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Comment by kartan | Hacker News Reader

> It seems Apple still thinks of the mobile web as a content delivery platform rather than an application platform.

Apple wants in-app purchases. Why deliver full flexed apps in the web were people pays using PayPal or VISA if you can force people to use your store?

This is the reason Apple killed Flash and is the reason why they may kill any other web technology.

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When Apple decided not to put Flash on the iPhone, they had also decided that there would be no 3rd party native apps on the iPhone.

They later reversed that decision, of course. But the Flash decision was right at the beginning and had nothing to do with in-app purchases.

Note that Android never got Flash to work well on phones either. It just killed performance and battery life.

Native IOS apps can absolutely accept credit card payment. In app purchases are only required for content that is consumed in app.

While I'm sure there was also a financial motive, the primary was still that flash did (and does) suck. It sucks batteries, it sucks at security and it sucks at scaling for mobiles.

Not to defend Apple on this, but no, Flash was already dead by the time Apple implemented in-app purchases.

Conversely, Apple is in a perfect position to spearhead a web micropayment API standard, and has total control over the browser and thus the way users' use it.

They have already released Apple Pay for the Web.

My post clearly was missing the word "standard", which I've now added. Running in as many browsers as possible once something is completed is important for these things.

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