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A comment on Show HN: Beeper Mini – iMessage Client for Android.

Re:Show HN: Beeper Mini – iMessage Client for Android by SpencerOMG on Tuesday December 05, 2023 @04:05PM (#38536882)
I remember Nothing tech did something similar-ish not too long ago, but I can't find their announcement of it. But then I stumbled upon a video talking about privacy concerns[0]. What's the difference between what they did and what Beeper is doing? Sounds cool though, impressive work! (also, "hacker"-news needs to be more embracing of their name lol)

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMdj8RyMb64

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Re:Show HN: Beeper Mini – iMessage Client for Android by drewtato on Tuesday December 05, 2023 @04:55PM (#38537478)
Nothing's thing was a branded version of Sunbird https://www.sunbirdapp.com/ which is technically similar to the iMessage part of Beeper Cloud. It is essentially a way for you to login with your Apple ID on a Mac Mini in a server farm, and then interact with its desktop iMessage client from an Android app.

This was done because Apple obfuscates how its notification system works, so the cheapest short-term solution is to just use real Apple hardware.

When Nothing released it, it was found to have many flaws, which is where that video comes in. Nothing unreleased it and hasn't followed up since.

Beeper Mini uses the long-term solution of reverse engineering Apple's notification system so that it can run independently of an Apple device.

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Re:Show HN: Beeper Mini – iMessage Client for Android by dvngnt_ on Tuesday December 05, 2023 @04:34PM (#38537234)
this one doesn't have reports of using insecure http during account linking and I think you have the option to self-host
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Re:Show HN: Beeper Mini – iMessage Client for Android by nani8ot on Tuesday December 05, 2023 @06:38PM (#38538486)
Nothing/Sunbird lied about how their bridge worked, while Beeper has an open source matrix <-> imessage bridge implementation with docs.

Technically they are similar with both using macs in a server farm for their hosted offers.

[0] https://github.com/mautrix/imessage

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