Tablet Musings
daringfireball.net
daringfireball.net
It might be true that the tablet will have a significant impact on tomorrow's computing platforms. But what really scares me is the prospect that it might become more and more accepted that the user will loose the freedom to decide what software he can install and thus what to do with the machine.
This is something that goes against anything we learned from the open web and, of course, from "hacking" (jailbreaking does not count here). It goes against the central things I value at computing.
By comparison, _I_ could not care less whether this thing comes with Flash or not.
Our only hope is that web apps can be accepted before the idea of a 'pc app store' really takes hold.
This is a major reason why I ordered a Nexus One today to replace "my" iPhone, which Steve has made clear is only mine in the sense that I paid for it.
Imagine if Apple started out as a company that distributes music and designs handheld devices before creating a computer. It's not hard to see a Mac OS that only lets you buy apps from an app store.
Without the risk of an insecure cellular network, greed would be the only motivating factor in keeping this a closed device.
That's probably true for the iPhone, but it doesn't explain the closed nature of the iPod Touch. The two devices share the same core OS, but it wouldn't be difficult to let iPod Touch users download apps outside of the app store. So if its not about protecting the cellular networks, and it's not a technological barrier, what's left? I guess you could argue it's about control or about enforcing a consistent (and "safe") user experience. I'm hoping they don't apply the same thinking to the Tablet.
What about the rumors that the Tablet will include nationwide 3G access, similar to the Kindle? I believe this is a necessary addition -- think about how useful the iPhone would be without Edge/3G access: not at all.
Maybe you wouldn't.
But I would. Because when I need mobile computing, I generally don't have a desk, or even a chair. Sometimes I'm actively walking around. And I don't need to use it for sessions of length or complexity that justify the overhead of the desktop computing model. And I don't need arbitrary pre-existing desktop apps.
I just need awesome core apps that I can get at in a couple seconds, use (literally) on the go and be able to get through a day without recharging or hassle (lock-ups). It doesn't have to replace my laptop. Just my dead-tree notebooks.
The iPhone has come far, far closer to working for me than conventional laptops, netbooks, or windows tablets. It just doesn't have quite enough screen real-estate for some tasks and the ergonomics aren't right for others.
It also makes commercial sense - they don't want people playing flash games on the web, they want them buying games from the appstore.
Yeah, well the future also isn't here yet.
Flash still has much relevance for any web-surfing focused product shipping today.
The future is now for websites and browsers that support it.
I do about 1/3 of my internet surfing on my iPhone, at least an hour or two a day and I rarely miss the Flash. In fact, I'd say I'm actually glad it's not there. Most of my major online annoyances are Flash powered.
Almost every mainstream site has verified mobile Webkit compatibility and/or dedicated applications. The group of people who still need Flash in that scenario is small enough that leaving it out wouldn't likely have a measurable effect on adoption.
For a web product from a company that can't command as much market attention, shipping without Flash might well be a death knell. But Apple's different. The App Store is different.
There's a larger strategic issue here. HTML 5 is going to reduce a lot of the need for Flash and Flash in turn is going to be forced back into it's traditional market of providing streaming media solutions. In that role they are Apple biggest competitor both in format (Quicktime) and content (streaming media competing with iTunes)
By keeping Flash off the iPhone and the tablet Apple is taking their very high income audience and telling web site developers "Support us or risk losses in advertising". In doing that they're using the iPhone and the tablet to further the company as a whole. Something that might be worth losing a few sales in the short run
And you thought the iPhone was just Apple's way of muscling into the mobile business! No, it’s really a proactive battle against a wide swatch of proprietary platforms promising to plague a new wave of mobile devices."
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/RD/RDM.Tech.Q2.07/879DD82D-559...
Non-windows versions of flash have turned out to be incredibly inefficient: relatively simple flash banner ads make my otherwise near idle mac go wild. From what I've seen, it's even less efficient on Linux. Battery life is still going to be a huge concern for the apple tablet. If adobe gets its sh*t together, it may yet come to the tablet/iPhone OS. Until that time, it would be ridiculous for apple to allow that poorly designed of a virtual machine onto its otherwise energy efficient hardware.
I imagine Apple has it's own ideas for how media on the tablet should work.
With a good industrial design house, someone could give it sex appeal, and between the iMac and the Macbook Air, thats the something different I'm dreaming of from Apple.
(Alas) too many sites currently rely on Flash to not include it in the Tablet OS.
That's why I've hardly ever read any of the nytimes articles that get submitted here. Because they put them behind an irritating signup wall. There's accounts you can find on google but I really can't be bothered.
It's not like there's a shortage of websites doing the same thing.
If the webmaster cares, they can modify it. And they really should know what ads are showing on their own site.
Like I said: dwindling relevance. Nobody in their right mind uses Flash for anything important. The one small exception is games, but the iPhone platform has no shortage of games that are faster, better looking, and better tailored to the platform than anything you can do in Flash.
Or at least, _could be_. I expect IE's lack of support will prop it up for quite a while.
Also, you make it sound like YouTube isn't on the iPhone.
Online ads: I don't think the majority of users find that to be a problem
Uploaders: What are you going to upload that can't be done just as well with a normal file picker? I'd guess the thing is a big iPhone, not a small computer.
the majority of online display advertising
Which no consumer gives a flying fuck about and many actively oppose. It isn't "important". Nobody would desire Flash just so they could get Flash advertising.
Facebook and countless other uploaders
The iPhone has no user-visible filesystem for these to interface with. Even if it did, it isn't as though Flash is the only way to upload files: it just happens to be a way that skirts around browser limitations. A native application (even on the desktop, like Flickr Uploadr or iPhoto's Facebook integration) does the same thing.
I'm not trying to say that Flash is dead. Obviously it is in use all over the place. I'm just saying it's not a vital thing to have in anything new, and can cite the iPhone's success in the past few years as an example.
iPhone has, but I'd wager the vast majority of YouTube users watch videos in their browsers.
the majority of online display advertising Advertisers are the revenue source for innumerable online sites; they like Flash so it is important.
Re: uploaders... A native application...does the same thing. Sure, but again, I'd wager that most people use the on-site bulk uploaders.
The point is that Flash is useful and easily accomplishes things (with nearly 100% market penetration) that would be much more difficult without Flash (building a native app, trying to animate ads across browsers).
Yes, but what are they actually doing? They're streaming the exact same h.264 video, except using the Flash plugin as a (buggy, inefficient) decoder.
they like Flash so it is important.
Not to users. Users are the ones who actually buy and use the devices that end up viewing the ads. No user buys a device for a better ad experience. That's nonsense.
nearly 100% market penetration
This is not going to hold true as more people browse the web on devices that lack Flash. Such devices may not be the sole or even primary way of browsing the web for some time, but in terms of total volume of web usage, it is already significant, and will only grow. It will make less and less sense to target a web platform that can't be reached every way that people use the web.
I used teamapart.com a few days ago - it's a very impressive product, built with Flash (and Flex). I've never seen anything like it that doesnt use Flash.
Just because some uses of Flash are questionable, doesn't mean that Flash has no place. Its performance issues are, of course, a consideration.
Google's uses of Flash (OFTTOMH): Gmail's GChat, Street View, Charting for Public Data, Marketing for Nexus One..
Since Adobe rolled out AS3 I would say the Flash platform is as vibrant as ever.
Apple sold 7 million iPhones last quarter, and a few million more iPod Touches. One of the primary features of these, for which they are often praised, is web browsing. None of them, not even jailbroken ones, support Flash. Many other devices in the market offer web browsing with Flash. They do not generally sell well, at least by comparison.
One conclusion you can draw from this is that there are 7 million more poor deluded fools out there who stupidly think it's possible to slink by on the web without the vital component of Flash. There will be much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments as these dreamers agonize over their diminished experience of the web, until that proud day in some distant future when they are finally blessed by their provider of their crippled devices with the privilege of Punching the Monkey any time they like. There will be load screens and gradients and tweening galore.
Another possible conclusion, which is the one I have drawn, is that these people are by and large satisfied with their purchases and consider the lack of Flash support a mild disappointment, if they consider it at all, on the occasion that they are blocked from some task (watching a video, playing a game, viewing an ad) because the author has chosen to limit its accessibility to Flash-supporting clients. And that this is a sign, perhaps, that Flash is really not so very vital to the experience of the web as is often supposed, being not so much a technical necessity as an inertial holdover from an earlier time--from back when you could honestly say that 99% of Web users had Flash. And further, that the popularity of devices that omit Flash support is not going to wane on that basis; more likely the opposite: that Flash itself is likely to slide into irrelevance as more people browse the web without it.
Hence: Flash is a legacy feature of dwindling relevance.
As it happens, I don't own an iPhone. I have only even used one for maybe 30 minutes, total. You may want to paint me as "hyper progressive" or swayed by owning the device, but my argument is based on what I see going on around me, right now, here on planet Earth.
7 million iphones sold is great, but pales in comparison to how many pcs/macs are sold which come with full Flash support out of the box.
The poor iPhone users with no Flash support deal with it because they bought an Apple product and know 'the deal'. If you're going to buy Apple products you buy what they shit out, and complaining doesn't do a damn thing to sway Mr. Jobs and his crew. With any other provider the uproar over no Flash support would be deafening.
You're probably right, most iPhone users probably don't care so much about Flash support because they don't really have a choice and would rather have the good points of an iphone rather than ditch it just for that one feature (look how many stuck around with no MMS).
Flash blows, and I curse the day my clients discovered it but its not dieing, dwindling or fading .. yet.
That's last quarter alone, not counting iPods, not considering the potential of a new device, which presumably will also lack Flash. Also not counting any of the other mobile devices that support web browsing which also lack Flash, of which there are many.
It's not approaching total PC sales, but that's not the point. Flash-less devices don't need to outsell PCs in order to have an impact on them. It's a big number. It's a growing number. It's a number that represents the declining relevance of Flash, among other things. The point really isn't the devices themselves, but with the fact that people are using the web more and more without Flash, and Adobe has no foothold.
how many pcs/macs are sold which come with full Flash support
Which a growing number of users promptly disable. Consider that the most popular web browser plugins and extensions are for blocking ads, which incidentally means they block most of the Flash content on the web. To me, that suggests that if you can give users decent alternatives to the other core uses of Flash--the things they actually like, like video--they won't miss it. This was easier for Apple to do with the iPhone, but I'd say they did it successfully. It seems like only a matter of time on the desktop, which is why I say it's dwindling and not that "X will kill it".
The poor iPhone users with no Flash support deal with it because they bought an Apple product and know 'the deal'.
This is just a repeat of the incredibly naive and hackneyed idea that Apple is floating on die hard true believers, and not the same sea of average customers as everybody else. In point of fact, most of Apple's revenue in the past decade has come from people who use Windows and have no particular attachment to the brand. Not enough of one, anyway, to persuade them that something that really is important to them isn't.
No, more likely is that supposedly vital things like Flash support, MMS, and copy-and-paste (don't forget copy-and-paste!) are not actually important features to very many people at all. They may be desirable and appreciated, but in practice they don't make much difference as to whether people buy them or not.