Sorry, you're right. I stand corrected, Samsung discontinued their own RCS-Service in January 2025. Yet the point stands, Google doesn't restrict usage of alternative RCS-services on its devices, Apple does.

> again, Google forcing its services into operator hands

Frankly no. Carriers tried to make RCS work and failed for many years. I was involved in so many meetings, individual projects, interoperability testfests, just to make all the crazy "flavors" of RCS required from different operators work with each other. Each of the large carriers thought he could do RCS better than the next one, destroying simplicity, reliability, interoperability.

Many of them rolled out their own RCS-service initially, with flaky UX and ridiculous limitations making it weaker than WhatsApp at that time.

Google didn't start this mess, and didn't force itself into this matter. But yes, they ended it by acquiring Jibe and unifying the platform.

[dead]