Steve Jobs: Thoughts On Flash
.... we met Adobe’s founders when they were in their proverbial garage. Apple was their first big customer ......Apple invested in Adobe and owned around 20% of the company for many years. The two companies worked closely together to pioneer desktop publishing and there were many good times. ....... Mac users buy around half of Adobe’s Creative Suite products – but beyond that there are few joint interests. ...... why we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. ...... Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While Adobe’s Flash products are widely available, this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system. ....... Apple has many proprietary products too. ..... Rather than use Flash, Apple has adopted HTML5, CSS and JavaScript – all open standards. ...... Flash is the number one reason Macs crash....... Flash was designed for PCs using mice, not for touch screens using fingers. ..... Besides the fact that Flash is closed and proprietary, has major technical drawbacks, and doesn’t support touch based devices, there is an even more important reason we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. We have discussed the downsides of using Flash to play video and interactive content from websites, but Adobe also wants developers to adopt Flash to create apps that run on our mobile devices. ....... Flash is a cross platform development tool. It is not Adobe’s goal to help developers write the best iPhone, iPod and iPad apps. ...... the mobile era is about low power devices, touch interfaces and open web standards – all areas where Flash falls short..... Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind.Adobe: The Truth About Flash
The Adobe Flash Player runtime was actually originally created as a technology for tablets with touch interfaces ..... For new content developed specifically with touch in mind, Flash Player 10.1 will provide a complete set of multitouch and gesture APIs. ...... Seventy-five percent of all video on the web is viewed via Flash Player, including videos encoded in the most popular codecs such as H.264 and VP6. ...... H.264 is a video codec (which requires a player), while Flash Player is a complete multimedia runtime that can play back H.264, among other codecs. ....... Flash Player 10.1 will include support for hardware-accelerated video playback across devices from mobile to desktop environments. ....... since Flash Player runs across platforms, all of the optimizations made for mobile will also benefit content on desktops, laptops, netbooks, and tablets when they run Flash Player. ........ The Symantec Global Internet Threat Report for 2009 found that Flash Player had the second lowest number of vulnerabilities of all Internet technologies listed (which included both web plug-ins and browsers). This is significant when you consider that Flash Player is among the most widely distributed and used pieces of software in the world. ....... Flash Player is part of a rich ecosystem of both open and proprietary technologies. ..... The core engine of Flash Player (AVM+) is open source and was donated to the Mozilla Foundation, where it is actively maintained. The file formats supported by Flash Player, SWF and FLV/F4V, as well as the RTMP and AMF protocols are freely available and openly published. Anyone can use the specifications without requiring permission from Adobe. Third parties can and do build audio, video, and data services that compete with those from Adobe. ....... Flex, the primary application framework for the Adobe Flash Platform, is also open source and is actively maintained and developed by Adobe and the community.Freedom Of Choice: Home
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The Truth About Flash
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