Adobe's failure
- Started
- Last post
- 26 Responses
- twokids
..makes Apple and Jobs look more correct by the day. Some people over there really screwed up by not getting Flash mobile faster.
- mathinc0
Your title is misleading. Reading the article it looks like it's Google's failure.
'Adobe's Flash 10.1 requires version 2.2 of the Android OS, and that just won't be ready for the Droid's launch.'
Android 2.2 won't be ready, not flash mobile...
- twokids0
Yeah, but Adobe should have had Flash out there all over those smartphones by now. We are now in iPhone4 and iPad is selling millions...all without any flash content....or on other smart phones.
If they had got their act together years ago this would never have been an issue. Flash would be on iPhones and the iPad. Apple would have had to put it on there.
- mathinc0
^ I agree with you there, Adobe should have more market saturation in the mobile market. Which is undoubtedly a fault of theirs. But there are also issues with the phone os on a lot of mobile units. The Android 2.2 is supposed to be a LOT faster than 2.1, so the flash experience should be a good one now. The question is that when it does launch, does it deliver.
Your article only points out that the Android 2.2 isn't ready yet, so it won't be on the Droid X, therefore the Droid X will lack flash until it's new OS is ready. From some of the tests I've seen, flash works pretty damn well on mobile devices.
- nuggler0
Flash is already on millions of smart phones, has been for years -- most phones in Japan have it http://www.adobe.com/mobile/supp…
What they don't have is the full, current 10.1 player which isn't ready for mobile. Apple didn't allow the Flash Lite player on their stuff, but they could have
- munch0
I think Motorola are to blame. Flash 10.1 for Android is out, Adobe launched a beta immediately after Google announced Android 2.2. They also launched Air for Android at that time and have been releasing constant updates to it. Far from lazy.
Android 2.2 is out (as of yesterday). Verizon is launching the phone on the 15th of July. I have no idea how long it would take Motorola to update their Droid X rom to 2.2 but if they really wanted to make an impact with this launch then they should be working day and night to have it ready. This is completely in Motorola and Verizon's court now.
- georgesIII0
twokids stop circle jerking,
rtfa and tell me where it says its adobe's failure,
if android isn't ready it isn't adobe's fault at all,
by the way pointing that we're at the gazzillion generations of iphone while ignoring the other brands that use flash lite just smell like extreme fanboyism,
sorry but it is true
- twokids0
No matter what the reasons, as the worlds #1 distributor of video and rich media on the web, they should have had a presence by now in the smartphone world. They didn't and are now playing catchup in a desperate way. Im sure there are squads of people at Adobe working feverishly on this....
- georgesIII0
I quote
"We are now in iPhone4 and iPad is selling millions...all without any flash content....or on other smart phones."where does it says in the article you posted that it is adobe's fault. If they want flash to run well they're entitled to chose which version of Android they should run it on.
I quote
"anyone who knows me know...I am NOT an Apple fanboy"yet you only mad because we're on the fourth generation of iphone/pad while ignoring the huge number of phone that supports flash lite.
- mathinc0
'what about Apple? what does Android have to do with it?'
You mean what does Adobe have to do with Apple. iPhones have the processing power to render flash, why are they not flash enabled? Did you see the video I posted? Flash can run on mobile devices just fine. Why flash 10.1 isn't available on Android 2.1 I can't say, but previous versions of the player did and do work well on mobile devices and we can all test 10.1 on Android 2.2. The claim that 'Some people over there really screwed up by not getting Flash mobile faster' is kind of a farce. You can make that same general 'faster' claim about phone hardware and software all day long. Technology is a hand-in-hand process, it's always evolving and improving.
- twokids0
I like to think I am neutral in this. I do not own an iPhone, or a smartphone (Samsung Rant - with data package, so I can read NYTimes and check mail) but I do own Apple laptops at home and an iTouch.
I respect Apple, and I use Adobe products. In fact Adobe produts provide my living for the most part. When I look at people freaking out about losing 10 years of learning in Flash, I pay attention, 'cause I use Flash.
So I look at the events, see that headline above and think: man, Adobe screwed up. They should have a presence on smartphones by now.
Apple and Adobe are just giant companies that make products that do affect my life. I don't 'care' about either one, except how it affects my work...ok?
i think it may be possible to be neutral in this, isnt it?
- No,
you're either with us, or against us,
* points Ak47 :)georgesIII - so, what is that circle jerk like again?twokids
- I think you mean iPod touch.monospaced
- You're neutral about your livelihood? Steve Jobs loves you. He also has his knife in your back.CyBrain
- No,
- ukit0
twokids is right. Flash 10.1 wasn't ready when the original iPhone shipped, when the iPhone 3G or 3GS were released, or even when the iPad was announced.
This is something a lot of people seem to kind of gloss over - even if Jobs was the biggestest Flash lover in the whole wide world, he wouldn't have BEEN ABLE to put Flash on those devices - unless Apple settled for Flash Lite which until very recently didn't even run AS3.
- He could have been working with Adobe to be ready for Flash 10.1CyBrain
- whatsup0
“To ignore a major component of the Internet like Flash seems a little silly,” said John Warnock, a founder of Adobe. Mr. Warnock said Mr. Jobs would have proceeded more cautiously when the company had less clout. “Apple does what it does,” he said. “But I don’t think that they would have made a decision like this 10 years ago.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/2…
However 10 years ago, Apple didn't even have an iPhone. Two years ago, Apple launched the iPhone and it too didn't have Flash. How do you complain about something two years late?
Companies like Adobe are now fueling a reputation that Apple is being a bully which is far from the case. Surprisingly the makers of 3.5 floppies didn't complain this much when Apple decided not to use them in their computers. Apple has a habit of discarding useless technologies that people do not need anymore. Zip disks, CD-Roms, etc... our iPads, iPhones, iPods work fine without them.
- stewdio0
Putting the whole Apple-Flash argument aside (and really Flash is just one product in Adobe's arsenal, and one of their more recent acquirements at that) I think Adobe did make a large mistake. It's a subtle one, but I think with far reaching implications : THEY DID NOT PRODUCE A BROWSER.
I'm surprised there's not more talk about this. Apple did it. Google did it. Even Amazon did it. (You'll see what I mean about Amazon in just a moment.) It used to be that a browser was just a free piece of software. But now in 2010 that free piece of software is a stepping stone to an expensive piece of hardware. In a sense an iPhone is not iOS, it's Apple's browsers (Safari and iTunes) in a physical form factor. Android is sort of a physical Chrome if you will. And Amazon's physi-fied browser is the Kindle. Browsers are middlemen; they intercept the content you're trying to access and they display it a certain way. And because of the market created by the Microsoft / Netscape war, browsers are free software. But put that browser in a mobile device and suddenly that middleman is a real money maker.
If Adobe had released a young buggy browser 5 years ago, then incrementally improved it until it had a proper fit and finish they would now have even greater leverage on the digital creative industry than they already do. "Does Apple claim that our Flash plugin crashes Safari? Well just use our browser where Flash is baked right in." It wouldn't make direct money, but it would please users—users that created something using an Adobe product and then would be happy to view it in an Adobe product as well. And if they expanded that browser into a console OS (where it would make direct money) they could now say "Are you upset that the iPad doesn't render Flash? Just purchase our handheld device which runs on Flash OS and will properly render all your Flash content." Perhaps then Apple would be forced to add Flash to the iPhone / iPad. (Although the problem seems to be that Flash as it stands just won't operate smoothly or efficiently on a mobile hardware so that kind of kill's it, yea?)
Google was concerned about users being able to experience their rich web apps properly so they created their own browser to ensure that there was a way to experience Google on Google's terms. They're controlling their channel. Adobe should have taken notes on this. Why rely on the good faith of Apple, Google, MS, etc when they can just release their own browser and control their channel? Experience Adobe on Adobe's terms. Then create a physical version of their browser and force the mobile device market to compete with their killer feature: built-in Flash. I suppose the answer is they're too comfortable with the continued success of Photoshop / CS.
- +1PIZZA
- +another one. good thinking and writing down thereof.mikotondria3
- airey0
hey twokids, thanks for illustrating what a fucking idiot looks like. well played sir...
- PIZZA0
Upgrade to
- ukit0
It does seem like controlling the platform it's whether browser, device, or even web app (Google) is what companies need to produce the kinds of changes they want. And I think what you see now are the platform owners attempting to shake off the Adobe middleman/ toll booth now that they have the chance.
When you look at stuff Adobe did spend time or money on, people seem to forget they were pushing their suite of web productivity apps, like this Flash-based word processor: http://www.adobe.com/acom/buzzwo… So did that become a viable contender to something like Google Docs or was it misguided?
Also, what about the whole Air initiative? Should it be deemed a failure at this point, or do you guys think it still has legs?
- SteveJobs0
@ukit
this concept may elude you completely, but in the business world, corporations do actually compete in markets outside of their core business. and as such, there are risks, and failures. this goes to prove no point against adobe, and it really hurts the objectivity you so obviously strive for in your discussions on these topics.
- graphicdefine0
The session by Lee Brimelow at FITC San Francisco looks like it might shed some light on Adobe's efforts in regards to Flash 10.1, commitment to HTML5, etc...
http://www.fitc.ca/events/presen…
- stewdio0
@ukit
You're right. They put work into Air, etc. But I think that emphasizes my point even more. They kept building onto the little browser empires of other companies like Microsoft, Apple, Google, Mozilla, and so on. That made them even more reliant on things they couldn't control. It's like building the house of cards even higher, rather than building a solid foundation to stand on.
If they had built their own browser they could use it to ensure their products would always be reliably supported by at least one company—their own. And they could have made it a mandatory install that came with any of their applications. I'm guessing all of us on QBN have Adobe products installed and therefore we'd all also have this Adobe browser installed. It could be as ubiquitous as Adobe Reader for PDFs. The difficult task would then be gaining some browser market share. But they have more advertising money and perhaps comparable political weight to Mozilla so I'd give them the benefit of the doubt and say they could have at least made a dent in the market. (At least if the browser was any good.) Google did this with Chrome after all.
Imagine that. Imagine Adobe had made a browser, we all had it installed because we had installed something else from Adobe, and perhaps from there Adobe could do something interesting... like release a new version of Flash Players with some cool new features. And the catch is that it would be only available for their own browser first, and then make its way to others.