Adobe To iPhone Users- “Want Flash? Don’t Blame Us”

I’m always bemused by the Mac fanboys defending Apple when it’s abundantly clear – in fact, it’s a “feature” – that Apple have a closed, approval-driven, architecture that prevents many great applications from becoming available to consumers. Whether or not you, individually, think the Flash player is great or awful, it would be good to be able to make the choice at all. At the moment, Apple don’t allow us to.

Apple’s policy blows, and Adobe are probably sick of people assuming that because Flash can’t play on their iPhone, it must be Adobe’s fault for not making a suitable player. The message they’re posting may sound “harsh” to some, but it’s the truth – Apple are robbing their customers of the right to choose whether or not to use the Flash player on their portable devices.

@treq With respect, I must disagree. Adobe (and even 3rd party developerd) have already written (a) Flash player(s) for iPhone, but Apple have persistently disallowed it. The reason is nothing to do with performance it is to do with Apple’s stubborn insistence that nothing on the iPhone is allowed to execute downloadable code, which Flash by its very nature does.

One example from earlier this year: http://www.appscout.com/2009/04/developer_submits_flash_player.php

Apple want total control over their hardware. I say, give some control to the users, please. We can decide what risks we want to take, we don’t need a nanny Apple telling us.

@treq There have been functional versions of the Flash player on mobile devices for over 5 years. Even if Apple were to allow one of these “lite” versions of the Flash player, it would be a step in the right direction as far as user choice is concerned. Performance is a total non-issue.

As far as downloadable code goes, Apple are just stubborn asses. Their excuse is not about security, it is about control. As a fanboy, however, I expect you’ll swallow their line hook line and sinker. I’m no fanboy, though I do have an iPhone 3GS – but it’s the first and last iPhone I’ll buy should Apple persist with their closed wall mindset.

I very much like the look of Android.

@treq I’m sorry, but it’s only fanboys who believe that everything Apple does it does for the good of its users – “to create a more stable, reliable, secure, enjoyable user experience.” Their continued battle to take and maintain total control of the user environment – evidenced by prevention of “jailbreaking,” prevention of other software interfacing with iPhones, prevention of other hardware interfacing with iTunes, and numerous cases of apps that have allowed users to acquire some independent control of iPhones and iPod Touches, all points to a control-freakish mindset that is far more condescending, ignorant and insulting to its users than anything I could do here.

Second, your opinion of Flash is only that – your opinion. If Apple were truly worried about buggy applications that use too much processor power, then a large proportion of “approved” apps (lol) in the App store would also need to be banned by Apple. And they’ve shown themselves happy to ban apps on far more trivial (and even obscure) grounds.

Ditto security. If Apple were interested in security, they would work with Adobe to create something for their users. Apple haven’t come to the table, haven’t shown an interest in co-developing a suitable product, and hey – even if they were partners in software development, I guess it wouldn’t guarantee app acceptance. Just ask Google.