The ad goes on to say what Adobe DOES NOT Love about Apple.

Now, I’m not going to write an extensive piece on Tech Titan Passive-aggressivism. This is simply meant to be an extension of the original article Apple, Adobe…The New Tech War?.

Many are trying to paint Apple as an evil corporate tech giant trying to control the world and its content. However, all of Apple’s developer tools for the devices in question (iPhone, iPad, iPod touch) are free of charge. Anyone can develop HTML 5 (Apple’s replacement for Flash video on these devices) for free. No licensing, no paid developer tools, no plugins. Adobe is the one who loses money if Flash finally dies its overdue death. Adobe is the Desktop Publishing industry’s Microsoft.

I’ve downgraded my Adobe “rating” from “I like them” to “I accept them.”

Steve, thank you for protecting the integrity of your products and the unparalleled user experience of your products. Keep up the good work!

Today, Adobe returned fire with a response slamming Jobs’ claims that Flash is unstable, insecure and hinders performance. Jobs further decried Flash as an outdated, closed technology that is not suited for mobile devices with touch screen interfaces. On the surface, these claims seem like in your face insults to Adobe and this technology platform that has been well established since the late 90′s.

The Facts
The truth is, Steve Jobs is right. From industry developers, consultants and techies across the web and around the world. Flash is not only dead, it has had its hey day and simply never caught on as it was intended to.
Since the late 90′s me and my tech buddies were dreaming of a day when all web sites would be 100% Flash based. HTML was dead (we thought) and today, there’s some amount of Flash on what seems like nearly every web site we visit, but those sites are still primarily HTML and Javascript based. Flash became the de-facto standard for showing cross platform, cross browser video on a web page.
So what’s the problem with Flash? Why hasn’t it truly taken over the world? Why has CNN, Wall Street Journal and many many other sites removed Flash based video from their web presences?

Because Steve Jobs is correct. Flash is difficult. The development tools, originally created by Macromedia (later acquired by Adobe in April of 2005) are cumbersome, unfriendly and non-standard to web developers. Flash, as a technology platform is CLOSED, you must rely on Adobe (a corporate monolith, slow to adapt) to update its tools, close security holes and support new hardware platforms. To view Flash on the web you must also install a 3rd party plugin for your web browser. If the plugin does not exist, you cannot view the content. This has been a confusing issue for users over the years.
Flash, as Steve Jobs implies, is an outdated technology, and Adobe with their “return fire” is trying to paint Apple as a controlling tech entity blocking out others’ technology for their own greed and corporate interests. In reality, all of the claims that Jobs made in his open letter are true and accurate, from a technical as well as user experience perspective. Apple simply wants to move forward away from closed standards and a technology that was needed in its day but has long since been deemed outdated.
So what do we do? What replaces Flash…especially video?
As I’ve read recently in a headline, it really was HTML5 that killed Flash, not Apple. HTML5 is cross browser, cross platform and requires no special plugins. It runs natively to a web browser, runs on existing iPhones, Blackberries, iPads and other smartphones and is an OPEN Standard.
So, Adobe, let it go. Let’s move forward. Flash is dead.

While I do agree there should be some built-in protection that goes beyond the content providers simply self-policing, I strongly disagree with this law as it is written and I believe it was conceived prematurely in the history of the Internet, while the technology (web browsers and such) still had a lot of maturing to do to what it is today so the authors of this law could be as informed as possible.

The Solution

I propose a combination of voluntary and legally enforcable controls from both ends.  Action on the part of the content providers as well as security controls built-in to web browsers.

I will start with the voluntary.  Currently, there actually is a content rating system on the Internet (hidden HTML tags in web pages).  However, very few web sites and content providers use it as it is purely voluntary and there are no repercussions for not rating your content.  I believe this part should remain voluntary.  As it is completely impractical to monitor millions of web pages.  Utilizing these hidden “ratings” tags, pages will be rated by their own creators.  The creators will have motivation to accurately rate their content, read on.

So how do we protect the viewer?  This is where the law steps in…  Require web browsers to provide parental controls (with REAL security) locking and unlocking certain ratings for their young web surfers.  Any UNRATED pages will simply be blocked so the unsuspecting web browser cannot stumble onto an inappropriate site simply because that site hasn’t rated their pages yet.  This mechanism is not unlike the “V-chip” law that requires televisions to acknowledge ratings of broadcasts.  This may block much of the Internet at first, but the protection is there. (Currently, child content protection software for computers actually does block most of the Internet, unfortunately, it also blocks valuable, legitimate content mistakenly as well.)

If a “clean” site wants to be sure all browsers can view it, they MUST rate their site’s pages, hence the motivation.  Requiring web browsers to recognize content ratings will encourage any legitimate organization to rate their pages.  Almost “overnight” most of the valuable web will be rated as it takes relatively minimal effort to add these tags.

A “certified” web browser would be one that meets specific requirements.  Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, Mozilla’s Firefox and Apple’s Safari web browser constitute nearly 100% of all web browsers used (especially those used by children) and those organizations would find it in their best interest to get this certification.  It wouldn’t be required certification, but parents would at least have a choice in web browsers and know that, with certification, real protection is there.

What about inaccurate content ratings that can fool the browser into showing inappropriate content?

Yes, this is a risk and it is also the part of the cost of having truly Free Speech.  But there is a solution for this as well…a realistic one.

Utilizing a fraud reporting system (similar to SPAM ‘blacklist’ services) browsers can “double-check” a site’s credibility with the reporting organization (it can do this real time).  So, as soon as a viewer sees incorrectly rated material, they can report it.  With enough reports, the browsers will see that a “G” rated site, for example, isn’t really G rated and blocks it from the viewer as needed.  Further, the domain can be threatened to be locked for presenting incorrectly rated pages after a number of reported violations. (This may also be written into the new law so the new rating system requirements have “teeth” as it were).  Again, the law would not require ratings, just that the ratings, when used, are accurate.

So, it’s mostly still a voluntary system.  As it should be.  However, the law is simply providing a realistic mechanism so that we may more easily protect our children while still leaving our precious First Amendment intact.

Notice I referred to IE as the ‘most common’ browser, not necessarily the ‘most popular.’ The most popular browser would be the one that’s not laser-etched into every orifice of your operating system, one you may have had to download and install, and preferred over the ‘embedded browser.’

Redmond’s tech and innovation leader had to lose another 10% of their browser share before seeing a business need to add a single feature that was clearly a powerful ‘move away’ factor.

However, I think they’re too late. Waiting almost 10 years before witnessing a noticeable trend in technology and user interface is too long, an eternity in this industry. This is enough of a message to your user base that you don’t really care what your users ACTUALLY want. You only care about what you think they _should_ want. Do I hear Marx turning in his grave?

Now we have Safari for Windows and Mac, yet another web browser that’s had tabs for years and even on the Mac, Safari is not etched into every crevasse of the OS.

I ditched “the people’s web browser” quite a few years ago…

Go Firefox and Safari!