (AAPL) for the iPhone, iPad, and Mac computers, for instance, whose blue messages has become almost standard thanks to its market penetration as the most popular smartphone in the US. On the face, iMessage pretty much checks all the boxes. It can be used with multiple devices—desktop too—allowing people to use a real keyboard instead of the phone’s, if it’s on hand. It has end-to-end encryption, essentially guaranteeing privacy as long as messages are blue. And it has no message length limits, unlike the SMS.
But as great as iMessage is to its users, the most valuable company in the world has prevented its app from becoming a global standard—it excludes the 87.6% of the world that uses Android. Apple reportedly has flirted with the idea of bringing its messaging system cross platform to Android, internally sharing mockups of the app, but nothing has come to light yet.
If inclusivity is the measure, WhatsApp sets the standard, available across operating systems. With well over 1 billion active user accounts, it’s the second-most popular virtual community behind its owner, Facebook (FB). And it checks boxes: It uses an open-source end-to-end encryption protocol that’s easy to verify, it is available for multiple devices (including desktop) and has all the modern features you expect like photos, videos, and groups. But it’s just not popular in the US.
Similarly, some people just use Facebook’s messaging platform, Messenger, to communicate, or they stay on Gchat or Hangouts via phone after their browser windows close. Others people—many Android users—simply communicate through the age-old SMS protocol, using the built-in app. In the US, unlike in some other places, unlimited texting with the operating system’s default app is the norm, which has hindered the third-party chat app revolution that countries like China have seen with WeChat. (Of course, people in the US would never use WeChat due to privacy and censorship concerns.)