Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple

February 22, 2010 Written by James Middleton

During Mobile World Congress in Barcelona last week, we caught up with Mark Doherty, Adobe’s mobile evangelist for the Flash platform, who gave us a demonstration of Flash Player and Adobe Air running on Android.

Flash is increasingly seen as an essential part of the web experience, and as you can see from the video, Android users get the full Flash experience. Yet the technology’s absence on the iPhone’s spec sheet has been duly noted.

Doherty told telecoms.com: “We have done a lot of work to build Flash Player for the iPhone, but Apple at this time haven’t decided to have Flash on the iPhone. We encourage them and have demonstrated that it works really well on other platforms and at some point in time the apple user base will start demanding the full internet.

“Today 70 per cent of games on the web are Flash based and 75 per cent of video is played back through Flash Player. Apple just seems to want to have some control over their ecosystem and effectively tax their developers. But our business model is about selling tools and enabling our developer customers and content providers to get access to consumers and that’s why they use Flash because it allows them to do that in a consistent manner across all screens.”

Doherty said he believes the pressure will build on Apple and force it ultimately to support Flash on the iPhone. “Recently seven million or so iPhone users have actually come to our player download centre to download Flash Player because they didn’t know it wasn’t available. So now we have a special page up telling these visitors that Apple is restricting open technologies like Flash,” he said.

Android

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Tags; Adobe, Android, Apple, developers, Flash, Android, Apple, Barcelona, Content & Applications, Featured Videos, Handsets & Devices, News & Analysis, iPhone
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  • I am currently surfing the web with a browser running the click to flash blocker which stops any Flash content from loading or running. Have been using it for three years and don’t miss flash one tiny bit. My browser loads pages quickly and has NEVER crashed. Flash could NEVER be called an essential part of the web and Mark Docherty is simply talking up his job.

    Reply to Mark on Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple

  • “Doherty said he believes the pressure will build on Apple and force it ultimately to support Flash on the iPhone.”
    Doherty is mistaken.
    Why will pressure build – Adobe has just demo’d Flash on Android!
    If you want a smartphone with Flash buy an Android phone, simple.
    No pressure on anybody.

    Reply to iPad Developer on Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple

  • I do want to play Dofus on the iPhone. or the iPad. the facts about gaming and flash are there. you may argue about stability and the typicall “it’s only gaming”… but the safari still crashes in the iphone even without Flash way too often, and i’d say “it’s gaming… no less!”
    anyway, enough ranting, back to jobhunting ;-)

    Reply to overloaded on Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple

  • Wtf flash player is part of all internet browser essentials whoever said it isn’t is talking from the ass

    Reply to Master G on Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple

  • I also use some add ons in Firefox which block Flash contents. You have to click on the Flash contents to activate them. I haven’t done that in years. I don’t think I am not missing anything significant.

    I absolutely disagree with Master G.

    Reply to IKE on Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple

    • I cannot imagine my life without ad-blockers but I do not ban Flash globally. Why? How you can say you don’t miss anything. If you ban all Flash content, you cannot see the video in this article so = you can definitely miss something.

      Reply to Oldes on Adobe demos Flash on Android, blasts Apple
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