Will Apple Ever Fix the iMessage Text-Killing Problem?

When Liz DeStasio's smartphone abruptly stopped getting her parents' text messages, she chalked it up to old-person syndrome — that they had simply screwed up a setting that was preventing the texts from getting through. But the missing-text problem began spreading to more of her contacts, perplexing both her and her husband, Dominick.

Soon, they found the common thread: All of the people whose texts weren't getting through wereiPhone owners. "It was actually her father who noticed that whenever he sent a message, it was showing up as if it were sent under iMessage," says Dominick. "Once he mentioned the iMessage thing, I put two and two together that all the people that were having trouble messaging her had iPhones."

It quickly became obvious that Liz had been affected by a known problem with iMessage: That is, if someone switches from an iPhone to a non-Apple phone and neglects to turn off the service — which routes text messages through Apple's servers instead of the carrier's SMS network — then that person will no longer get texts from other iPhones.

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