Post #328
Aakash Gupta @aakashgupta
Americans don't use WhatsApp because of a decision Apple made in 2013. We only know about it because the emails came out in court, and the whole thing came down to keeping your kids off Android. It started with Eddy Cue, the guy who runs Apple's services. That April he emailed the team saying Apple really needed to put iMessage on Android. Google was reportedly trying to buy WhatsApp for $1 billion at the time, and Cue's pitch was that Apple already had the best messaging app, so why not make it the one the whole world used. Craig Federighi, Apple's software chief, shut it down. He asked how Apple was supposed to get Android users to leave WhatsApp when they didn't even have iPhone friends. So back in 2013, the guy running iPhone software was basically admitting WhatsApp already owned everybody who didn't have an iPhone. Then he got to what he was actually worried about. iMessage on Android would remove "an obstacle to iPhone families giving their kids Android phones." Phil Schill…
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