A strange thing has been happening over the past year or so. It has become quite fashionable amoung open source advocates, social media “experts”, and HTML5 zealots to talk down Flash with every breath…
Well, that was the start of an article I’ve been writing for the past three weeks or so. It was a difficult article to write and I’ve been stuck on more than one occasion – causing some frustration for me. There’s no need for me to do so now as similar thoughts have been expressed elsewhere with more grace than I would have allowed and a more informed perspective.
I encourage anyone who is interested in the subject to read the following posts and the comments that come along with them:
- Sympathy for the Devil [John Nack]
- 2010: the year Flash became irrelevant [Serge Jespers comment is golden]
- On Google, YouTube, HTML5, Adobe, and Flash [Ryan Stewart]
- HTML 5 and Flash video [Lee Brimelow]
- Flash Platform is at a crossroads [Ain Tohvri]
- The Flash world that the standards people do not see [Robert Reinhardt]
- HTML5 will save us all from the evils of Flash! [Andreas Rønning]
- Why HTML 5 Won’t Kill Flash or Silverlight [Roger Peters]
- Flash vs HTML5 – a few points for HTML5 advocates to consider :) [Neil Webb]
- RE: Is Canvas the End of Flash? [Kevin Suttle]
- Tech tabloids, Project Harmony, and the proposal of a ‘Flash’ tag in HTML5 [Kevin Suttle]
- Growing tired of Apple [Rick Mason]
- “The World is Moving to HTML 5” and Other Flights of Fancy [Richard Leggett]
- HTML5 and a Brave, Flash-Free, Open World? Uh… Not So Fast [Peter Kirn]
- Why Flash Isn’t Going Anywhere, iPad Be Damned [Scott Gilbertson]
- Open Access to Content and Applications [Kevin Lynch]
- My Thoughts on the Future of Flash [Grant Skinner]
- Web development will become much more complicated [Lee Brimelow]
- Five Myths of HTML5 (vs. Adobe Flash) [Radley Marx]
- The Future of Web Content – HTML5, Flash & Mobile Apps [Jeremy Allaire]
- My thoughts on HTML 5, Flash and Innovation [Duane “Chaos” Nickull]
- …more to come
My general take is this; Flash and HTML are not in any way enemies or opposed to one another. Both can serve very different purposes and both are useful in many different (and sometimes similar!) circumstances. It is ridiculous to go after Flash as it it is the worst thing to ever happen to the Internet and needs to “die” – as many have stated.
Am I biased? Hell, yes! I love working with the Flash Platform for many reasons and am heavily affiliated with Adobe. Do I hate HTML5 or any other tech due to my bias? Hell, No.
There is true evil in the world and it is not Flash, Silverlight, JavaFX, HTML5 or any other technology platform.
A call for sanity – everyone just chill out. It’ll be okay :)
UPDATE 1: In regard to Apple and iPad; Serge Jespers has a nice post, of which I’ve made comments on.
UPDATE 2: Okay, I give in – “Just To Put Things In Perspective…”
I just wrote about it some time ago having the same notion in Flash Platform is at a crossroads.
The amount of inadequate fuss is unfortunate, but it’s also inevitable since there are always those talking about things they have no idea of. I’ve been (and still am) involved in testing quite a lot of new/experimental CSS3 and JS (e.g. in conjunction with WebKit) – the confrontation is absurd.
Therefore I join Joseph’s side and call all to senses. Spend that energy on collaborating for the better overall experience instead, whatever the technology.
The whole thing is really unfortunate. I don’t remember any such negativity regarding Web technologies when I was first learning a decade ago- and at that time it was a total free-for-all; no standards whatsoever, prescribed, de-facto, or otherwise.
Negativity always wears people down and slows down innovation. It’s pointless and detrimental to the overall progress of the Web.
I’m adding your post to the list.
Great point. It has been fascinating to see so many people attack eachother on their blogs or over twitter etc over this topic.
“It is ridiculous to go after Flash as it it is the worst thing to ever happen to the Internet and needs to “die” – as many have stated.”
You might be surprised, as I’m the author of one of the articles you give as an example, but I actually do agree. The only point I was trying to make (and which I tried to explain in the follow-up blogpost, which also refutes some of Serge Jespers’ comments) is that I see an evolution in which “the open web” (i.e. the stack based on html+css+javasscript) is becoming more powerful, resulting in what would have been typical Flash use-cases being implemented in the “open web technology stack”.
But being the non-violent bloke I am; no way anyone has to die! Let there be love, and healthy competition off course! ;-)
It’s absolutely becoming more powerful, as it should – but I would argue that this does not in any way diminish the contributions of other platforms.
BTW: I hope you didn’t infer the “die” comment as pertaining to your post! This has more to do with cheap-shots on Digg/Slashdot and such.
If you actually look back about close to years, it’s been things like flash, ebay, amazon, browser advancements, gophers (I’m dating myself now LOL), etc., that have created new spaces of business and industry which pushed the internet ISP’s to improve bandwidth. And just like these advancements, Flash and HTML(X) are technologies that will continue to advance. I imagine they will both be around for some time.