The Death of Flash and the Quiet Triumph of Open Standards 09/28/2011
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- twokids
from here:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timo…The Death of Flash and the Quiet Triumph of Open Standards 09/28/2011
Yesterday I noticed this story about a web startup called SlideShare ditching Flash (a proprietary plugin provided by Adobe) in favor of HTML 5 (a set of open web standards that have recently been adopted by the major browsers). One announcement by an obscure startup is hardly news. But the announcement is part of a broader trend.
Two years ago, I would have predicted that Flash would be part of the web for the foreseeable future. It was used by sites like YouTube to deliver web video, and it was a popular way to deliver interactive applications. And it had been bundled with all the major browsers for more than a decade. Apple had chosen not to adopt Flash on the iPhone, but I assumed it was just a matter of time before Apple and Adobe figured out a way to fix that.
Then, in early 2010, Apple announced the iPad. It didn’t have Flash either, and Steve Jobs made it clear they had no intention of ever bringing Flash to the iPad or iPhone. Suddenly, creating a Flash-based website not only meant that it wouldn’t work on a popular smartphone, it also wouldn’t work with the world’s most popular tablet.
Jobs had two stated reasons for the shift. He said Flash was a crash-prone resource hog and that it wasn’t an open standard. To a large extent, the first point is a consequence of the second. Because Flash is proprietary software developed by Adobe, third parties like Apple don’t have access to the source code or permission to change it. That means they can’t fix bugs or to optimize the code for particular devices. They have to rely on Adobe to do these things in a timely manner.
Yesterday’s news about SlideShare is just the latest sign that Apple’s no-Flash stance has caught on. A couple of weeks ago, Microsoft announced that the tablet version of Windows 8 won’t include “legacy” plugins like Flash. And web design firms report that they’re starting to get requests from clients to move away from the technology. When ditching a technology becomes trendy, its days are numbered.
Apple couldn’t have killed Flash if HTML 5 hadn’t recently been adopted by major browsers. HTML 5 offers alternatives to most of the key features of Flash. And no one controls it the way Adobe controls Flash. Since no software company wants to build its products on a standard it doesn’t control, every company other than Adobe has a natural incentive to adopt HTML 5 over Flash.
This brings to mind Jonathan Zittrain’s book The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It. Zittrain warned that the success of the proprietary iPhone threatened to undermine the decentralized, bottom-up structure of the Internet. The Flash story is a useful counterexample to Zittrain’s thesis. On the one hand, iOS is a proprietary standard controlled by Apple, so its ascendancy looks like a threat to open standards. Yet the rise of the iPad was a major factor in the decline of another proprietary standard, Flash.
There are two things to note about this. First, in the competition among firms, open standards have an inherent advantage even if none of the firms care about open standards as such. If Apple had tried to replace Flash with its own proprietary standard (as Microsoft tried to do with Silverlight), other technology companies like Google or Microsoft would have had no reason to support the move, since it doesn’t benefit them to shift power from one competitor to another. But adopting an open standard means shifting power from one competitor to everyone else. So everyone except the incumbent has a reason to support open standards.
The second thing to note is that the rise of HTML 5 has gotten much less press than the rise of iOS. Reporters love to cover the clash of corporate titans. The battle between Apple and Google for dominance of the smartphone business makes good news copy. But because everyone supports HTML 5, there’s no conflict and therefore no story.
At any given time, there are a few new proprietary platforms making rapid gains, as well as a huge number of open technologies that are making gradual gains against older, proprietary standards. It’s easy to get the mistaken impression that the proprietary standards are on the verge of overwhelming the open ones. But this is an illusion. What’s really happening is two things. First, the proprietary standards have marketing departments that are making sure they’re in the public eye, so they get a lot of coverage. And second, even the company pushing the hottest new proprietary standard (Apple with iOS, in this case) is simultaneously adopting—and, therefore, entrenching—numerous open standards like TCP/IP and HTML 5.
So for at least two decades, it has looked like proprietary technologies were on the verge of taking over the software industry. Yet open standards have grown more and more dominant. This hasn’t been a lucky fluke, it’s a matter of basic economics. Proprietary software is central planning. And in the long run, central planning doesn’t work as well as bottom-up organization.
- detritus0
The SlideShare changeover didn't justify its spot on the Slashot front page yesterday.
- TheBlueOne0
Amazon Kindle Fire plays Flash. Just saying.
- YOU'RE WRONG FLASH IS DEEEAAADDDD!!!!Hombre_Lobo
- thats interesting, good to know.Hombre_Lobo
- we'll see how that performs, hahahahhaamonospaced
- A lot of people using the Kindle, but not primarily for surfing the web or checking their email.Jaline
- Kindle Fire doesn't even have an email clientanimatedgif
- No it doesn't! Rendered in the cloud.comicsans
- Hombre_Lobo0
Choose the appropriate platforms for the audience. Flash is great in its own right. no cross browser compatibility bullshit which plagues web devs the world over.
- obsolete0
I guess if this is true... flash won´t go away...
- moldero0
Adobe Japan makes flash for the iPad, check it out
- See steve jobs was right! the devices are incapable of playing flash media..
Oh wait!Hombre_Lobo - i see his camera on the reflectionjon_d
- frash thats funny74LEO
- See steve jobs was right! the devices are incapable of playing flash media..
- Hombre_Lobo0
To bring up an old debate a mate said something which i thought was true.
Apple say how flash is too resource heavy, so their devices don't support it. But apple have some how convinced the world (impressively) that the full internet isn't 'right' for their device.
When obviously, the truth is their devices are inadequate to properly display the internet. What kind of crap is that. Well played though apple, genius marketing to fool the masses.
BRING ON THE FLAMING FAN BOYS?!?!?!
- reality distortion field is successfulvaxorcist
- Not genius, just a sign of apple fanboys' failureCyBrainX
- Battery life and a responsive interface are more important than Flash or the "full internet" whatever that isanimatedgif
- Hombre_Lobo0
And they say thats its the performance and battery life thats the issue with flash.
Next time you buy a car, they'll say you dont get air conditioning, it uses more petrol. I personally would like the choice.
COME AT ME FAN BOY BRO?!!
- popfodders0
It's still going to be used for kiosk development and self-contained application development (iPad / iPhone aka iOS devices), which is ironic.
http://tv.adobe.com/watch/cs-55-…
I mean to generically state that, it seems kind of fucking stupid. Depends on the project, but hey maybe I'm crazy...
- flash goes niche... that's what it's good for anyway, finallyvaxorcist
- IE 10 will fuck it up bigtime. Too many users on IEpopfodders
- ifeltdave0
relevant:
- deathboy0
im sure flash will at least out live steve jobs- ROFL! hahahhaa hahhhapopfodders
- hhahaHombre_Lobo
- AmenCyBrainX
- Pixter0
"OPEN SOURCE! OPEN SOURCE! Oh, wait, you want to code for ios? Sorry, you HAVE to buy a mac for that."
- Ha ha, exactly such a load of hypocrtical SHITEpopfodders
- hehePonyBoy
- hahahahaaahHombre_Lobo
- Apple never cried "OPEN" that's Google who do thatanimatedgif
- 3rd paragraph!
http://www.apple.com…Pixter
- BabySnakes0
I rarely see this argument's benefits for supporting for flash. So how is the experience with flash on your mobile devices? (Don't attack me just asking)
- Full on flash sites on a single core are OK, but on a dual core they are absolutely fine.Hombre_Lobo
- ('OK' meaning not perfect)
If jobs said, no flash for our current single core devices, fair enough. but forever? gtfo!Hombre_Lobo - How is your experience animated with CSS, Javascript and whatever on all platforms for you?CyBrainX
- Just asking.CyBrainX
- Just fine thanks, less tedious than using the Flash IDE actuallyanimatedgif
- monospaced0
I tried Flash on an Android. It loads. It crashes sometimes. It works most of the time. But here's the real issue:
Most Flash content that people expect just doesn't work with a touch device. Games? Yeah right. Most require a keyboard and a mouse (touch fails miserably). Lots of flash requires video acceleration too and that's simply a joke.
Anyone who criticizes Apple for not including it needs to see the big picture.
- you're right for the most part... but you can't argue Pixter's logic above - Apple's quite the hypocritePonyBoy
- And what about the 50% of Flash that doesn't fit your description? You want to be restricted form it?CyBrainX
- There are better alternatives already, in my opinion.monospaced
- monospaced0
I'm sure that as soon as Flash is actually optimized for less powerful devices and hardware starts to catch up Apple will support it. But they don't have much incentive if the result will be shitty battery life and inconsistent performance.
- build better hardwarePonyBoy
- totally, but that's easier said than done... I put the responsibility on Adobe to create better softwaremonospaced
- How about developers developing for mobile versions of Flash? It would be easier than any alternative.CyBrainX
- totally, Cymonospaced
- no.... Apple hates flash because people can bypass the App Store and go cross-platform!vaxorcist
- orpkoobcam20
everyone seems to want flash dead.. but flash isn't so bad for animation of a certain kind. in fact it's really good for general 2d character animation.
if flash dies - how will html5(in other words javascript) replace that?
You can't artistically character animate by writing a load of <body>move</body> tags?And don't answer this question with a load of links to those crappy html5 timeline animation tools - they are nowhere near close to how you can animate in flash.
- orpkoobcam20
^ the problem with websites etc, is the can go from flat static text sites(wikipedia for example) to crazy immersive things.
Flash has dominated the crazy spectrum.
Html5 seems like a potential contender, but is still in nappies.So rather than waste time on this debate, why don't people go outside and breath some fresh air, turn off their computers, shutdown their pads, pods and tablets and go forget about it. There's bigger fish to fry.
- chrisRG0
oh no... not again.
