
Adobe manager puts partial blame on Apple for mobile Flash failure - evo_9
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/11/11/adobe_manager_puts_partial_blame_on_apple_for_mobile_flash_failure.html
======
protomyth
If I were going to blame anything, I think it would be Adobe's decision to
treat every desktop platform other than Windows as a second class citizen. The
Linux and OS X flash players have been horrible for a long time. When mobile
OSes were released that were derived from these two, the results of this
strategy were fatal to mobile Flash.

~~~
tjoff
It _really_ bothers me that people seem to think that flash works well on
windows.

And that's even before taking into account that flash is a gigantic security
hole (on _all_ platforms) and that adobe still can not, after all these years
of misery, push updates well (to windows clients at least).

Google did the world a huge favor by developing Chrome and thus make it so
blatantly obvious what crap flash really is (putting the blame where it
belongs as they so delicately put it). It's become much better the last year
but some things you just can't rescue and it should be banned from use just
for security reasons anyway.

~~~
masklinn
> It really bothers me that people seem to think that flash works well on
> windows.

It pretty much works (at all), which is a far cry from the experience on OSX
and Linux both.

And that's not limited to plugin either, during the holiday I've been out with
only a macbook. Wanted to play Binding of Isaac, which is in Flash and cross-
platform.

Performances on my Win7 machine are good, especially in fullscreen (there are
some slowdowns when windowed). On OSX it was absolutely dreadful, any time
half a dozen missiles were on the screen the game would just crawl down to
single-digit FPS. I was not able to play any Binding during the holiday, it
was just too horrible.

------
mzarate06
Adobe doesn't need to point the finger at anyone, they only need to look as
far as their own product to see why a company so focused on user experience
and security, like Apple, would decide against it. Adobe never seemed to take
Flash on Linux based OS's seriously. Now that those systems are becoming more
popular, Adobe is trying to play catch up, not succeeding, and trying to point
the finger elsewhere.

However, I read Mike Chambers' blog post that this thread's article is based
on. It doesn't sound like he's explicitly blaming Apple for anything. He
states:

 _Just to be very clear on this. No matter what we did, the Flash Player was
not going to be available on Apple’s iOS anytime in the foreseeable future._

... and ...

 _... given the fact that one of the leading mobile platforms (Apple’s iOS)
was not going to allow Flash Player in the browser, Flash was not on track to
reach anywhere near the ubiquity [it has on desktops]._

Is he going after Apple there, or merely stating facts?

~~~
masklinn
> Adobe never seemed to take Flash on Linux based OS's seriously.

*nix-based, OSX is not (and has never been) Linux-based, and Flash has always been absolutely dreadful on it. Still is.

~~~
mzarate06
Understood; thanks for clarifying.

------
mvkel
What's all this "blame" and "failure" stuff? It's like Windows Vista blaming
Windows 7 for its failings.

This is an evolution of technology, plain and simple.

------
zabar
It's true that it didn't help, but the main reason is the success of the app
stores on mobile.

People install apps a lot more easily on mobile than desktop, it's better for
developer as well especially regarding monetization which means there is
really no reason for a plugin.

------
nirvana
Well, then, thank god for Apple for rescuing us from the tyranny of flash.

Now, if we could just get rid of it on the desktop, things might be much
better. CBS.com, I'm looking at you. Hulu, you can do better also.

Once again, by the way, despite the cacophony of personal attacks that it
produced at the time, Steve Jobs has been proven right.

~~~
tborthwick
He wasn't proven 'right' as much as 'successful'. He wanted to keep flash off
the iPhone and iPad and he succeeded. Just because Adobe, faced with a ban on
the most important mobile platform, decided mobile flash wasn't worth the
development effort doesn't mean that they couldn't have created a viable
player on iOS. With enough money and the improving hardware of devices, they
almost certainly could have. But even then they'd be left with the fact that
native apps are succeeding far better than web apps on mobile devices anyway.

~~~
wmf
The AIR runtime is basically Flash Player and it's allowed on iOS — it sucks.
Adobe also spent years on Flash Player for Android and it's not that great.

~~~
joshu
What? I don't think air runs on iOS.

~~~
wmf
<http://www.adobe.com/devnet/air/air_for_ios.html>

------
aaam
To be honest, I never really liked the whole concept of an third-party "web
plugin" for the browser? Either support the file-formats inside the browser or
just download the file and let some (native) app of my choice deal with it?
Would that be so bad?

I even question the wisdom of inline graphics? The screen is not really like
paper. If there is a need for a "figure 1", then it would be almost always be
more useful to have it display in a separate window next to the browser, so
that you don't have to scroll up every time the text refers to something on
this figure?

~~~
suivix
Navigating between two windows is much more annoying than scrolling up.

~~~
aaam
It might be in some implementations, but not always: Given a large enough
display you could set them side by side and what could be easier then looking
left/right?

Requiring scrolling is usually bad enough and only becomes worse the greater
the distance.

