Flash, HTML5 and Rotten Apples

Flash has its own “AIR”?

Flash has been the most popular multimedia platform originally acquired by Macromedia but currently owned and developed by Adobe Inc. As we all know that Flash is powering the web in form of animations, video/audio, advertisements and various other web components. Adobe Flash has strengthened its root with its (RIA) Rich Internet Applications deployment project and currently releasing the Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR), a cross-platform runtime environment which can be used to build, using Adobe Flash, rich Internet applications that can be deployed as a desktop as well as mobile application. It recently surpassed 100 million installations worldwide. In the mobile web world, Adobe has made significant developments with its Open Screen Project partnering with mobile industry giants like Nokia, Palm & Motorola to provide a consistent application interface across mobile devices and other consumer electronics.

Yes Flash on Android,  not tabled by Google tablet…

Adobe also announced the first mobile device Android OS based new HTC Hero with Flash Player running inside of the web browser. At recently concluded Mobile World Congress, Barcelona, Adobe announced the Adobe Air based applications and support for Google Android and Apple iPhone. Also, At Mobile World Congress, NVIDIA showcases Flash Player 10.1 and Adobe AIR on Tegra-powered tablet device.

This video is in Flash, sorry for iPhone or iPAD users..

Steve Jobs on Flash: “i” don’t FLASH, it rots my Apple…

So considering this scenario, there is no doubt on compatibility and interoperability fronts for Adobe Flash with tablets but, this is not what Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs thinks. He has openly criticized the stability of Flash, claiming that when one of Apple’s Macintosh computers crashes, “more often than not” the cause can be attributed to Flash. Additionally, he labeled Flash as “buggy” and that in the future, the role of Flash will be diminished due to the increasing adoption of HTML5. HTML5 is the proposed next standard for HTML 4.01, XHTML 1.0 and DOM Level 2 HTML which aims to reduce the need for proprietary plug-in-based rich internet application (RIA) technologies such as Adobe Flash, Microsoft Silverlight, Apache Pivot, and Sun JavaFX.  The HTML5 editors are Ian Hickson of Google, Inc. and David Hyatt of Apple, Inc . This shows the Google’s smart strategy in supporting HTML5 as well as Adobe’s proprietary AIR platform integration in its existing products but this is not the case with Apple. May it be Apple’s successful iPhone or the recently launched and heavily hyped iPAD, Apple have distanced it users from enjoying the widespread Flash based rich media on its smart but now not so smart devices. Almost 70% of websites and games are currently Flash based on the internet. Below is what users experience on their Apple devices and  have coined it as the “The Blue Lego of Death”

Why some people hate Flash ?

We cannot say that Flash is clean too. Flash also has his own disadvantages which it’s the reason why many applications are running on the other competing and popular platforms such as Microsoft Silverlight and has led to the recent push for development of open standard – HTML5 due to the lack of availability of free players which will solve the similar purpose as Flash does.

The argument is that the Flash is not native to the system-on-chip ARM chip architecture which is widely used in Apple’s A4 processors for tablets and smartphones but was built primarily for x86 PC architecture.  It is also claimed that Flash based applications drain the battery to 50% and loads the GPU/CPU (graphics and central processing units) decreasing device efficiency which might reduce the iPAD’s  claim of 10hrs battery life down to  5hrs, puts Apple’s business model at risk. It is contradictory as we have witnessed the Adobe AIR platform successful integration into other smartphones and tablets in the industry. This is evident from the demo above for Nvidia’s Tegra powered Android tablet which proudly presents the Asobe Flash’s integration and the Tegra powered tablet runs on nothing but an ARM architecture processor in its system-on-chip package….So it is possible.

Mobile network Operator likes Flash? Might Not..

Also Flash is seen detrimental for the mobile operator networks serving the ever bandwidth hungry smartphone devices, because if all the iPhone users start watching flash powered HD videos on for example Hulu.com may be in San Francisco or New York, the network will come crashing down in minutes.

Adobe’s Strategy: Customer Lock-in

The point is Adobe with Flash has a greater customer lock-in and this has been its major business strategy which can be seen with our dependence on Adobe PDF too. Also to note, any large application maybe on Flash, Silverlight or any other platform will certainly consume memory, GPU and CPU draining the battery. So for Apple to be successful their long standing abstinence from Flash will not help them unless they come up with a better solution quickly.

Growth of HTML5

Assessing the current situation, we can see the internet industry’s huge dependence on Adobe Flash. Henceforth, companies are adopting and developing open source solutions in this domain like HTML5 standard which is seen as the future of the web but it can take a long time considering the complexity of HTML5’s current working model. Also,there are many advanced effects that are only available in Flash or Silverlight or Java. Some serious work will have to be done for HTML5 to catch up with Flash. Though, YouTube has already rolled out use of the video element in HTML5. Other web sites and applications are using Canvas and offline storage. Also, there is a de-facto working subset of HTML5 that is already starting to appear, both on the “desktop Web” as well as the mobile Web. Though Google is driving HTML5 for its Chrome OS but its reliance on Flash still can be seen with Google Maps (Streetview) and in Gmail (multiple-file upload). Also there are thousands of Flash based games, applications (within Facebook/MySpace), video players, website animations, videos, etc. Adobe is set to release Flash 10.1 some time this year, and pretty much every mobile device or mobile operating system maker, including Research in Motion (RIMM), Samsung, Palm (PALM), and Google (GOOG), is prepping their devices for the upgraded Flash.

Wait and Watch to see the Act

So now we will have to wait and see how quickly Apple replies to the Flash vs HTML5 battle and also how Adobe will strive to improve its performance in not draining out their customer’s business models.