Steve Jobs has penned an open letter about the problems with Flash, accusing the widespread Adobe product of being a closed system that was designed for PCs and mice and is riddled with security and efficiency issues.
He says that while the companies still work together, "there are few joint interests", and gives six reasons why the platform is not supported:
1. Flash is not open
Jobs says that while Adobe claims Flash is open to all, "this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system."
He goes on to point out that HTML5, a standard Apple is involved in directing, is a better fit for today's modern devices.
2. Flash video is the only way to access the 'full' web
Although many websites use Flash for video and web page building, Apple believes than the H.264 format is a more modern and simple format, which it uses for its YouTube app. "iPhone, iPod and iPad users aren't missing much video," claims Jobs.
3. It's not secure and it's unreliable
Jobs says that Flash was highlighted as having "one of the worst security records in 2009" and "Flash is the number one reason Macs crash". He also said that Adobe has been unable to show any mobile device that runs Flash well, and that it has constantly been pushed back as a standard release for smartphones.
4. It's a battery killer
Jobs again harps on about the power of H.264, which uses hardware decoding, rather than software to realise serious battery savings.
"The difference is striking:on an iPhone, for example,H.264 videos play for up to 10 hours, while videos decoded in software play for less than 5 hours before the battery is fully drained.
"When websites re-encode their videos using H.264, they can offer them without using Flash at all. They play perfectly in browsers like Apple's Safari and Google's Chrome without any plugins whatsoever, and look great on iPhones, iPods and iPads."
5. Flash was designed for mice and PCs, not touch
With Flash created so long ago, Apple believes it still relies on mice and such peripherals to function for elements like 'rollovers'.
"Apple's revolutionary multi-touch interface doesn't use a mouse, and there is no concept of a rollover. Most Flash websites will need to be rewritten to support touch-based devices. If developers need to rewrite their Flash websites, why not use modern technologies like HTML5,CSSand JavaScript?
"Even if iPhones, iPods and iPads ran Flash, it would not solve the problem that most Flash websites need to be rewritten to support touch-based devices."
6. Apple wants to stay in control of the App Store
A lot of people believe that Apple has denied the use of Flash on its devices because it would undermine Apple's control of the App Store – and now Jobs has admitted it, saying Adobe wants developers to use Flash to create applications.
"We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform.
"If developers grow dependent on third party development libraries and tools, they can only take advantage of platform enhancements if and when the third party chooses to adopt the new features. We cannot be at the mercy of a third party deciding if and when they will make our enhancements available to our developers."
Jobs confirms that Apple wants to keep Flash away so it can control the performance of its apps to make sure they stand up to Apple's standards, something he believes has made the App Store so successful:
"Everybody wins - we sell more devices because we have the best apps, developers reach a wider and wider audience and customer base, and users are continually delighted by the best and broadest selection of apps on any platform."
Jobs signs off with a final broadside at Adobe: "New open standards created in the mobile era, such as HTML5, will win on mobile devices (and PCs too). Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind."
Your comments (9) Click to add a new comment
michael_h_reed
June 25th 2010
9. Its definately not a security thing or they would have fixed their own site - http://bit.ly/amXYDN
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shanee
May 6th 2010
8. Are you really serious?
You are going to lambast apple for having a closed product (like the iphone) - Is windows not closed? what about photoshop?
Ahhh they're different. No - theyre no different. They are only different in your mind! If you can not discern between closed web and closed product, then you obviously werent reading carefully enough.
I have to agree with Jobs. Flash causes me more grief than anything else. Its a royal pain in the but and causes Safari and Firefox to crash regularly (although it doesnt crash my mac [For OS crashes - see Microsoft]).
And why should a product manufacturer go with something because of its market share - no matter how bad. Were that the case, Id still be using a windows machine.
Seriously, why go with the status quo, when we all know that the status quo is often wrong.
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bradavon
April 29th 2010
7. MACs actually crash too? Who'd have thought it.
Whilst what Jobs says is largely true, the simple true is, Flash is EVERYWHERE. So to not support it is just stupid.
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d4lien
April 29th 2010
6. Buy Apple and stay in their sandbox and all is fine. Beware if you leave it though or you will be persecuted!
So all in all he is saying "Do as we say but not as we do!"
Jobs is a hypocrite and sells shiney things with little substance.
But hey! He's a billionaire so he is doing something right isn't he!?!
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badgerboy1977
April 29th 2010
5. Exactly my thoughts, the iphone and ipad are so closed its unreal yet hes complaining about flash. The mans ego seems beyond bounds to me, coded correctly flash is superb and flash sites that arent just wont get the mobile traffic, simple as. Its all just money grabbing business nonsense if you ask me and has really helped me in deciding whether or not to buy apple products in the future, I for 1 wont be putting more money in that egomaniacs pocket (i'm sure hes terrified, ah well).
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randomdog
April 29th 2010
4. "this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system."
...
...SERIOUSLY?
Pots and kettles come to mind...
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awjr
April 29th 2010
3. This is one of those situations where Adobe are playing catch-up. WHEN 10.1 is finally released and available and deployed on every smart phone except the iPhone THEN can we revisit this discussion.
As it stands Flash pre 10.1 has issues, post 10.1 with it being gesture aware/screen size aware etc, written specifically to run on mobile devices, THEN can we start this discussion.
As a developer, I am still betting on Flash with their Air packager for the other 6 phone OS out there. I need one language to deliver the same look and feel app (as I expect with my websites on multiple browsers), which will have exactly the same bugs in them, NOT 7 different languages each with their own unique bugs and all looking/behaving slightly differently.
It's a shame Adobe are late coming to the party with Flash 10.1. Flash has evolved with the web and has adapted over the years to it's needs (e.g. inclusion of Video). It is now racing to adapt to the mobile environment. Of note I don't think the mobile phones were up to running it till this year.
As to Jobs defence of the quality of the app store? Is he serious? Could he at least back it up by deleting all apps that have been in the store for 6+ months with poor ratings?
As an App developer I am desperately trying to stay platform agnostic. To a certain extent, this is what the internet tries to promote and is based on.
The promise from Adobe is a platform agnostic development environment with the ability to deploy my apps to any app store going (apple excluded) as well as deliver to any pc platform. I an extremely good value proposition.
Soooo anyway, I'm in this for the long run. In two years time when your new fridge is running Android and has my Flash app running on it through the Air packager, let's discuss this again.
This really is early days and I do think the next 3-6 months will see a settling down of the issue.
On a side note, Adobe have released coding guidelines for targetting Flash apps to the mobile platform (http://help.adobe.com/en_US/as3/mobile/flashplatform_optimizing_content.pdf) . If you take an existing Flash app, use the Air packager, you will find that it will run like a dog but you knew that already ;)
If you don't want to head down this route, then another option may be to wait for Adobe to release the Flex Mobile Framework. Some colleagues of mine just don't want to do that type of low level optimisation.
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mobius
April 29th 2010
2. @jordy but that's purely a content issue and it'd actually be more difficult/take more time to redevelop sites in HTML5/CSS/Javascript than it would in Flash/Flex for developers to address their sites for mobile. He keeps going on about standards but HTML5 still isn't a standard yet and there are plenty of issues that surround features not formalised yet, plus you're adding CSS and JS in there so that's two ADDITIONAL languages and standards and not always play well together. At least flash/actionscript is a single consistent platform and standard/language.
If you really really wanted to at the very complex end you could recreate very complex flash and flex interactions in HTML and AJAX etc but from a business point of view it's suicide as it'd take ten times longer.
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jordy
April 29th 2010
1. When you look at it that way, not just video, but actually controlling a Flash website... then there is a major issue with Flash and touch. It's all a little clearer now.
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