Apple's engineering decisions have produced a platform that works pretty well and is enjoyable to develop for. They've sold a lot of handsets as a result. If it weren't for these decisions, then the sales wouldn't have happened and Adobe wouldn't be trying to strongarm their way onto the platform.
In short, decisions such as not supporting Flash are in fact part of the OS's appeal and this entire debate is bizarre.
Furthermore, Adobe's entire argument that developers and consumers should shun Apple's lock-in for Adobe's lock-in is absolutely absurd!
edit: In thinking about it, the danger of an Adobe (or any other vendor) monopoly on the write once, run anywhere application market is huge. It's several orders of magnitude greater in significance than that of Apple controlling the development environment for its own devices.
Apple will have a large market share in internet-connected devices for quite some time, but it probably won't ever command a majority of marketshare in any given segment (it will command an abnormally huge amount of revenue share though, the way it does with PCs and now phones). If you don't like what Apple offers you as a developer, there are plenty of other targets. If Adobe gets its way and controls the runtime everywhere, and even assuming it works and is fast everywhere (it won't be), then all developers are probably screwed.
Lastly, it's disappointing that Google in recent times has reneged on its relative commitment to HTML5 given its Android and Chrome development decisions to bundle flash into both platforms. This is a much more significant development, with much greater consequences, than changes to the iPhone dev agreement because Android and Chrome, in various forms, are likely to be run on the plurality of devices going forward. We need HTML5 to succeed flash, but this won't happen until the infrastucture is built: implementations need to get faster, dev tools need to be built, et cetera and Google's decisions have likely impeded this process by removing some of the incentive for these things to happen.
While native apps are amazing and performs real well on iPhone and iPad,performance of web apps is a disaster on these devices. iPhone struggles to render even the basic javascript effects properly. Having said that i am not disappointed by this. I do not expect the iPhone to provide a full blown internet experience. Its a freaking phone! I still dont get why Adobe tries so hard to provide Flash on Iphone.
On the other hand, the choppy -almost unusable- HTML5 experience on iPad, makes me feel like these devices arent optimized to provide rich experience within the browser realm. Perhaps Apple wants us to depend more on the app store than the web based apps (Google's business).
"Furthermore, Adobe's entire argument that developers and consumers should shun Apple's lock-in for Adobe's lock-in is absolutely absurd!"
I don't have a problem with blocking the Flash plug-in. What I have a problem with is blocking native iPhone apps that were developed in Flash (even if they pass the review process).
But, I totally agree with the "write once, develop anywhere" danger. IMO, this is the real reason Apple is blocking all types of Flash content. Sounds great to a developer but it would completely change the uniqueness of the App store.
But Flash is popular with developers for building smartphone apps. Many developers use automatic translation tools - some built by Adobe - to convert Flash code so their apps can run on Apple gadgets.
"We publish the specifications for Flash — meaning anyone can make their own Flash player. Yet, Adobe Flash technology remains the market leader because of the constant creativity and technical innovation of our employees."
Read: our player remains the only viable one because we keep moving the goalposts on everyone else.
Also: because they're lying — they don't publish the full Flash spec. Any alternate Flash implementation simply doesn't work on video sites with encrypted streams, which means it will never gain traction.
We believe that consumers should be able to freely access their favorite content and applications, regardless of what computer they have, what browser they like, or what device suits their needs
That just doesn't jive with reality. Adobe is the sole gatekeeper of where Flash is available and how good the experience is. I don't see Flash Player 10 available for FreeBSD/PPC, NetBSD/anything, Solaris/SPARC, Linux/SPARC, Linux/MIPS, nothing for IA64, etc. Of course I don't blame Adobe for not supporting these platforms but the point is no one else can offer Flash support on them either.
You are absolutely right. How long did has the UNIX community had a substandard, or non-existent flash player? Flash 10 still crashes alsa on my Gentoo systems. It seems petty that they can't open source the player. The community will fix it for free! And then they have the nerve to criticize Apple, which is clearly looking out for it's own best interest(Which I don't support, I haven't bought any Apple products). This is blatant hypocrisy.
Is your mom qualified to make the choice? Does she know what impact it will have to install it? Chances are that's a big NO. Implications of this? She will install it because uncle Joe's crappy photo gallery site needs flash, and then she'll proceed to complain about the iPhone crashing, go to Apple for support because "her battery life sucks", etc.
Apple makes consumer electronics devices, you can't install new codecs on your DVD player and you can't install new VM's on your iPhone.
"We believe that Apple, by taking the opposite approach, has taken a step that could undermine this next chapter of the web — the chapter in which mobile devices outnumber computers, any individual can be a publisher, and content is accessed anywhere and at any time."
So Apple is undermining the advancement of the web by advocating the use of HTML5 over Flash? And how is choosing to not support Flash on their platform undermining the web?
Adobe's rebuttal to Apple on all of this sounds like the movie industry: biding for relevancy when their middle-man is becoming obsolete.
"When markets are open, anyone with a great idea has a chance to drive innovation and find new customers. Adobe's business philosophy is based on a premise that, in an open market, the best products will win in the end — and the best way to compete is to create the best technology and innovate faster than your competitors."
Is it just me or does that perfectly explain Apple's business philosophy regarding iPhone OS as well? The mobile market is open. Apple doesn't have a monopoly or a majority of the market. There are plenty of other phones and carriers to choose from. The bottom line is Apple is trying to make the best product with the best technology and faster innovation than anyone else – and they are succeeding. Adobe is just-now-almost-ready-to-release-a-beta of a mobile optimized flash player. The iPhone has been out and innovating for 3 years. Adobe is not following it's own philosophy very well.
App store approval, no flash player, 3.3.1, all the decisions Apple have made that have got people angry are all explained by them trying to make the best mobile experience they can. Is it the best ever? Is it the best for you? Is it the only way? If you answer 'no' to any of these you have two options: buy something else or make something better.
Having flash on the iPhone will not make it a better platform (from Apple's point of view, and mine). Did you see the flash content running on the Nexus One the other day? (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0y7XJI4NN7k) It looks great! If it allows reasonable battery life I want one. But at the same time I want iPhone apps. I don't want the progress of the iPhone and iPad to get stalled trying to get flash to work. Apple can keep innovating in it's way and Adobe can work with Google and HP and whoever else to innovate in another way. They can both coexist.
I think a lot of the issue is Adobe (and by extension flash developers) feel like they are entitled to develop for every platform. Apple has so much mindshare (despite is relatively small market share) that it's the new toy for developers to play with. Flash devs understandably want a piece of it. They are used to being able to write once run everywhere. Adobe is used to being able to tout their ability to allow flash devs to write once run anywhere. Apple's just finally the first company in the position to say no and be able to back it up.
note: I make a living doing flash and web development (5+ years)
Dear other companies that don't make tools according to evo_9's exacting standards - please stop as well, because if your tools aren't good enough, you can't call yourself a tools developer.
I was actually referring to the IDE that one has to use to write ActionScript code for Flash. Not a very intuitive IDE compared to Eclipse, Aptana Studio, VisualStudio, etc.
In short, decisions such as not supporting Flash are in fact part of the OS's appeal and this entire debate is bizarre.
Furthermore, Adobe's entire argument that developers and consumers should shun Apple's lock-in for Adobe's lock-in is absolutely absurd!
edit: In thinking about it, the danger of an Adobe (or any other vendor) monopoly on the write once, run anywhere application market is huge. It's several orders of magnitude greater in significance than that of Apple controlling the development environment for its own devices.
Apple will have a large market share in internet-connected devices for quite some time, but it probably won't ever command a majority of marketshare in any given segment (it will command an abnormally huge amount of revenue share though, the way it does with PCs and now phones). If you don't like what Apple offers you as a developer, there are plenty of other targets. If Adobe gets its way and controls the runtime everywhere, and even assuming it works and is fast everywhere (it won't be), then all developers are probably screwed.
Lastly, it's disappointing that Google in recent times has reneged on its relative commitment to HTML5 given its Android and Chrome development decisions to bundle flash into both platforms. This is a much more significant development, with much greater consequences, than changes to the iPhone dev agreement because Android and Chrome, in various forms, are likely to be run on the plurality of devices going forward. We need HTML5 to succeed flash, but this won't happen until the infrastucture is built: implementations need to get faster, dev tools need to be built, et cetera and Google's decisions have likely impeded this process by removing some of the incentive for these things to happen.