Cross-platform messaging startup Beeper, founded by YC and Pebble alum Eric Migicovsky, has been delivering an iMessage experience for Android that doesn’t use middlemen, and that’s the way it should be (always a big caveat here, since we’re relying on the company’s word) private and secure. It has the potential to illuminate just how much lock-in value iMessage has for Apple and the iPhone, allowing users to switch to Android without losing the blue bubbles that us North Americans seem to love so well.
I will say that for me at least, a decision that I have been struggling with for the past few weeks has been made incredibly easy: Specifically, I am switching from the iPhone 15 Pro to the OnePlus Open as my main everyday smartphone. The OnePlus Open had already won me over for its foldable charm, along with what I can only describe as a unique character and personality that I’ve come to appreciate from the photos taken by its Hasselblad-powered camera system. Android in general is also gaining traction in part because unlike Apple, Google seems willing to really tinker with and incorporate AI features where they’re useful.
Being a quintessential North American, the only thing stopping me from switching is iMessage. Not that I personally feel attached to the platform over any alternatives, including Signal and WhatsApp. But the people who matter to me in my life do, and I honestly wouldn’t welcome green vibes to a number of my existing group chats, or for sharing proper full-resolution media with the people I really want to be with. stay connected more. .
It’s not worth debating why Americans and Canadians seem to have been content to let this happen instead of switching to another cross-platform messaging service with all or more of the same features and none of the platform lock-in – the fact is, it happened and it’s not going away anytime soon.
You play the hand you’re dealt, and so far Apple has won almost every time when it comes to its messaging platform and interoperability. There are ongoing regulatory challenges that could see this change, but what Beeper has done manages to sidestep the stickiest legal points (although it relies on an already-proven protection of reverse engineering for the sake of interoperability as its main argument for the why Apple won ‘t just kill it) to offer functional service today.
So far, it’s working well enough that I feel confident that I won’t lose the few remaining connections I have that live exclusively in iMessage, and that’s enough to allow me to finally switch to the phone I actually enjoy using today: the OnePlus Open, which of course it still has its flaws, but it does a great job of showing exactly where Apple’s bastion of lock-keeping features like iMessage is on paper due to a sluggishness to innovate and an unwillingness to experiment.
The most likely outcome here is obviously that Apple finds some way to kill it, either legally or technically, but Beeper is in a good position given how closely it’s being watched by regulators for behavior just like this right now. Here’s hoping they’re allowed to continue so we can see just how much iMessage is a finger on the scale of the North American smartphone market.
