I agree that opening up an RCS API would be great but I don’t think that’s what the original comment was getting at

And even if there was an API that 3rd party apps could hook into, I don’t think that would skew the numbers in any meaningful way.

With something as important as messaging, average consumers (at least in the US) are just going to stick with whichever chat app comes on their phone. They aren’t going to reach out and search for anything else. That’s how we got to this point in the first place and why iMessage is so ubiquitous

IMO it’s good that they’re forcing it through messages.

It appears they are sticking with it and it’s working

I’ve luckily been able to convince all my family members to use Google Photos

Makes picture sharing way better