iMessage

I'd love to know the answer to this.....we have one apple ID so we share one iTunes acct and I think that is the problem but not sure of the fix.

Have each member of the family create there own Apple ID so the messages don't go to the wrong place. You can still sync them to one computer. Every Apple ID can transfer purchases to 5 authorizes computers, however, one computer can be authorized for every Apple ID in your family.

Everyone can still use the same Apple ID. What you need to do is go into - "Settings" , "Messages", "Receive At", and add a different Email for each user for where they can be reached for messages at. Once you have added a new Email to each device delete the original Email that was there which should have been the same as your Apple ID. Then when you send a new message, send the message to the Email for that person that was just added to their iPhone. There is no need for each family member to create their own Apple ID just to use iMessage. Each family member would only need to create their own Apple ID if everyone wanted to use iCloud and not have all family members data, contacts, calendars, etc sync together. If you are also using FaceTime between iPhones do the the same thing in the FaceTime settings.

Hope this helps.

Bohm, You are Welcome! Glad I could help.

I did EVERY thing you said to do, and when I send an iMessage to my daughter, it sends from the email i set up for my self, and it wont let her phone at all send an iMessage to me, but to other people she knows.

Also, we can't even facetime, I have to call my daughter if I want that to work, WHY?!?!

SOS

go into your settings and choose to receive at your phone number, not your email

Make sure your daughter has a different Email than you do set up in iMessage and Facetime on her iPhone. Also in her contacts list make sure she has your Email you are using for iMessage and FaceTime under your name. Then she should be able to start a new iMessage and select the Email under your name in the contacts to send an iMessage to you.

I Updated my wifes phone (3GS) yesterday evening. Today I (3GS) see both her texting and her friend's reply on my phone. A very interesting feature if I wanted to check on her. How can we solve this? 4 family members using same Apple ID.

MacSwiss, what you need to do is give each family member a different Email. Go into - "Settings" , "Messages", "Receive At", and add a different Email for each user to their iPhone. Do this for each family member.

Example - Your iPhone - Dad@me.com, Your wife's iPhone - Mom@me.com, Child 1 iPhone - Kid1@me.com ,and Child 2 iPhone -Kid2@me.com. If each family member already has their own Email account then you can use those Email address. No need to create any new ones.

Once you have added a new Email to each device delete the original Email that was there which should have been the same as your Apple ID. Also make sure the Email you are using for each family member is also under their name in the "Contacts" list.

I'm not sure if we're talking about the same thing, but here's my problem. Well, not really a problem. I'm getting all my texts from my contacts, whether it be someone on an iPhone or another cell. Except one contact. She's has both and iPhone 3GS and an iPhone 4 and has updated to ios 5, but when she texts me I don't receive any of her texts. Also, for some reason, when I text her she sees my email address come up instead of my phone number. Any thoughts?

I'm still using mobile me as my imac duo core is incapable of upgrading to lion and so I can't go to the icloud but that another story. Anyway as part of that process new email aliases on mobile me have been disabled and imessage will not verify the existing @me.com aliases my kids have already set up.

I'm hoping they will relent and allow the cloud for snow leopard, in the mean time I have turned off imessage as all messages are coming through as from my wife who has the common email in the synched contacts.....I could just create a new apple id but won't I then lose access to contacts, calendar etc.... it sounds like this might be different for icloud ids but as mentioned that "free" service is not much good to me

Try sending an E-mail from your common E-mail to the aliases @me.com E-mails your kids have set up. I had the same problem when I created the second aliases E-mail under my iCloud account, it would not verify the second E-mail address. So I sent an E-mail from my main E-mail (which is also my Apple ID) to the aliases E-mail and then it was verified and I was able to use it for iMessage.

Thanks Eklab...this was very helpful. I had the same problem and your suggestion fixed the problem with my husband getting all of my iMessages. However, now he is unable to use the iTunes store on his phone. I am assuming this is because he deleted my email address (our apple id) from "Received at" and replaced it with his personal e-mail address. Do you happen to know the solution to this problem? Thank you so much in advance!

Caarrajj79, by just changing the e-mail address for "Received at" in iMessage it should not have had any effect on the iTunes store. Try this - Go into "Settings", "Store" and see if the Apple ID listed is your main Apple ID used for the iTunes store. If it is the same log out and then back in and if it is different, log out and change the Apple ID to the one used for the iTunes Store and then log back in.