Re/code:

The Internet is filled with tales of frustration from those who have traded in their iPhone for an Android phone only to find their text messages trapped within Apple’s cloud. The issue arises when an iPhone customer trades in his or her phone for, say, an Android device, but keeps the same phone number that Apple’s messaging system recognizes as an iPhone.

iMessage is far from perfect but has gotten much better over the past year (at least from my experience). But that said, there is a point here.

Spurring this little number:

The iMessage problem is now the subject of legal action by a California woman seeking class-action status for a suit against Apple. She charges that Apple’s message-grabbing ways are depriving former customers of the ability to get full value from their wireless service after they give up their iPhone. The suit, filed last week, claims Apple’s actions violate California’s unfair competition law and also interfere with a wireless carrier’s abilities to deliver its promised service to consumers.

Which brings up an interesting point. What responsibility does a tech ecosystem bear to enable customers to easily leave that ecosystem? When an ecosystem is created, do the exit tools need to be created at the same time? Obviously, part of the value of an ecosystem, from a business point of view, is the friction that keeps customers on board. Clearly, there is a disincentive to making it easy for customers to leave.

As anyone who knows me will attest, I’m an unabashed Apple fan, have been since the Apple II days. Part of what makes me so loyal is Apple’s value of quality over strategy. I think Apple designs every product and service with the loftiest of functional and aesthetic goals. The “friction” problem becomes a “magnetic” solution. People stay because of attraction, not because of the difficulty of leaving.

There seems to be a friction problem here. My guess is, there’s a fix in the works.