flash – ɔimoɈɒ

Apple is not the dominant player in any market that matters

How significant is Apple to the mobile market? Mobile Review writes: Before the Digital Agenda anti-competitive investigations centred on companies with dominant market positions, this initiative would change that to companies with a significant market position e.g. Apple. It may result in Apple being forced to allow Flash on their iOS platform amongst other things … Continue reading “Apple is not the dominant player in any market that matters”

How significant is Apple to the mobile market?

Mobile Review writes:

Before the Digital Agenda anti-competitive investigations centred on companies with dominant market positions, this initiative would change that to companies with a significant market position e.g. Apple. It may result in Apple being forced to allow Flash on their iOS platform amongst other things like allowing 3rd party devices to sync with iTunes e.g. the way Palm tried to do with the Pre. Apple has built a closed eco-sysem for itself that delivers a first rate user experience in terms of interoperability, a situation not totally dissimilar to what Microsoft was trying to do with bundling its own products with its Windows OS, a move that ran foul of the EU’s competition commissioner.

As much as I would like to say that Apple is dominant in the smartphone market, it’s simply not true. Apple is behind Nokia, Samsung, RIM and others in their share of the overall mobile market – and they’re not even dominant in smart phones. Apple does, however, have significant mindshare – which isn’t the same thing. The comparison with Microsofts EU ruling regarding anticompetitive practises with their monopoly is unwarranted – Microsoft had a 95%+ market share at the time. Apple is not even out of single figures in their share of the mobile market.

Adobe has been crowing about being present on 97% of Internet devices and yet they’re bleating to the DoJ and the EU to allow them to increase this market share? It’s plain who has a dominant or significant market share here and who is trying to force their will upon the market.

What is it about Apple doing well which sends competitors into unreasoning panic? Why do we have Microsoft fumbling with Windows Phone 7 and then undermining their own efforts with the Microsoft KIN and then undoing all that work after selling just over 500 devices? Why do we have Adobe tripping over themselves to get Flash onto a couple of devices when they themselves lay claim to 97% of the content framework market? Why is Nokia stumbling with half-baked attempts like the N97 and their own hubris regarding signal/antenna issues when they should be working to make something truly great. Why is Google lying and rewriting history to suit their new paradigm where they are the only freedom option against Apples alleged iron grip of the market? You have to remember that in each of these respective markets it is these companies, not Apple, who is the dominant player. Apple is, in every case here, a distant minor player. So why are they so worried?

It’s plain to see that not only have these companies lost their cool but they’re also out of ideas. Apple is a niche player. Their own dominance, in digital downloaded music, is what they consider to be a break-even business. It enabled the rise of the iPod but in itself it doesn’t make a huge benefit to Apple’s bottom line. When companies have to lie, cheat, plead with the authorities – then you have to acknowledge that something is rotten.

And it is blindness that motivates them. Microsoft has a successful OS launch with Windows 7 and some neat new innovations with Windows Phone 7. Notable because they haven’t copied the iPhone. So why are they pissing about with Courier and KIN and all the rest? Why squander that advantage? And what the fuck is Ray Ozzie doing?

Adobe used to be a great company with great product. Now all I see is posturing about Flash on iPhone. Flash, a recently acquired technology, is being pursued at the expense of their own self-regard. Give it up, make Photoshop, Acrobat, Illustrator even more kick-ass! (and make them as good on the Mac as you do for the PC and see if Apples attitude softens) Stop making me roll my eyes at every douche move you make.

Nokia. Stop fucking about. The last good phone you brought out was the N95. Move the fuck on. Stop whining. Stop over promising and under delivering. And stop wasting effort on Symbian. No-one likes working with it. And anyone who says they do just doesn’t want to lose a dominant position on a dying platform. They’re stupid and you need to ditch them.

Google should know better that the Internet stores truth better than any other medium before it. We know you didn’t buy Droid to save us from Apple. We know your OS is a ‘little bit open’ but getting access to it requires signing away your first born. Stick to what you’re good at. You’re a shit liar.

These mega-corporations will gut themselves rather than see Apple win – even when Apple isn’t trying to win. They’re being distracted from making good products. They’re declaring Apple to be a winner when it ain’t true and they’re suffering because of it. And it needs to stop.

Ugh. More Flash. Do not read.

James Alliban, who recently made a name for himself with FLAR (Flash Augmented Reality) rails against the notion that Flash is shit. This ignores the facts that a lot of people were already using a Flash blocker, like Click2Flash, before Steve Jobs gave his opinions on Flash. Why? Because Flash has proven itself to be … Continue reading “Ugh. More Flash. Do not read.”

James Alliban, who recently made a name for himself with FLAR (Flash Augmented Reality) rails against the notion that Flash is shit.

This ignores the facts that a lot of people were already using a Flash blocker, like Click2Flash, before Steve Jobs gave his opinions on Flash. Why? Because Flash has proven itself to be pretty shit.

I didn’t need Steve Jobs to tell me that Flash was shit. I had personal experience of it. I’ve had Click2Flash installed for months because I finally got sick of how bad performance was.

Adobe doesn’t like this and have put a lot of marketing effort into making sure that everyone knows how unfair Apple has been. You have to ask yourself that if Apple is saying they get more bug reports and crash reports from Flash than anything else on Mac OS X, then why would they lie? You have to consider which company you trust more (assuming there’s any trust for either).

So Adobe says their Flash platform is pristine.

This ignores the fact that it’s taken Adobe 10 years to catch up to Mac OS X’s APIs and no-one has any shred of confidence that they’ll be able to keep up with the iPhone OS APIs – to put it another way, they’re already out of date now and they’ll be further out of date with the release of iPhone OS 4. That means no multitasking, no Game Center, no Core Data and probably no MapKit.

This ignores the facts that Flash is a security risk. Adobe may say that it had the second fewest security holes of all Internet technologies listed but the severity of those security holes is an important factor, as is the proliferation of outdated software (like when Adobe were shipping a compromised version of Opera within their suite).

This ignores the obvious performance burden of Flash. Adobe may say that “Flash performs as well as, if not better than, comparable multimedia technologies” but Flash makes my computer more burdened than when playing a fully immersive 3D game. The fans come on sooner, the machines heats up quicker. For tiny animations this is just not right. Adobe’s own comparisons are not even comparing like for like.

And why is Adobe so upset that Apple has restricted Flash when they say on their web page that:

we actively support technologies like HTML4, HTML5, CSS, and H.264, in addition to our own technologies.

So support these technologies and support them well and don’t get embroiled in this debate. So you’ve lost Flash on iPhone and iPad – move on. There’s no antitrust argument here, there’s no monopoly here (unless you can have a monopoly on “who makes the coolest devices”).

Local Newspapers on iPad

When I go to a newspaper web site, I’d love to see things like ‘news’. That would be the whole point, really. Evidently someone doesn’t ‘get it’. What’s doubly entertaining is that the Irish News hides all their content behind a Flash paywall which means those of us with a Flash blocker on our “Windows, … Continue reading “Local Newspapers on iPad”

When I go to a newspaper web site, I’d love to see things like ‘news’. That would be the whole point, really.

Evidently someone doesn’t ‘get it’.

What’s doubly entertaining is that the Irish News hides all their content behind a Flash paywall which means those of us with a Flash blocker on our “Windows, Mac or Linux” machines will see this:

This is what happens when you make a poor technology choice. Flash, as a content distribution platform, is dying. It was great in the day and everyone enjoyed something about it but extending it to cover video, the desktop and everything else they’ve shoehorned in there has ruined it’s simple appeal.

Adobe is trying to bring in the Feds

From Bloomberg.com U.S. antitrust enforcers are considering an investigation of Apple Inc. following a complaint from Adobe Systems Inc., according to people familiar with the matter. Adobe says Apple is stifling competition by barring developers from using Adobe’s products to create applications for iPhones and iPads, said the people who spoke on condition of anonymity … Continue reading “Adobe is trying to bring in the Feds”

From Bloomberg.com

U.S. antitrust enforcers are considering an investigation of Apple Inc. following a complaint from Adobe Systems Inc., according to people familiar with the matter.

Adobe says Apple is stifling competition by barring developers from using Adobe’s products to create applications for iPhones and iPads, said the people who spoke on condition of anonymity because they aren’t authorized to discuss the case.

The complaint triggered discussions between the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission over which agency should review the allegations of anticompetitive behavior, the people said. Neither agency has decided whether it would open an investigation, one person said.

The problem in Adobe’s plea is that Adobe’s products can certainly be used to develop for iPhone and iPad. Photoshop, Dreamweaver, even Premiere, can be used to create compelling content for iPhone and iPads. Acrobat’s PDF format has long been a first class citizen on the iPhone platform and comes into it’s own on the iPad.

Just not Flash.

And for those of us who choose to use Click2Flash, we can see why. As Adobe have failed to deliver a good experience of Flash on Mac OS X and has no plans to enable Flash on iPhone (note their project was for a cross-compiler, not something that would make Flash on iPhone just work).

This is all about control. It’s Apple’s platform, not Adobe’s. Adobe wants to be everywhere and they’ve asked the Feds to force Apple’s hand here.

The Internet without Flash

Is better than you think. Fewer ads to put a buzzing sound through your speakers, fewer jarring UI clashes, fewer weird pop-ups which obscure the content. With ClickToFlash, it’s like being able to wander through a dodgy neighbourhood but feel safe which is why the trap line for the plug-n is “your web browsing prophylactic”. … Continue reading “The Internet without Flash”

So in all I’m supportive that Flash ain’t coming to the iPhone at all. And I’m confident that we won’t lose Unity, Cocos or other useful frameworks out there.

ADBE vs AAPL

Eighteen months ago, John Paczkowski speculated that Apple may want to use their considerable war chest of cash to buy Adobe. Adobe is currently worth around $18 Bn and Apple has around $30-35 Bn in the bank (Apple themselves are, at the time of this writing, worth $215 Bn. This is why I think Apple … Continue reading “ADBE vs AAPL”

This is why I think Apple has been maintaining such a strong position against Adobe over the last two years. They’re trying to reduce the stock price (as well as maintain control over a platform).

Adobe made less than half a million dollars in income last year and has been increasing it’s debt. We know in comparison that Apple has no debt at all and reported $3.38 billion in profits last quarter (Apple will release their next quarterly results in about two weeks).

[UPDATE: The figures are in thousands so I’m out there. But it means the debt is in thousands as well which puts them about a billion in debt.]

@webtwozero writes:

@cimota why would apple buy adobe? they don’t like flash, which pretty much rules out director too, they after photoshop, and premiere?

They’re after Photoshop, to adopt it in. They’re also after Premiere and Lightroom, with a view to either enhancing or replacing Final Cut Pro and Aperture. I think they’re also after Acrobat, Flex, Flash I reckon they have no good intentions towards them.

GodsWearHats writes:

@cimota AAPL vs ADBE: I don’t think Apple wants them, tbh. Doesn’t strike me as Steve’s style.

They’d already done something similar to the music sector when they purchased eMagic and made Logic Mac-only. And they did the same with Nothing Real and Shake.

Lomifeh writes:

@cimota I don’t really want them to buy adobe. The companies seem too dissimilar in philosophy. I’d prefer them forcing adobe to act right

To my mind, Adobe made their bed when they stopped feature parity on the Mac with the Windows version. They still haven’t rectified this and as a result Apple and Mac users have been treated like second class citizens. On top of that, the use of Flash in video undermined QuickTime, Lightroom undermines Aperture and it’s possible they see Premiere as a competitor to Final Cut Pro.

Adobe has also dragged it’s feet on the releasing apps which take advantage of Mac OS X technologies and there’s no way that Apple would permit Adobe to control access to their OS features the way they already have manipulated the market with Flash. Adobe was one of the major reasons for Carbon due to their reluctance to rewrite their application portfolio in Cocoa – something which still hasn’t been done after ten years of Mac OS X.

If Flash is the real bone of contention here then I’ll be very surprised. Flash video has always been little more than a hack – a compatibility layer that locks video into a proprietary format for later display. the poor performance of Flash on Mac hardware underlines the need for Apple to react. While I may lament the loss of many excellent education and entertainment games which have been developed in Flash, the truth is that many of these games simply will not work with a touch-based interface. They use a lot of facilities such as ‘hover’ which is possible with a virtual cursor but not possible with a touch interface. As a result, running Flash-based games and education tools on the iPad or iPhone would result in a substandard experience with poor performance and in both cases Apple would shoulder the blame.

Is it any wonder that Apple now feels they have to take a strong position.

That said, I feel that last night’s presentation on iPhone OS 4 was a rush-job, meant to try and stop a drama from turning into a crisis. If Adobe had announced CS5 officially and then demonstrated it and Apple had refused to stock the apps in the AppStore, then it would have been bad for both. I do think, on the other hand, that Apple is being curiously heavy handed here.

Flash: a legacy technology

More moaning and griping about the lack of Flash. How it means the web will be broken for most consumers. How it disables the useful content of the web. The only thing we realistically can’t do is use Flash. And what does Flash give us: A way to watch video on the web which was … Continue reading “Flash: a legacy technology”

More moaning and griping about the lack of Flash. How it means the web will be broken for most consumers. How it disables the useful content of the web.

The only thing we realistically can’t do is use Flash. And what does Flash give us:

A way to watch video on the web which was a hack back in the day and remains a performance and battery sucking hack
A way to play games on the web – games which may be aimed at education, training as well as throwing shoes at Dubya’s head.

I will not lament the loss of Flash video. It’s sufficiently abhorrent that I installed Click2Flash and haven’t looked back. As a result, my Mac runs faster, cooler and I’ve fewer Flash-based ads to watch. Yes, it was great when we needed it – when there wasn’t a standard, they stepped in and filled a gap and thanks are due to them for that.

I do think we’re missing a trick with the Flash games – especially those designed for education. The problem being that most of the Flash games out there won’t work on a touch interface properly. They’re based on hitting keys or waving the mouse around, hovering over items and as you can guess now – there is no ‘hover’ in a touch interface. So even with Flash, most of the games won’t work anyway.

The performance issues with Flash are my biggest gripe. I tried to access Flash-based sites using “Flash Mobile” on the Nokia N800 and was constantly disappointed with the performance. Slow, laggy and And this was on their mobile platform?

Adobe has had a decade to get this sorted out but performance always suffers. While doing nothing but watching Flash video, the MacBook Air here routinely hits a load average of 6.0 which is ridiculous. It can play HD video onto a big screen with much less effort. Flash is just sucking CPU cycles, lagging even when only watching video and generally ruining the experience of the web for the rest of us.

But for those ‘designers’ who have designed entire web sites that only work in Flash and don’t provide any sort of fallback? You suck as a designer. You suck.

Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

WTF. This sort of logic is daft and alarmist. Does Word close off the Internet? Does “God of War” sanitise the net? Does “Photoshop” have a net negative impact? These are just apps, little applications that people want – that the market wants. They don’t sanitise the Internet, they don’t restrict anyone. As long as … Continue reading “Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.”

WTF. This sort of logic is daft and alarmist.

Does Word close off the Internet? Does “God of War” sanitise the net? Does “Photoshop” have a net negative impact?

These are just apps, little applications that people want – that the market wants. They don’t sanitise the Internet, they don’t restrict anyone. As long as you have a web browser you can go anywhere you want.

Except for Flash, of course.

But then when Adobe was locking up the ‘net in closed, proprietary DRM’ed Flash, with entire web sites developed in their inaccessible muck, no-one listened because no one cared. So the difference here is simply hypocrisy.

Apple at least is telling people to build their web sites using open standards. At least they’re pushing a Flash-free future and they’re not telling you to create apps to replace them – YOU’RE ASKING FOR THEM. We all want features that don’t yet exist in HTML5. We want these things and we want them now.

Every time I visit a web site which is 100% built in Flash with no open standard fallback I think “This company is scum”. Strong words but that’s what happens when you subscribe to total lock-in.

We got Youtube, Vimeo, CBS, iPlayer and TED. Woohoo!

Mike Cane pointed this out: Think about this – what are the big sites for online video? Youtube and Vimeo (both have H.264 in beta), CBS are trialling it and iPlayer is also there if you’re in the UK. Other than Youtube, Vimeo and iPlayer, I only watch TED videos and now that’s going H.264 … Continue reading “We got Youtube, Vimeo, CBS, iPlayer and TED. Woohoo!”

Mike Cane pointed this out:

Think about this – what are the big sites for online video?

Youtube and Vimeo (both have H.264 in beta), CBS are trialling it and iPlayer is also there if you’re in the UK. Other than Youtube, Vimeo and iPlayer, I only watch TED videos and now that’s going H.264 too.

After this it’s just Hulu for the Americans and what are you really left with? The ITV player? 4OD? Do we care?

I met with the BBC Trust several months ago and recommended that they look at H.264 across the board. I also recommended they push hard to beat their most fervent competitor (video piracy) and offer a better service than can be found on bittorrent. Bittorrent, to the BBC, is little more than a distribution channel they have no control over. It should be in their interest to provide a better service which will give people high quality video that they do have control over, that they can gain useful statistics of, that they can count eyeballs from.

I guessed it fell on deaf ears. Have to see what happens.

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