Adobe has made its Flash technology compatible with the Android smartphone operating system developed by the Google-backed Open Handset Alliance. Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch demonstrated Flash Player 10 running on Symbian, Windows Mobile, and Android platforms — but no iPhone. But Adobe is working on it, he said.
Andy Rubin, Google’s director of mobile platforms, along with Adobe’s Lynch announced the effort Monday at Adobe MAX, the company’s developer conference. The two presented a demo of Flash 10 running on a G1, which is manufactured by HTC.
Adobe Systems and ARM announced a technology collaboration designed to optimize and enable Adobe Flash Player 10 and Adobe AIR for ARM Powered devices like (but not necessarily including) the Apple iPhone.
However, at an Apple shareholder meeting in March, CEO Steve Jobs said that Flash won’t be coming to the iPhone anytime soon. Jobs said the full-blown version of Flash would perform poorly on the iPhone, and Flash Lite isn’t the spirit of the iPhone’s full internet experience.
But allowing Flash — which is a development platform of its own — would just be too dangerous for Apple, opines Wired.
Flash support could be a big draw, enabling Web video (such as YouTube) and interactivity — key features that mobile users may be seeking.
A recent survey by mobile gaming and content firm Artificial Life found 46 percent of mobile device owners use devices for entertainment. The survey found that 87.5 percent of smartphone users access entertainment content, such as music, games and video, and that 33 percent use the phone for entertainment over any other purpose, including e-mail, GPS, and Internet browsing.
Rubin said Flash is crucial to mobile devices.
“We are thrilled that Google will be one of the first companies along with the Open Handset Alliance to bring Flash technology to the smartphone market,” he said in a release.
Along with Research in Motion’s BlackBerry devices, Apple’s iPhone is one of the very few phones that doesn’t have Flash support. Those two aside, Flash is available mobile platforms including Symbian, Qualcomm BREW, Sony Ericsson, Windows Mobile and Linux. Adobe said Flash has shipped on more than 800 million mobile and is expected to be on more than 1 billion handsets by early next year.
