

Despite all the hoopla & animosity, Flash is what drives innovation on the web - object404

Keith Peters (aka bit101) makes an astute observation here: 
http://www.bit-101.com/blog/?p=2908<p>Flash was blazing trails doing widespread use of RIAs &#38; XML data exchanges long before AJAX took off (or the term AJAX was even invented). RIA (Rich Internet Application), by the way, was a term coined by Macromedia with regards to how Flash was used. Before Flash started doing what it was doing, surfing the web meant reloading entire HTML pages or the marginally better iFrames (which were a compatibility big headache back then because of the browser wars between IE &#38; Netscape) to make simple data calls.<p>Flash has driven the ubiquitous and acceptable use of internet video, saving content creators from the huge costly headache of having to support multiple formats. Not only that, but Flash has made video <i>interactive</i>, allowing everyone to embed videos as entire rich mini-websites even non-tech savvy end-users can stick on any webpage they wanted.<p>Flash is the reason why casual games and the web games are so popular now, especially with both genders. Now, Flash is going to have full GPU hardware 3D acceleration, gamepad support and will be running on upcoming TV set top boxes including Google TV: http://tv.adobe.com/show/max-2010-keynotes<p>HTML5? Every single HTML5 demo you see now is playing copycat catchup to what Flash was already doing 5 years ago.<p>Think about it.<p>Can't wait to see what the web will be like in the next 10 years.<p>(btw, big shoutout to http://opera.com which has been responsible for most of the innovations modern browsers have today such as tabbed browsing, tab session saving, thumbnail preview buttons to your favorite sites upon opening new tabs, and speed, speed, speed http://bit.ly/aeEuFO )
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Detrus
Flash is what drove innovation on the web years ago. It hasn't added anything
significant to the web since video. The player itself has not been
significantly improved in two years.

The past does not predict the future.

And this is a very tired debate at this point.

~~~
object404
3D is now creatively & being properly used on websites like
<http://ecodazoo.com>

Unity3D is what's pushing the envelope for 3D on browsers right now, but once
the clamored for Flash 3D acceleration tech goes out of beta
(<http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flash/molehill>) it'll be interesting to
see how web evolves.

Flash's new peer-to-peer communication
(<http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/cirrus/>) capability is very exciting and
it'll be interesting what other apps will pop up when developers start playing
with it more (NSFW shenanigans aside, <http://chatroulette.com> is cool result
of this technology)

I think you also don't understand the impact of Flash to gaming. With just the
62 million Farmville users alone, Flash is one of the biggest gaming platforms
in the world and its impact and boon to amateur indie game development &
creativity cannot be stated enough. With all the upcoming features, it'll be
interesting to see what amateur & indie game developers without the capital of
hundreds of thousands of dollars will be able to do, especially in the living
room (via set top boxes + 3D/gamepad support) where barriers to entry to X-Box
Live Arcade, Playstation Network & Wii Ware are very high.

Add to this that mobile is the current big push, so all of these are coming to
your mobile web browsers and you won't have to always download and keep
updating and reinstalling standalone native apps to be able to experience
these things.

Do you also know how hard it is to port across platforms if you're an indie?
With Flash/AIR, you can now deploy simultaneously to Windows, Mac, Linux,
Android, iPhone/ iTouch/iPad (via Flash iOS Packager) & Blackberry Tab (and
soon, Windows Mobile 7 + Meego) with minimal porting effort. Sure, native is
still optimal in terms of performance & capabilities, but for content creators
with limited resources, this is a godsend.

~~~
Detrus
WebGL will probably be ready sooner than molehill, does the same thing.
Ecodazoo is 2-3 years old. Browsers will also add video conferencing.

There is a lot of overlap. Advantage of sticking to browsers is better
integration with everything else that exists in browsers.

Another thing going for browsers is economics. Google is interested in keeping
the web alive and well, make sure websites load fast, visual extravaganza
works fast. They'll prioritize that because their revenue depends on it. Adobe
has different motivations, so they allowed visually intensive sites to run
slow for years, didn't prioritize hardware acceleration. They get their money
from selling tools, don't care about end users.

It will be interesting to watch, but I think Flash's development priorities
are out of touch with what people do on computers.

------
noonespecial
_HTML5? Every single HTML5 demo you see now is playing copycat catchup to what
Flash was already doing 5 years ago._

That's the innovation. You can finally do it with a few lines of HTML instead
of a god-awful binary closed-source chunk of browser crashing plugin that saps
1/4 of you users batteries just being on the screen. Thanks flash.

~~~
etrdya
No, you can't. Not yet, anyway.

