Editing 2365: Messaging Systems

Though relatively ancient by modern standards, {{w|SMS}} is supported by almost every mobile device (unless you're using a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phone#Kosher_phone] or still on a {{w|DynaTAC}}) that has a phone number attached, which means if you want to send a message to someone, but aren't sure if you have a messaging protocol in common, you can be sure at least they have SMS.

The title text proposes an alternative, absurd mingling of technologies in the vein of [[1636: XKCD Stack]]. IRC is Internet Relay Chat, a similarly antiquated messaging service that may also never die, as suggested in [[1782: Team Chat]]. {{w|Transport Layer Security}} (TLS) is a layer of networking software that provides encrypted communication. {{w|DOSBox}} is an emulator that recreates the operating environment of {{w|MS-DOS}}; part of the absurdity is that DOSBox is intended almost solely for video games.

{{w|End-to-end encryption}} is another messaging system where only the communicating users can read the messages posted. In principle, it prevents potential eavesdroppers – including {{w|telecom provider}}s, {{w|internet provider}}s, and even the provider of the communication service – from being able to access the {{w|cryptographic key}}s needed to decrypt the conversation.

*{{w|Pretty Good Privacy|PGP}} (short for "Pretty Good Privacy") is an encryption protocol for privacy and authentication developed in 1991. PGP can be used for signing, encrypting, and decrypting data. It is used to ensure the validity of the nature of the sender of the message (i.e., to make sure you got the email from the sender and not from someone else pretending to be someone else with malicious intent). PGP was also featured in [[1181: PGP]].

*{{w|XMPP}} (short for Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol), formerly named Jabber, is a communications protocol based on XML that was developed in 1999. The XMPP protocol could be used with {{w|Transport Layer Security}} (TLS) to have a secure communications service.

The first IM service based on XMPP was {{w|Jabber.org}}.

There are several (XEPs) (short for XMPP Extension Protocols).

*{{w|SMS}} (short for Short Message Service) is a text-messaging service formally defined in the {{w|GSM}} standard in 1985 and first used in 1992. It limits messages to 160 characters, text-only. SMS has been extended at least twice, first by {{w|Multimedia Messaging Service|MMS}} (first used in 2002), which allows for "multimedia", including short videos, images and audio. MMS is also supported by most modern phones, but does not have any security features and is less powerful than other messaging apps, making it less modern. {{w|Rich Communication Services|Rich Communication Services}} (abbreviated as RCS) is a more modern protocol, aimed at replacing SMS & MMS protocols. RCS support has been slow to rollout among cellular carriers, due to their preference for proprietary implementations & monetizable usage tracking &\or gatekeeping. Like SMS & MMS, RCS is a federated network, wherein failure of one provider's systems is unlikely to result in a total system outage. The single-provider messaging networks of other widely used systems (such as those mentioned on this page) can experience system-wide outages that prevent all users from communicating via them at all; this has happened multiple times for both Signal & Discord, among others. For this reason, single-provider networks are intrinsically more prone to total system outages than federated networks. The long-standing interoperability of SMS+MMS networks is difficult (if not impossible) to match in terms of communicating with a maximum number of people, & maintaining functionality for other users when one provider experiences an outage.