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A comment on Tell HN: I asked Signal motivations for SMS removal. Parent comment

Re:Tell HN: I asked Signal motivations for SMS removal by edent on Wednesday October 19, 2022 @05:00AM (#33259412)
Agreed. I remember when - years ago - they unilaterally switched all Android devices to use the Apple emoji. No consultation, no investigation with users, no reason other than they wanted consistency across their apps.

Took a lot of grumpy users before they backtracked.

I use and like Signal. I'm not smart enough to disagree with some of their technical decisions, but I wish they could have found a way to make SMS/RCS work.

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Re:Tell HN: I asked Signal motivations for SMS removal by edent on Wednesday October 19, 2022 @05:27AM (#33259603)
Just to add some citations.

You can see various threads where people complained about the forced Apple emoji e.g. https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/issues/3712 and https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/issues/3675

Signal's own FAQ says

> Signal Android includes built-in emoji functionality for consistency between platforms

https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360017561992-Wh...

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Re:Tell HN: I asked Signal motivations for SMS removal by NavinF on Wednesday October 19, 2022 @05:24AM (#33259580)
I can see why some people would want a toggle, but defaulting to Apple emoji seems like the obviously correct thing to do. I suspect a major reason why HNers hate emoji in general is because they see different images from what gen-z sees and therefore have a hard time understanding jokes that rely on how these images look.
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Re:Tell HN: I asked Signal motivations for SMS removal by batiudrami on Wednesday October 19, 2022 @05:48AM (#33259749)
This used to be a problem but has been largely solved for the last 3-5 years. Emoji while slightly different looking are tonally consistent across devices.
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