How’s that for a controversial title? But… It’s true… Hear me out!
First of all let me say that I have absolutely nothing against HTML5! Innovation and competition is always good and keeps everyone on their toes. UPDATE: I also want to emphasize that this is not a fight. HTML5 and Flash can live together just fine and can even complement each other!
One of the first blog posts I read this morning was one on AppleInsider. An Apple spokeswoman claimed that Adobe’s Mike Chambers got it all backwards when he blogged about Apple’s closed system. That’s not the part that made me cringe though. She said that “it is HTML5, CSS, JavaScript, and H.264 that are open and standard, while Adobe’s Flash is closed and proprietary“.
Ok… So… Let’s analyze that a little bit… Let’s begin with the biggest claim here: H.264. Last time I checked, H.264 was far from open. It is owned by a private organization known as MPEG LA who said earlier this year that “Internet Video that is free to end users would continue to be exempt from royalty fees until at least December 31, 2015“. Nobody knows what is going to happen after 2015. The patents awarded to MPEG LA don’t expire until 2028. So… to make this clear… H.264 is not open.
So what about HTML5, CSS and JavaScript… Those are open, right? Well yeah. The specs are open meaning that everyone can download those specs and build an application around it to display that language. Hey… Wait a minute… That sounds a lot like Flash! The specs for FLV (Flash video), SWF (the file format for Flash Player), AMF (the binary format for exchanging data) and RTMP (the protocol used for transmission of audio, video, and data) are all published and can be downloaded by anyone.
The specs for HTML5 are decided by the Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group (WHATWG). The WHATWG was founded by individuals of Apple, the Mozilla Foundation, and Opera Software in 2004, after a W3C workshop. Apple, Mozilla and Opera were becoming increasingly concerned about the W3C’s direction with XHTML, lack of interest in HTML and apparent disregard for the needs of real-world authors. Anyone can participate as a Contributor by joining the WHATWG mailing list. The same goes for Flash. Our bugbase is open to anyone and anyone can view bugs and add feature requests.
But the Flash runtime is closed! Ok… Sure… Flash Player is not open source although some parts are. That said… Ask yourself this: Is your browser open source? The only browser that is completely open source is Firefox. Safari is only partly open source (only the WebKit engine). The same can be said about Chrome (in the Chromium project). However, the biggest HTML runtime out there –Internet Explorer (still used by over 50% of all internet users)– is as closed as Flash Player. And so is Opera (even though they are part of the WHATWG).
And with that, I come back to the title of this post: Flash is as open as HTML5 = HTML5 is as open as Flash.
UPDATE: You should also read “HTML5 canvas proprietary Apple technology?” by Leo Bergman and “I’d rather be a Woz” by nothingGrinder. Hat tip to Philippe and Aaron who posted this in the comments.
Note: I’m sure many of you will have some comments on this topic and I have no problem with your comments as long as you keep them constructive and on topic.
Note 2: For those who saw a drop in the comment count: I just disabled and deleted Topsy trackbacks. These are not comments but automatic pingbacks from RTs on Twitter.
(Image credit: Justin Marty)
The difference between HTML5 and Flash is that for the latter you are forced to use the Adobe Flash player. So no, Flash is not as open as HTML5.
I think there are few flaws in your argument that we could probably all focus on a bit more before we agree that Flash is “open”. Adobe’s clearly providing the blueprints – to a point – on how the file format can be produced, the how being the more important focal point of this conversation.
SWF/FLV can be build via 3rd party solutions, yet the specification is quite complex to decode and parse and it’s not an easy thing to replicate. Not to mention it’s governed by Adobe so in a sense what Adobe’s reacting to in terms of Apple changing the game-plan as they see fit, can easily be applied to Adobe (the “trust us” approach isn’t going to fly either).
HTML5 is an open transparent spec (it should be it took them long enough to document and agree on) but the browser model isn’t easily closed off. As you’re not factoring in market pressure as the current browser models have been reduced to a point where WebKit seems to be the primary focal point as a rendering engine and IE team are the only ones really holding out – yet by doing this, they are obviously losing market share.
If you were to trade HTML5 for Flash, it’s in turn the same effect and danger as Apple to Adobe today, in that Adobe own and decide the road map for the Flash runtime, which is an incumbent platform that one realistically couldn’t fairly compete against – the danger here for Adobe is they could effectively fall under the DOJ much like IE+ Windows had as there is no realistic fair compete that can occur on the same format.
Silverlight has made strong moves against Flash but even then it’s still got a long ways to go to reach website saturation levels as Flash has today (ubiquity is a fools errand in statistical arguments) and that took a lot of serious investment and introduced a different file format – that has a lot of open source pieces attached (DLR etc). The reality is, nobody will go against Microsoft or Adobe on these formats other than maybe to extend slightly or to compliment.
Apple, Microsoft and Google will eventually bake HTML5 into the operating system level, it’s a perfect way to force the industry to slow down shift the differentiator factors back to the OS level where the money trail ends really and at the same time it can aggressively push all 3 into a heated content battle much like we saw in the browser wars (its going to suck for us dev/designers but thats just the way it will be).
Adobe have to regroup and figure out a way to judo flip HTML5 into their favor and if that’s a case of making Flash act as an open source rendering engine much like WebKit than this could put a lot of interruption on the big 3 software cartels. Failing that i think it will get pushed aside more and more as if more companies like Apple signal their intent to abandon Flash this can put the entire ecosystem into an interesting tailspin.
(I have no dog in this fight, i dislike all 4 companies equally so its just a sidebar analysis).
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Scott.
I totally agree – well said. I am similarly excited about the possibilities that HTML5 will open up. And it offers some healthy competition to Flash, which has been doing well, but this will force Adobe to do some even more innovative stuff which can only be a good thing.
Another thing you didn’t point out here is that Flash Player is and will continue to be available in all the major browsers, where as how long do we think it will take for IE to adopt HTML5? And then to adhere to the standards properly? It took them over 10 years to get the hang of HTML4! (IE6, anyone?!)
I understand the argument about Flash Player being a proprietary plugin, but it does have 90+% penetration. With over 50% of users still using IE, that means less than 50% of users will have access to HTML5 in the next few years.
@Marco: With the specs for Flash being open, no one is stopping anyone to build an open source Flash Player… And in fact… There already is one: http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/ That said, I don’t think different Flash Players would be a good thing. Look at the fragmentation in browsers. Browser X supports this HTML5 feature set while browser Y doesn’t.
Adobe is also member at W3C, they also have worked on HTML5 specs. If Flash was open-source, it would have been the only technology of choice to render and script HTML 5. For me it talks by itself. HTML5 and Flash must not be rival as they follow the exact same goal. If this has be done, Flash would have been integrated in Webkit/Mozilla for years, at least Internet Explorer would now have followed the same standard in its Internet Explorer 9.
What would Apple had to say to this ? What would Flash opponents have to say to this? It’s a good solution for me, even if it’s a hard move for Adobe, even if it needs a lot of work for them, this is a choice of predilection.
The main argument from opponents of the “open source Flash idea” always say the same thing: “Flash Player embed private codec like H.264 or Fraunhofer MP3 so it can’t be opened”. It’s false. Any open source software embedding licensed software can be open source if the license of the closed libraries it uses authorizes it and the publisher pay the license fee for it. Adobe probably pay MPEG LA for H.264, they also pay Fraunhofer for its use of the MP3 codec and other codedc. As Adobe pay the license fees for it can open source Flash. Recently, even Mozilla corporation discussed to pay the H.264 license fees to MPEG LA.
Nothing prevents Adobe to open Flash Player, but they need to change their business model and obviously this may represent a real challenge for them, a real risk but don’t tell me that’s impossible or a bad idea for the end user.
If you think that open Flash Player sources is a good idea, you can sign a petition to ask Adobe to do so http://www.openplayer.net/
Are you likening the Flash Player to IE?
In my opinion, the Flash player is currently the weakest link in Adobe’s entire strategy. Its performance & feature-set are controlled by only a single corporate entity, whereas browser’s speed & performance are a matter of competition. Chrome, Firefox & Opera are constantly striving to one-up each-other with every release, and now MS seems to be finally joining in with IE9 claiming increased performance for canvas rendering.
You could argue that having multiple versions of the Flash player would cause the same amount of grief we have/had with different browser specifications. But that’s already the case today. I’ve had instances where a new version of the Flash player introduced new bugs that completely broke some of our existing websites/applications.
The Flash player is far from consistent on different browsers and platforms as it is, with some bugs only occurring in IE on Windows XP, others on Safari on Mac, etc…
My point is that Adobe is running out of excuses for not open sourcing the player in its entirety, and it’s only going to hurt it in the long run. Adobe’s strength lies not in the Flash player, but in creating tools for professional creatives, whatever their chosen platform or technology.
What if Adobe talked to all major browserbuilders to build Flash hard-coded into their browser? No more plugins needed, no more extra installs. That way the can all work on bugs related to their browser and their requirements.
If Adobe manages to convince the competitors of Apple to do so, Apple will in time be forced to embrace Flash Player.
To me HTML5 isn’t a problem for Adobe. It has some good things, but you still won’t get the same end-user experience as you would with Flash. HTML5 and Flash can easily work together within one website.
Looking at the conversion-rate of IE6 to IE’later’, I don’t expect HTML5 a regular player until 5 years from now.
@kristof: That’s exactly what we are doing with Chrome: http://www.webkitchen.be/2010/03/30/google-and-adobe-bringing-improved-flash-player-support-in-chrome/
Something to add to your argument :
HTML5 canvas proprietary Apple technology?
http://www.blixtsystems.com/2010/04/html5-canvas-proprietary-apple-technology/
I have no problem with HTML5 or Flash…
The real problem is that Jobs turned HTML5 into a weapon in his personal fight against Adobe and the rest of the world… making it seem as if there really is a Flash VS HTML5 issue… but in reality
it’s non-existent…
@Kristof The dev builds of Chrome are bundled with the Flash Player….
What about the open-source aspect of Flash and HTML5 end-user applications/scripts?
IMHO open-source has its negative aspects as well.
The two main editors of the HTML5 specification are Ian Hickson of Google and David Hyatt of Apple. David Hyatt was the original writer / inventor of the HTML5 Canvas tag technology, which is patented and owned by Apple. Apple also has 3 more patents in the HTML5 specification.
MPEG-LA is not the patent holder of H.264 codec. It is also patented by Apple along with Microsoft and nearly 30 other electronics corporations including SONY. The license for the H.264 codec will eventually cost 5 million dollars.
Flash Player is in fact open source, just not as a completed software. Tthey have released the Actionscript virtual machine and the SWF Specification as open source so anyone who chooses to do so, can build a Flash Player.
For more on the patents and the nature of openness in HTML5 and Flash Player please read this post:
http://blog.nothingGrinder.com/id-rather-be-a-woz
Serge
I think you talk a lot of sense, but Adobe is evolving and I think we will all have to evolve much more quickly over the next few years. GPU rendering has made huge differences to how and where you can run code now, the tools you might use and with Apple blocking Flash, HTML5 will come to the fore much quicker than planned.
The Air on Mobile version of Flash will be the centre of attention, but Adobe tools still have the strength to be the tools of choice for whatever site you are trying to make. Adobe tools have always moved forward each year (although I dread the upgrade price when it comes around) and I always find a reason to use them. Adobe seem to be moving more toward automating tools within a pipeline which will give us the flexibility that we need.
I think there is plenty of room for all in a creative sense.
IanM
No, it isn’t.
And it is beyond me why so many independent Flash Platform developers fail to see it. I completely understand of course why Adobe evangelists downplay it.
It is irrelevant for the so called “open web” whether the Flash Player is going to get open sourced or not. That’s not the point. Microsoft won’t open source their browser, Opera won’t open source their browser, etc.
Relevant is who decides about the development of the data format that a runtime consumes, and the APIs a runtime provides to access that data. In the Flash world that’s SWF and the Flash Player APIs, both controlled by a single vendor: Adobe. In the HTML world that’s HTML and DOM, controlled by many vendors, including you and me, via standards bodies.
Adobe neither provides formal means for other companies and individuals to participate in the development of SWF and Flash Player APIs, nor does it provide detailed work-in-progress specs to the general public for discussion. This effectively rules out the possibility for third parties to provide alternative runtimes. The runtime and its specs are released to the public at the same time.
This is the exact opposite of “open”.
To make matters worse, the specs released by Adobe are incomplete and buggy (e.g. the SWF spec fails to explain how exactly shapes are supposed to be rendered and leaves out information on codecs, the ABC spec is plain wrong on some things) and generally infested with patented technologies.
Of course i understand why it is how it is (and likely always will be). If Adobe were to become truly open and put the development of SWF etc in the hands of standards bodies, the 1.5 year release cycle would become a 10+ years release cycle. Innovation would slow down significantly. I as a Flash Platform developer wouldn’t want that to happen.
However, sorry to say that, but to tout “Flash is as open as HTML5″ is pure FUD.
Serge,
“That’s exactly what we are doing with Chrome: http://www.webkitchen.be/2010/03/30/google-and-adobe-bringing-improved-flash-player-support-in-chrome/”
The rules of ‘open’ are pretty clear:
If you have to work with Adobe to bring better Flash performance to Chrome, it’s not open. By definition.
You’re trying to open-wash Flash, but it’s as open as ActiveX.
Well said Claus. There are some outrageous claims being made by Adobe reps about “openness” lately and this post is up there with the best of them. Good to see someone talking sense.
Hi all,
Well there’s a question here I think I need to ask what is Flash?
Well my arguments are:
Are you talking about Flash as the player (plugin)?
If so I believe you have to address it as partly open, and I don’t intend to blame Adobe on this, SWF format is open, RTMP format is open, H264 (the video format being used in it is not ), so you have to ask yourselves is flash as open as it can be?
For me it is, Adobe can’t be blamed for “giving” you a tool that makes your creativity open (eventually that creativity comes with a cost, if you want to put video in H264 because of the quality and compression of it, you are to blame), it’s all in your mind’s eye to set the game, you can build for flash using the Flex SDK so that you are not bound to a Commercial Tool (be it Flash Builder, Flash, or even FDT , there are others who are free).
Also people advocate being closed as being bad (I know this is walking in a very thin line, but bear with me a couple of lines) but being proprietary protects you as a business, you like to get paid for your works don’t you? You got Intelectual Rights on what you create don’t you? So commercially it’s a protection, and plus paying gives you the right to complaint and be heard, but Adobe went further than that, it supports you as a community (sure it makes their apps better with your contributions, so it’s kind of like an exchange).
Now about comparing it to HTML5, your telling me that a standard promoted by a commercial group of companies is open, well, the specification is … as is adobe’s one on the swf file format, but is html5 really open? Can I have the same behaviour everywhere? Is it that ubiquitous? Also thanks to who does it have the features it is advocating don’t you think it’s kind of like biting the hand that feeds you? Hasn’t adobe given all those features for all these years when everybody forgot about javascript? ( by the way , actionscript is an ecmascript superset, as is javascript ) now all of a sudden ajax is the saviour, html is reborn and what about flash oh it’s evil … come on you’re better than that, where would HTML5 be if it wasn’t for flash?
The “HTML5 is open” argument is pointless anyway: native iPhone apps aren’t written in HTML5.
Apple are forbidding cross-platform *native applications*. That is their main target.
No-one is saying “let us have Flash and not have a web browser” or “let us have Flash and not care about HTML5″ because that’s clearly an absurd point of view. What people are saying is let us build native apps in some cross-platform manner because recoding an app 4 times for 4 different mobile OS’s is a complete waste of our time.
Flash and AIR could give that to us, but Apple don’t want us to have it. Adobe aren’t the childish ones here…
I have to join Claus’s opinion.
Why do you even argue that way? The only problem that I see with flash player right now is that in some things worse its than the html pendants. Some “features” run just buggy and the integration into a html page is just ugly.
People will always have something against Flash – because after all – its a second programming language you need to know, the libraries don’t match with your other “web” tools, the integration in the browser (web experience) is not really cool, some clients still run around with older Player versions than required for your tasks and the knowledge changes faster than in HTML/JS.
Coding in/for HTML5 has a technical advantage these days to flash. Exceptions will die silently. JavaScript doesn’t really stop everything from beeing rendered (text is still available), easy and natural way of content/display seperation; playing back your Youtube video (with html5) will load like anything else in the browser – 100% integration (from context menus, to render updates, javascript access and html based layouting).
I think as developer we’re required to do cutting edge web with flash in order to argue for it. I would prefer if I could use flash for non-cutting edge stuff as well but: It will add a unnecessary dependency – and unnecessary dependencies as any programmers know are “bad” which needs different – explainable – reasons.
That is my explanation for why there are like 10x-100x more JavaScript/HTML developers out there than Flash fellows. Of course they will always be envy it that those who know Flash can do fancy tricks -^_^-
I am tired of this dicussion. I really want to see more innovation in the flash player to show some “HTML5″ lobbyists what you really can do with a closed platform. I think about Stereoscopy, 5.1 audio, cool video seeking( ever tried exact seeking and video syncing in Flash API?), better&faster text rendering, device support (midi, joypad,…) and 3D.
Because that would be web from tomorrow.
If the flash player would properly integrate to the browser and become “hard-to-break” then I think this discussion would soon be over and we could spend our time beeing proud that we do flash and focus on the product.
Sidenote:
Did you recognize that this whole “Flash VS HTML5″ discussion got really in flames with AS3 and the possibility of having exceptions that stop the player? Which leads to People not getting to their content?
I fully agree with Claus here, Flash isn’t ‘open’. I still like the Flash platform, I like HTML5, I like the iPhone OS platform, I like Android. I’m really excited about the apps we can develop on these great platforms.
But I dislike all the FUD coming from Adobe. Developers are not stupid. We see exactly what’s going on. Please stop flooding our inboxes and timelines with your propaganda.
You screwed it up with Apple and now you’re about to screw it up with your developers. Please don’t.
@Claus, Mark, Martin & Dorian: Adobe does listen to it’s users and partners! Like I said, we have an open bug base where you can add feature requests and track bugs in progress. You can use the bug base for the Flash Builder and Flex SDK, Blaze DS, Flash Player, the ActionScript compiler, ColdFusion and ColdFusion Builder. Just recently we also launched http://ideas.adobe.com where you can add feature requests for AIR, Flash Builder, Flash Catalyst, Flash Professional Flex SDK, LiveCycle ES and Workflowlab.
There are plenty of examples of new features that were added to Flash Player and the AIR runtime at the request of the community and our partners.
Serge, this is a great post. Apple’s comments always ensures to move off from the topic of Walled garden / Closed platform approach. The closed platform approach also means that they don’t allow competing app stores, approval process is not transparent, process for development is closed. They always seem to focus more on HTML5 Vs. Flash which is a non-issue as they are complimentary and they try to polarize the audience on a faulty premise, which is wrong technically and evil businesswise and not ethical at all.
@Dorian,
flash isn’t open ok everyone knows that .. but i think Serge got it right when he says it’s as open as HTML5 , if you check it html5 is as dependable on the browser that renders it as flash player is.
As a developer i’ll support Adobe, as a consumer i don’t give a damn about this whole debate as long as i can play my video on the browsers I use .. i do have an iphone so well yeah .. adobe doesn’t deliver for the iphone that upsets me … but apple is blocking it, so who’s fault is that … apple’s arguments are as bad as anti-flash ones and purist ones .. if it was for being all standards then the web would be dull, boring, and slow to update and in 2012 i still wouldn’t have web video ( if adobe didn’t exist ) because no one would have made the leap to it.
Stop the bashing at a company who has always supported their developer base, we ask they deliver, now where do you get that from apple ? and with html working groups … the web demands the spec they have to deliver it.
Adobe has many ears, eyes and mouths like all big companies – just few brains and hands.
All decisions taken in every process have to be of consensus. You have to consent with yourself first but others are important as well. The important difference in HTML vs Flash openness is that those decisions are made public before the implementation starts. Every HTML5 that is out there right now will stay a hack/demo until all came until the editors release HTML5. The public will hear before the implementation. Transparency is for me not a term that matches quite to “open” but its definitly associated with it.
It also feels a bit like the seperation of church & government. This sounds weird at first, because hey: all are from the same religion, shouldn’t we stick to it and stand our religion true? But this dual system ultimately allows to choose, gives freedom, feels good.
Sidenote: A bit critic on the bug base & ideas pages. I have been active on both and the experience was not good. Its not visible to me how you will process that ideas or how you priorize. (for example: how can “FP-1976″ have 130 votes and Priority: None? ). Also its not clear which bugs will be fixed in the FP 10.1, which will be put to minor releases etc. You will be notified at the release. Furthermore: Adobe does the decisions but it doesn’t tell opinion? Which are the ideas/bugs that you (the decision maker – whoever that is) enjoyed to hear about? Which will really be concidered? Which couldn’t you do – even you’d loved to?
It feels only like having a outlet for our frustration… which is a good first step …
@Amy: If you can make your own Flash player you can also decide what new features you add (a bit like that -moz-border-radius) and deploy it. If you can do it better than Flash (like Firefox was better than IE) then you will have success.
The campaign “Adobe, MAKE SOME NOISE” (http://www.make-some-noise.info/) is a great example how Adobe listen to the community.
I really like the Audiotool & the whole team, but only 0,00001% of all Flash developers have a benefit from this feature.
Rhetorical question: Should we make such campaigns for all these bugs which exits since Flash 4/5?
@Serge: I know Adobe listens to its customers. It would be bad if they wouldn’t. Still, this doesn’t change the fact that Flash is not open. Can i formally veto on new Player features? I didn’t think so :)
It would be nice if you guys would finally admit that, instead of spreading FUD. Flash not being open is a good thing.
@Claus: The subject of this post is that Flash is just as open as HTML5. Can you formally veto new features in HTML? I don’t think so. You can comment but ultimately it’s the WHATWGroup that decides… not unlike Adobe ultimately deciding on new features in Flash. I absolutely hear your suggestion on building a sort of standards body around Flash and will pass that suggestion on.
I think the article title still stands.
Serge, Adobe are great at listening to their customers and partners and the community in general but that doesn’t make your claim any less absurd. Adobe are a corporation not a standards body – they are not oblidged to listen to any feedback except that of their shareholders. Neither are Apple or Opera for that matter, but HTML5 is not Apple or Opera or any other vendor.
Hi Serge,
I think you made a wrong turn at Albuquerque.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8TUwHTfOOU
Regarding Apple and Canvas:
“The disclosure means that Apple is required to provide royalty-free licensing for the patent whenever the Canvas element becomes part of a future W3C recommendation created by the HTML working group.”
So Apple will relinquish all financial claims on Canvas. It won’t be the first time that a commercial innovation was contributed to an open specification. In this case I think Apple looks pretty good. (Am I missing something though? Let me know.) I certainly wouldn’t go after Apple for contributions to HTML where they are willing to relinquish all financial claims for their invention.
Of course h.264 is not open and was a poor choice for Trudy Miller to fling at Adobe who support h.264 in Flash.
I have not followed HTML 5 too closely but I don’t think it is quite right to say it is simply the creation of the Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group (WHATWG). Yes it was written there but it is now in front of the W3C where it will continue to evolve. Nevertheless, that’s how standards (or in this case recommendations) get written. A group of interested parties from the relevant industry get together and thrash out a recommendation they can all live with.
Claus is right to point out that Flash is not created that way. It is fully under Adobe’s control. If Adobe does not want to publish the new protocols (like RTMP/e or RTMFP) that it bakes into the player it doesn’t have to. If Adobe wants to reserve player extensibility for itself (screen sharing and audio cancellation) it can do that. See for example:
http://www.flashcomguru.com/index.cfm/2009/6/19/vendor-lock-out
So I think you, and perhaps others at Adobe, are making the wrong argument. My advice would be to argue something along these lines:
HTML 3.2 include the applet tag specifically so that applications could be embedded in Web pages. Later versions of HTML, including the current working drafts of HTML 5, include the object and embed tags. They are there to provide a general-purpose mechanism for embedding plugins in a Web page.
So, plugins have been a formal part of the HTML specifications for many years and are not going away in HTML 5. Plugins provide a way that organizations, including corporations like Adobe, Unity Technologies, and Google, can add important capabilities to the Web that are not supported by the current crop of browsers. Plugins are an essential way to provide extensibility to the Web. The facility to add plugins makes the Web more open and dynamic, not less so. Regarding Flash, I think Adobe has generally struck a reasonable balance between openness and control. It is possible to create rich interactive content for the Flash player without paying Adobe anything. The player does not have to be entirely open sourced to make Flash a relatively open and safe platform for independent developers.
Flash, and other plugins, have contributed to the richness of the Web and will continue to do so long after HTML 5 passes the final draft stage and IE 9 is widely distributed on the Web. If Adobe succeeds in its efforts to bring the full Flash player to mobile devices, it will only make the mobile experience of the Web better.
Plugins like Flash are important for the Web because they make it possible to add capabilities to the Web that are not supported by the HTML/CSS/ECMAScript specifications. A classic example of this is animation. Flash has filled the need to create complex well-performing cross-browser animations for years. It uses a display list technology that so far seems to be superior from both a performance and development perspective to the animation capabilities built into HTML 5. At some point HTML 5 or 6 may add something to allow for animations that perform as well or better than what you can do with Flash today. And that would be good. But, today that seems doubtful. From what we’ve seen so far of HTML 5, it is reasonable to expect that Flash will remain the premier tool for animators.
Flash 10.1 will add some new features to the Web when it is released including IP-based multicast and P2P multicast. Those features are not in HTML 5 and are unlikely to be added to an HTML specification for many years. So Adobe is blazing a trail that Web recommendations may eventually catch up with in the years to come. But when Flash player 10.1 reaches very wide distribution next year, Flash will make massively scalable live video possible with hugely reduced bandwidth costs. That means progress for the Web and opens new opportunities for live video communications on the Web.
In general, that is why plugins are a formal part of the Web. They make rapid deployment of capabilities that are not directly supported by other parts of the W3C recommendations possible.
Apple’s lack of interest in supporting plugins in their mobile browsers will look different when and if Adobe succeeds with Flash player 10.1 on mobile devices. Until then Adobe has some things to prove. Arguing that Flash is as open at HTML 5 isn’t going to help. I think you are better off arguing that Flash is part of the Web, is formally supported by the HTML 5 draft’s object and embed tags, and will continue to provide new and highly desirable capabilities as the Web evolves.
@Mark agreed adobe is a corporation … and it integrates the standards body also, shouldn’t the standards body be all of us ?
let me give an example of how open the standards body is:
each country gives a vote right ? talking of what I’ve seen in my country they have voted agree with comments which doesn’t invalidate the implementation neither obliges to revisions. The responsibles of that vote where in a majority biased as the government is a major “microsoft” fan … so do you think it is open when you have corporations in the standards body that have influence in one’s decision ? decision that should be neutral i guess right ?
@Serge: I would like to see better standards for Back-Button Support, Deep Linking, Context Menus directly from Adobe.
If Adobe solve this basic interaction features we can talk about all the eye-candy stuff like 3D in the latest Flash Player releases.
@Serge: The WHATWG is not a standards body, and decides nothing. It is a community of people who writes specs. For HTML5 to be considered an open standard, it needs to (and ultimatively will) be ratified by a standards body such as the W3C. Members of the W3C can formally veto on recommendation drafts. Anyone can become a W3C member and formally join the HTML Working Group. I think membership costs roughly as much as (or even less than) a Adobe CS5 Master Collection. I personally know people who are/were W3C members and who actively brought standard recommendations to life. I myself have briefly joined a W3C working group as invited expert.
And please read my comments correctly. I do NOT suggest building a standards body around Flash. I am perfectly fine with Adobe controlling the Flash Platform. It is a good thing. As long as they listen.
@Claus: Sorry… It must have been someone else who suggested that.
Addendum: … and i know of a few W3C standard proposals that have been vetoed to death, and others that almost have been.
Yes! HTML could run everywhere with a web browser… ok, but Why Apple turn to talk about HTML? Why he didn’t said nothing about Objective-C? try to do something complex with HTML5 as you can do with Flash…. HTML is not at the level of Flash/ActionScript, Apple is now under the excuse of HTML5 vs Flash, and this is not the main theme…. The closed door at iPhone is Obj-C, and Apple says that you can’t compile any application without that! this is very close!
I have to second some of the opinions here about Apple’s position in all this. I’m sure we all appreciate how great Apple guys are in designing attractive devices that everyone wants. So, the need to run apps on those devices is pretty clear.
Now, HTML5 is an open format, yes. Flash is not. Ok. But, in the end of the day, how much do you pay to run a Flash app? Zero! Anyone with a Flash Player (and let’s me honest, anyone surfing the web has it), will be able to run you app for free – unless YOU want to charge them something.
Now, Apple is indeed – for some odd reason – against Adobe (perhaps Apple forgets that most Apple users in the past had a Mac to run Adobe software), claiming that they support HTML5, which is open. That’s great! But why in the world should they prevent me from running my Flash apps on their devices? That is MY (and my users) decision, not theirs! Why can I run Flash on Safari on Mac OS, but not on the iPhone or iPad?
So, don’t tell me about supporting open formats. Google search engine, AFAIK, is not open too, and why don’t people complain about it? Because it’s FREE! Because being or not being free (instead of being or not being open) is what really matters here.
I agree that HTML5 and Flash should not be competitors, by any means. They are simply different cards from the same deck. But, for some reason, Apple decided that they should not be and we, developers, will have to pay the price for it, by having to reinvent the wheel to make apps that are ready, run on their – yes, very cool – devices.
But, that is, unless Adobe comes up with a very cool way to export to HTML5 from their Flash development tools. How could would it be to compile an app for Flash AND for HTML5, at once? If/when this happens, this discussion will be over. And Apple will have no means to force us to reinvent the wheel.
Just my two cents.
Whether they’re open or not, Im reading this from my iPhone, a nice device that’s barred all flash content. Flash ubiquity stats just went down the toilet.
Adobe needs to do whatever it takes to get it rolled into safari.
Nice article Serge!
I also believe that HTML5 and Flash can coexist easily. Even push each other forward! That must be a good thing. I am just disappointed about Apple’s move against Apps build using Flash CS5 or similar…
Very interesting! The arguement that FlashPlayer is bad because its proprietary would be more relevant if it was ever carried with examples of situations where its proprietariness actually caused some actual dilemma for someone. Where someone actually couldnt implement something because oh shucks FlashPlayer is proprietary.
@leef its reaaaaally hard to show something that couldn’t be implemented …. because: it couldn’t be implemented and therefore not be shown.
Its a lot less difficult to think of things not possible with flash or error-prone – see the bug tracker.
Huh?
Being able to submit bugs and feature requests is not the same as having an actual vote in the decision for future directions.
Similarly, WebKit being open source and Safari not would parallel a situation where the Flash engine code is open source but the plugin not — the latter is not the case today.
Proprietary and open software are complementary by nature. One cannot succeed and advance without the other.
Proprietary software leads the way through new features and technologies, because the focused vision and lack of community consensus allows it to explore new areas faster. Proprietary software is the primary source of innovation.
Open software brings up the rear guard, slowly implementing proven ideas once the industry can agree what the best solution is. This is most often based on observation of proprietary software that has already implemented those features and moved on to something else. This does two things very well; it provides a stable basis for developers to work from on projects that really require stability and safety, and it raises the bar for proprietary technologies over time.
Personally I would weep if the Flash Player were open sourced and bound to a committee-driven open specification. I want to see the Flash Player add new features before I retire. This is because I prefer to work in an environment of innovation and discovery. I don’t want to work on a platform that changes once in a decade.
I love the general concept of open standards and open source software, but I cannot articulate how frustrated I am by the idea that all software must be open, or that closed software is inherently bad in any way, shape, or form. It’s ludicrous.
Thanks everyone for your comments. I think this was a good discussion with some good and interesting points. I’m going to close the comments here as the last couple of comments in the moderation queue were seriously off topic. Feel free to email me (http://www.webkitchen.be/get-in-touch/) if you have further comments or thoughts.
To take the message further, Flash is not only open, but Flash content can be authored on an entirely open-source platform using Eclipse (Open-source Software) and AXDT (Open-source Software) that comes with Flex SDK (Open-source Software). For debugging/profiling you can use De MonsterDebugger AIR app (Open-source Software).
The above platform is quite easy to set up, see the guide at http://tekkie.flashbit.net/flash/axdt-open-source-cross-platform-alternative-for-flash-development