Why iMessage Is Actually a Failure

The Green Bubble Kerfuffle misses the point.

- By Jason Snell

A bit more than 10 years after its introduction, iMessage is suddenly a part of the conversation again. A dubious report in the Wall Street Journal (fave.co/3urjnbk) implied that the secret to the iPhone's success with young people is all about peer pressure, with Android-using teens being cast out of social circles owing to their embarrassing status as non-iMessage green bubbles in group chats.

That article was silly for numerous reasons, as John Gruber explored in detail last week (fave.co/3okoWnZ). While blue bubble FOMO is certainly real, suggesting that it's the reason people want iPhones is an A-grade, uncut “people only buy Apple products because they're status symbols” kind of delusion.

When you look at the messaging landscape today, iMessage isn't a colossus that dominates the world. In fact, I'd say that iMessage's first decade is more of a failure than a success in terms of worldwide acceptance, user experience, and innovation.

THE WORLD HAS SPOKEN

Let's start with the obvious: The only people having this conversation about iMessage are Americans. In most of the world, iMessage is an afterthought.

Platform-agnostic chat apps like WeChat, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger dominate, though the particular apps in question vary from country to country.

I'm not sure there's anything Apple could have done about this. The theory goes that in most countries, people fled traditional text messaging faster than in the U.S., due to more onerous per-message fees-and Apple was just too late to the party. If it had wanted to compete, though, it would have had to create an iMessage app for Android, and it chose not to. People chose other apps.