David Flatley > Actual RIA info > Flash Player too slow for iPhone?
Flash Player too slow for iPhone?
Or the iPhone is just another piece of O’Crapple. O’Crapple, my word for over priced crap from Apple. According to Information Week, Steve Jobs was quoted as saying that the Flash Player for the desktop
performs too slow to be useful on the iPhone
and that the mobile version of Flash
is not capable of being used with the Web
Steve Steve Steve. This from the same company that makes mice with one button. Now before we start a flame war where I’m accused of hating Macs, let me first say that I was a Macintosh user way before I ever used Windows. I currently use both. In fact, I was just looking to upgrade my G4 since it’s an old paper weight now. So rather than sort through the silly prices, I figured a new Mac Mini would suit my purposes just fine. While searching for one, I found heaps of them that were preloaded with…..oh man, Windows OS?! Ah yes, the old legacy of the Apple logo.
Buy an Apple machine, with the Mac OS ::cough cough UNIX cough cough:: with a nice new Intel chip, and wait……now you can get them with Windows installed? So what exactly warrants the insane prices? I’m getting a Mini because I refuse to pay a hoard of money for an Intel based, Windows OS dual boot with Unix. I can build my own box for far less 🙂
What’s wrong with you Steve? Now you’re giving Adobe some crapple because you say the iPhone, over priced ,AT&T one-widget-wonder of a miracle though it may be, won’t run the Flash Player (installed on over 98% of the world’s computers) fast enough? Why not just hand over it’s inards George Hotz, I’m sure he’ll get it up and running for you.
iPods and iTunes that you need a credit background check (practically) to play your freakin’ MP3s on? I have to say, I’m honestly not digging the whole Apple thing over the past few years. I can’t say that I’m sad I (a Flash and Flex developer) won’t be developing for the iPhone – oh crapple, NO! Won’t Bill Gates just hurry up and buy Jobs out already, don’t you owe him that much Bill?
Unless he’s got awesome evidence to prove it, and I’m leaning towards iPhone being a slow, over priced pile of crapple, than Jobs’ comments seem right up there with the folks who leave messages all over forums about how Flash is good only for annoying ads. Can you say, out of touch? I know, some of you will say ya but the iPhone allows this and that now, but to that I answer ” iPhone, iAmAnOverPricedPileOfCrapple” it’s the same crap. Sorry, but that’s about where I’m at now. I’ll still get my Mini because I MUST offer Mac support for my applications, but other than that, I think I’ll nail it to the wall pretty much just to show off the little Apple logo. I was thinking of just buying a cheap Dell Linux box, ripping out the guts and stuffing them in a shoe box with the Apple sticker on it and telling my clients that it’s a genuine “iAmNotFastEnough”.
Steve, I’m sure George would be willing to spend a weekend away from World of WarCraft and have a look at getting the Flash Player to work fast enough on your iPhone if you’d just ask him. Either that or take a look at the few 450 million Flash enabled devices that Ryan Stewart mentions, and maybe ask one of the companies who created them where they bought their hardware from.
I believe in you Steve!
P.S. Please send me an iPhone 🙂 but not until you get the Flash Player working on it, otherwise just send me a Mini instead.
I think Apple should come to terms and give up on this “Quicktime is better than Flash”. You’ll observe that even on their site, never has flash been used, even Microsoft despite silver light still uses flash extensively and embrace it cos it’s good. It’s more than the flash player being slow on the iPhone, it’s about Apple accepting the fact that Flash is good!
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It’s not that Flash is good only for annoying ads, it’s that Flash “is” the number one implementation choice for all of the people who make those annoying ads. Tough to hit any major site these days and NOT get 300K of Flash-based advertising shoved down your DSL line. Thank goodness for Flashblock.
Hi David, those 450 millions of phones are not capable of surfing the Flash web either, since FlashLite is not capable of rendering content designed for the full Flash plug-in, so should we call all these devices crapola as well?. Flash 9 is desigend for desktop PC, and requires a pretty large memory bandwidth (the player do not use any harware rendering) and the one of iPhone and other mobile devices is not that large, so even with a decent processor, Flash will perform pretty bad when the graphic to render is large. iPhone has a 480 x 272 x 32 bits screen vs (i.e.) Nokia N95 that has 240 x 320 x 16 bits, if you do the math you’ll see that rendering a screen on the iPhone takes 4 times more memory transfers compared to the N95. When and if Adobe will make a player capable of rendering vectors using the GPU rather than CPU and main memory, you’ll propably find a version that doesn’t suck on your preferred mobile. Also, the AS3 VM (Tamarin) has not been ported to ARM yet and so it is incapable of jitting ActionScript to native assembler code, this would introduce more slowness into an eventual iPhone Flash player. Steve do not have any particular reason for not introducing the player on the iPhone, he just want a version that works.
@Isaac:
Absolutely agreed. I think Jobs’ comment was aimed more at marketing QuickTime, but the whole world is using Flash Player, so it’s kind of a silly comment to make. If there are issues with Flash Lite on mobile devices, then you’d think he would definitely still accept the fact that Flash Player dominates the web, but maybe work with Adobe to hone it for mobile rather than just say no Flash on iPhone, but instead let’s use QuickTime.
@Michael:
Agreed, that’s the argument I hear from a lot of people who don’t really understand Flash Player. They say it’s only good for annoying ads, when in fact that’s just the cheesy implementation that hoards of ad companies use it for. Jobs’ comment seemed to me to be more along those lines of just dismissing Flash Player as some toy in an effort to market QuickTime.
Over all, I’ve been using Macs for years and my iPod etc, and I probably always will, but I don’t like Apple’s approach lately. Their products are way too expensive in comparison with the rest of the market, not to mention that the company relies on Unix, Intel, and even Windows OS sometimes when other companies are selling Macs with Windows installed on Apple computers. For Jobs to just dismiss Flash seems absurd to me.
@Emanuele:
I do use Apple products myself, so I can’t just dismiss the iPhone as crapola, you’ll have to forgive my ranting when I first read the article. And I can’t speak for performance on each device, or the iPhone specifically for that matter, but I do agree with Ryan Stewart that 450 Million flash enabled devices can’t be wrong. Beyond a doubt, Adobe would always enhance Flash Lite in the future to make a better experience, but it sounds to me like Jobs’ comment was aimed more at promoting QuickTime than discussing actual limitations of the Flash Player. Most of my friends who do have iPhones use hacked versions to run software on them, and they say they’re happier with the iPhone post-hacking 🙂
I think overall, I agree with what Isaac said, Apple just needs to accept the fact that Flash Player is good, and getting better all the time. And in my own humble opinion, I’m not nuts about Apple’s high priced products lately that don’t seem to keep up with technology in general. Over the years, Mac OS switched over and is now based on Unix, Macs have Intel chips now, I think Jobs knows whats going on, he was just trying to promote QuickTime.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a fan of Apple in general, just really pizzled lately with a lot of their moves. When I get my Mini, it’ll have its Intel chip, two button mouse (not from Apple) and it’s OS is really Unix with a pretty face on it, yet it’ll have it’s shiny Apple logo on top. All of which is fine, and I commend Apple for moving into the real world and building machines and devices that can keep up, but Jobs should realize his past moves and rethink the comments he tells shareholders before he just blurbs out “Flash too slow for iPhone”. To that I say bah! 😀
youtube.com/watch?v=pVDCJRxZd04
Hail to the Jobs ;>
Ehem, don’t think I could have summed it up better, but agreed, hail to the Jobs!
I think Flash should make the fix, not Apple. 2 cents.
@Remy,
Yup, actually Adobe is making a version of the Flash Player specially for the iPhone. But I think Apple should get with the program, I mean, I just got my Mini and iChat doesn’t work with hardly any USB webcams? Oops iCantChat…..all hail the Jobs!
You all do realize that QuickTime is superior to flash, correct? (go ahead argue with me, but when you go into professional video and audio, you’ll find out that QuickTime formats are essentially the only formats they produce) Well, I have hunch that maybe Steve didn’t want flash shitting up the iPhone. Because it would litterly be the most clunky part of the iPhone. So QuickTime was put on there instead?
Just a thought though.
@hardwarecompugeek,
Superior to Flash how? I don’t remember seeing QuickTime produce any cutting edge RIAs that allow real-time server pushed data, unless you count all the bugs that allowed hackers to penetrate your machine 🙂 heh heh jk.
But QuickTime is definitely great for video, although that wasn’t the issue. YouTube is using FP because of the penetration and speed, however most people I work with dump their QT videos into the Flash before publishing so there are no issues with codecs and so on and so forth.
Steve, or anyone else didn’t want Flash on the iPhone solely for video, it’s for the web experience in general – and for video purely, whatta ya think hes gonna push? 😉 I think he wanted more attention from Adobe so he just arbitrarily decided to diss them in front of the world thinking his one phone is the be-all and end-all, rather than bringing any performance issues to Adobe directly – working with your partners.
Most of my friends with iPhones are using hacked versions and say they are much happier. I didn’t think Jobs would be dumb enough to just poo-poo FP on the iPhone, even Gates was smarter than that. He signed up to use the FP while he bides his time hoping to produce something (SilverLight) worthy of dominating the market, and none of this has to do purely with video anyway, that’s the RIA race.
I think Jobs just wants a hug. Hail Jobs…
fix flash i guess:)
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LOL that’s classic. Are you sure Bill Gates is a smart guy?
(joking of course)
There was an interesting article today in the Daily Telegraph and an interview with Steve Wozniak – co-founder of Apple. Although he left Apple in 1987, the article was interesting as Wozniak is very much against the way that Apple has sort to control the iphone in a closed off system. He predicts ipod’s days are limited
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Ya I agree, I think Jobs could do a better….er… job at the way he’s handling the iPhone anyway. Dont be a Gates Jobs 🙂