Steve Jobs: ‘Thoughts on Flash’

Steve Jobs makes the case against Flash on iPhone OS. Cogent, detailed, straightforward, brutally honest. No prevarication. Read the whole thing, but there are a few choice bits. First, Apple couldn’t include Flash on iPhone OS now even if they wanted to:

We have routinely asked Adobe to show us Flash performing well on a mobile device, any mobile device, for a few years now. We have never seen it. Adobe publicly said that Flash would ship on a smartphone in early 2009, then the second half of 2009, then the first half of 2010, and now they say the second half of 2010. We think it will eventually ship, but we’re glad we didn’t hold our breath. Who knows how it will perform?

And they wouldn’t if they could:

We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform. If developers grow dependent on third party development libraries and tools, they can only take advantage of platform enhancements if and when the third party chooses to adopt the new features. We cannot be at the mercy of a third party deciding if and when they will make our enhancements available to our developers.

While you’re reading it, think about how little wiggle room the whole thing leaves for Adobe to respond.

★ Thursday, 29 April 2010