iMessage will reportedly dodge EU regulations, won't have to open up
Roid users’ hopes that Apple’s iMessage would be forced to open up in the European Union have been dashed. Google recently rolled out a campaign to implore the EU to qualify iMessage for regulation, as Android’s iMessage incompatibility is a big deal in the US. iMessage hasn’t made the list and that’s despite meeting the popularity metrics of 45 million monthly active EU users. Qualifying for the law would have forced iMessage to allow interoperability with other services, so theoretically, you’d be allowed to log in to iMessage from WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and whatever else.
Source: iMessage will reportedly dodge EU regulations, won’t have to open up
At least there’s RCS? And I suspect Apple is adding RCS support specifically to avoid litigation.