As technology continues to evolve, there is still a major problem iPhone users face: the dreaded green bubble. But a new company called Nothing is hoping to take the “boring” out of technological advancements and bridge the messaging divide between iPhone and Android users.
In the past two decades, technology has drastically evolved. Once upon a time, the standard IBM computer was more than 50 feet high and consisted of more than 750,000 parts. Radios that once dominated the 1940s and 1950s evolved into big boxy TVs that defined the 1990s and early 2000s until the introduction of flat-screen plasmas.
With these technological advances, the phone industry has become one of the hallmarks of rapid progression in the digital age. From huge landlines to the addition of the portable keyboard on the BlackBerry to the first multi-touch display on the iPhone, it is safe to say that the world has literally become “gadget-gilded.”
One company believes the excitement and innovation once revolving around the tech industry is now lacking, and they are committed to changing the narrative.
“Every year there would be groundbreaking new innovations on the market, but sadly that’s not the case anymore,” Carl Pei said.
Pei is the CEO of a new electronics manufacturing group called Nothing. According to Nothing’s website, Nothing was founded in 2020 and is “a London-based tech company on a mission to remove barriers between people and technology.”
Nothing has been attracting high-ranking investors including Twitch co-founder and Metatheory CEO Kevin Lin, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman, CEO of Product Hunt Josh Buckley and YouTube travel vlogger Casey Neistat, according to its website.
Nothing has set itself apart in a technologically saturated environment by incorporating unique characteristics into its products. One such perk for Nothing users is the ability to use iMessage.
If a text message is sent between an iPhone and an Android user, the message will appear in a green bubble. If texts are sent between iPhones, the standard blue bubbles appear that have become synonymous with Apple devices. Android has previously called out Apple to fix the problem with the #GetTheMessage campaign saying “blurry videos, broken group chats, lack of encryption and more. Texting between iPhones and Android phones feels like using tech from another era, because it is — Apple refuses to adopt modern texting standards.”
Nothing’s new cellphone, the Nothing 2, will have an app available called the Nothing Chats app, which will allow their Android device to use iMessage with an Apple ID, bridging the divide between iMessage and Android messaging.
For BYU software developer Lecio Riberio, Nothing 2 could be a big game changer for chatting software.
“As someone from South America, I’m not the biggest fan of chatting software from the common operational system we have in market, but I hope Nothing 2 becomes a form of using an open-source OS without having problems with cross-device interactions,” Riberio said.
Despite the praise for a new start-up entering the competitive game that is the tech industry, there is some concern with the security of Nothing 2’s chat app according to YouTube tech reviewer Marques Brownlee.
“Signing in with your Apple ID onto a device that you don’t own is an enormous security issue and it’s a huge risk to anyone using it,” Brownlee said. According to Brownlee, Nothing 2 phone users are essentially logging in with an Apple ID on someone else’s computer.
Although some may be curious about Apple’s response to Nothing’s new chat development, Nikolai Calixto, a Nothing customer support representative, said there is no deal between Nothing and the Apple brand.
Apple is already facing several anti-trust lawsuits, including one for thwarting digital wallet customers with Apple Pay. As of now, Apple has not made an immediate response to Nothing 2, but Brownlee believes Apple may either stay quiet or point out Nothing 2’s security risks.
