After the cell phone war started to heat up, especially with the iPhone 3G and 3GS, people thought Steve Jobs was crazy for not using Adobe Flash on the iPhone. Every Android phone out there was using flash and so to use HTML5 over it was looked down on as absurd.
That was until last fall when Adobe announced that they would be discontinuing Flash in the mobile market. It was a “better late than never” victory for Apple and a perfect “told you so” moment for Steve. Up until now, no one knew if there was going to be a gradual easing out of mobile Flash or one quick, swift cut off. We now have our answer and quick and swift it is.
Adobe has said that it is not going to be allowing Flash after August 15th. Not exactly sure what this will mean for android devices, but I am guess an adjustment period is in the works. Adobe had the following to say:
“Beginning August 15th we will use the configuration settings in the Google Play Store to limit continued access to Flash Player updates to only those devices that have Flash Player already installed. Devices that do not have Flash Player already installed are increasingly likely to be incompatible with Flash Player and will no longer be able to install it from the Google Play Store after August 15th…. In many cases users of uncertified devices have been able to download the Flash Player from the Google Play Store, and in most cases it worked. However, with Android 4.1 this is no longer going to be the case, as we have not continued developing and testing Flash Player for this new version of Android and its available browser options. There will be no certified implementations of Flash Player for Android 4.1.“
I think this is interesting news because it further goes to show that ability that Steve Jobs had to look into a market and see if it was going to be a winning bet.
Many people talk about his uncanny knack for rooting out a winning gamble before it was in play and by choosing not to implement Adobe Flash in iOS devices, that’s exactly what he did.
What are your thoughts? Anyone surprised by this news? Comment down below and share your thoughts
