Why Adobe Surrendered??

Saad Riaz Qazi

NUST

Adobe, in a move that has surprised many people, has announced that it will no longer work on further developing flash player for mobile browsers. This announcement came despite the previous reassurances by Adobe that they would improve their flash player for browser.

Official Statement:

In an official release, that will be out shortly, Adobe management says;

“Our future work with Flash on mobile devices will be focused on enabling Flash developers to package native apps with Adobe AIR for all the major app stores. We will no longer adapt Flash Player for mobile devices to new browser, OS version or device configurations. Some of our source code licensees may opt to continue working on and releasing their own implementations. We will continue to support the current Android and PlayBook configurations with critical bug fixes and security updates.”

Bug Fixes & Support is Still There!

Continued support and bug fixes are necessary because of the huge range of phones over which the flash player is used. However, not releasing any new version would certainly mean that most mobile phone giants would now use flash player alternatives till the phones supporting it are completely phased out of the industry.

Why did Adobe Discontinue FP?

Flash Player’s Poor Efficiency!

Many are wondering why Adobe would take such a drastic measure but some reasons are very clear. Firstly, Adobe has been taking criticism for long due to the poor performance of the flash player. It takes up a lot of resources and sucks all the juice out of the battery faster than any other application. This is also the reason why Apple continued to ignore Adobe for its iPhone browser even when it was criticized for doing so. 

HTML 5 is the Future!

Secondly, HTML 5 is now making ground in the mobile industry and it can act as a pretty good alternative of flash player. It will not only be complex but also more efficient. Adobe most probably realized that they would be forced to quit but the popularity of HTML 5 so they can save resources by pulling the product off market on time

.

Good for Everyone:

This also shows that Apple and Microsoft were correct in choosing HTML 5 over Adobe’s Flash player. This might be a disappointing news for some but in the long run, this would be beneficial for everyone including Adobe as the work on HTML 5 would start more vigorously with increased output.