Apple partly halts Beeper’s iMessage app again, suggesting a long fight ahead
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/12/apple-partly-halts-beepers-imessage-app-again-suggesting-a-long-fight-ahead/
A friend of mine had been using Beeper's iMessage-for-Android app, Beeper Mini to keep up on group chats where she was the only Android user. It worked great until last Friday, when it didn't work at all.
What stung her wasn't the return to being the Android interloper in the chats again. It wasn't the resulting lower-quality images, loss of encryption, and strange "Emphasized your message" reaction texts. It was losing messages during the outage and never being entirely certain they had been sent or received. There was a gathering on Saturday, and she had to double-check with a couple people about the details after showing up inadvertently early at the wrong spot.