Time for Apple and Adobe to bury the hatchet on Flash

The whole Apple-Adobe Flash battle took an ugly turn last week when Apple announced its new iPhone OS 4.0 and some interpreted the language in the developer's agreement to ban the use of Flash altogether. Needless to say, this did not go over well and the war of words got even harsher when Adobe Flash evangelist Lee Brimelow, (unofficially) told Apple to "screw itself" in his personal blog. I'm as big a fan of Apple products as anyone, and I realize I've gone back and forth on this subject, but I'm here to say, this has gone way too far and it has to stop. Whether each company realizes it or not, it's the customers who are suffering.

iPad/iPhone and Flash

After recently purchasing an iPad and as a regular iPhone user I can tell you that running into the Flash wall on these devices is no fun. If you try to visit any popular video site (except YouTube, which Apple sanctions for some reason), such as Hulu, you get an error message that Flash isn't supported. If you try to play an embedded video in Facebook or click a link to one in an email, the same thing happens. Now, c'mon Apple, these are expected behaviors on any device: You click a video and it plays. You absolutely shouldn't be encountering an error message.

What's more, if you go to a site that even has a single Flash element built in (like a chart), you have to deal with the error message every single time. This is distinctly unfriendly and it really doesn't have to be this way. Apple and Adobe must be able to find some common ground on this, right?

The future isn't now

I realize that HTML5 is coming and I understand that it will probably resolve a lot of these issues at some point in the future, but the future is some nebulous time down the road. Right now, many sites use Flash and for Apple to block it is in some ways inhibiting my experience as a user. I get that Flash can crash (and does), but I've had applications crash because of bugs on the iPhone and iPad and it has nothing to do with Flash. At this point, as nice as these devices are, they aren't without flaws.

It's really time for Adobe and Apple to take a step back, take a deep breath and find a way to bury the hatchet because as things stand right now, users are running in to road blocks. Developers aren't sure where they stand and Apple appears arrogant, rigid and downright unfriendly--not exactly how a company which has built a reputation on being cool and hip wants to be perceived. Adobe needs to work harder to make sure that Flash is bug free and they have to admit there are issues with it.

In the end, if these two companies find a way to work together we all win. For now, we have to deal with immaturity and angry recriminations and error messages when we try to visit a site with Flash running. That doesn't work at all and it's time to deal with it and move on. - Ron