Thoughts on Flash • Hacker News Board

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#301

Post by danudey » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:30 PM UTC

tomlin wrote: post #226

Zev wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Delays Your link makes it seem like an evangelist is playing loosely with words; "available for download" could simply mean beta/RC status, not ready for release everywhere. Battery Life From your link: The results are amazing: I can watch a 4 hours and a half flash movie, without interruption, with a bright screen (no sleep mode) and sound !!! From Steve Jobs post: The difference is striking: on an iPhone, for examp…

It is true that some of these links are from evangelists. But we're not saying Steve Jobs is neutral are we? Battery Life: It's a bit of hyperbole. We don't watch videos on the iPhone for 10 hours. Would it matter if Flash could play videos for 11 hours? It is a misdirection or a sidestep of an original claim that Flash would kill the iPhone inside of 2 hours. Touch/Scroll: Another sidestep. A Flash issue? With that…

"But we're not saying Steve Jobs is neutral are we?"

I would argue that that's a reasonable point to make. Steve Jobs doesn't have a vested interest in seeing Flash die, he has a vested interest in seeing the iPhone platform succeed. If he saw any way Flash could help that, I'm sure he'd be all for it, but he's seen how Adobe's behaved in the past (late with PPC versions, late with OS X versions, late with Intel versions, late with 64-bit versions, crashy Flash, slow Flash, etc.), and he has no interest in subjecting the iPhone to the same issues that the Mac platform has had to endure at the hands of a slow-moving corporation who has little interest in being a good citizen.

I would argue that Jobs is 'neutral' in the sense that he's not supporting anyone else's agenda. He's made his choice based on the facts before him, and while you may not agree with how he got there, I would say that he got there from an initial position of neutrality.

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#302

Post by pixelbath » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:31 PM UTC

cynicalkane wrote: post #278

billybob wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, to recap, legally being a person and being a person aren't, legally, the same.

Please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_person "This legal fiction does not mean these entities are human beings, but rather means that the law allows them to act as persons for certain limited purposes ..." Emphasis mine. This stuff isn't even on topic, but when people insist on insulting my intelligence with snide pseudo-logical comments, I will insist on correcting them.

In other words, you like feeding the trolls?

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#303

Post by tomlin » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:32 PM UTC

potatolicious wrote: post #273

tomlin wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thought: Proprietary isn't bad. Open isn't great. Proprietary vs. open is bad. Proprietary + open is great. Proprietary implementations are a (sometimes) necessary interstitial step towards great open implementations. Save the "VS." narrative for Street Fighter II.

> "Proprietary implementations are a (sometimes) necessary interstitial step towards great open implementations." True, but Flash is a closed standard with a closed implementation. Adobe likes to claim it is open - but the fact remains that not only is it impossible to write an open implementation of their incomplete spec, but Adobe has actively sought to keep core components proprietary even in spec and prevent comp…

So Adobe gets tossed aside in favor of HTML5/canvas. Or an open version of the SWF format with no licensing issues emerges. I am fine with that. If Adobe wants to be stupid, they are more than welcome to.

Apple is calling the kettle black with the proprietary argument. We can drill down to specific layers but the effects are the same to the developer coding on that layer.

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#304

Post by grellas » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:34 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #241

tjogin wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

John Gruber has been making these exact points. This could basically be ghost written by Gruber and we wouldn't know the difference.

Gruber is really Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs is really Fake Steve Jobs. Fake Steve Jobs is actually Bill Gates.

The latest from Fake Steve on this piece: http://www.fakesteve.net/2010/04/please-stop-thinking-about-....

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#305

Post by tom_ilsinszki » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:35 PM UTC

ajross wrote: post #176

tom_ilsinszki wrote: post #77

We techies are guilty of always wanting everything. I see projects a lot of time, that won't move forward because the developers will not have the balls to stand up and draw the line between things the software will to, and the software will not do. It's just more comfortable to avoid confrontation. When I read this, I felt that Steve really knows what he wants, and in order to get it, he is willing to eliminate thin…

So this is all about Steve trying earnestly and selflessly to create the best platform possible, and not about trying to eliminate competition to his dominant platform by disallowing portable application environments? I swear, I used to think the reality distortion field was a dumb metaphor...

You might be right about my vision being distorted, and I will think about that, but just so you understand me correctly: I did not say anything about selflessness. I have no doubt, that every move Apple makes is a business move; still, I don't think they only want to make money. They want to make money and deliver a great product. And the points Steve mentioned seemed reasonable to me...

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#306

Post by ptomato » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:35 PM UTC

pg wrote: post #252

What he describes as the "most important reason" is also the big mistake here. If using certain libraries or cross-platform development tools truly did result in worse apps, then the market would take care of that. He also doesn't seem to understand that such tools do not all totally hide the underlying APIs. They fall along a continuum in that respect. And in trying to ban extreme cases like Flash, Apple has also ba…

I do think it is reasonably evil, but I'll be very surprised if, say, Apple enforces this against somebody writing software in a lisp, or all the games using Lua or Unity. But saying literally "You can't write software in Flash" makes for somewhat questionable legal language.

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#307

Post by stcredzero » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:35 PM UTC

sp332 wrote: post #255

Shorel wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I always say to non-technical people: All the programs and data in your computer is in files and folders, even windows is just a bunch of files. You understand this and everything else is far easier to understand.

Well then, the iPad must be impenetrably difficult.

The iPad reduces everything to what the users currently understand: the sequence of steps they take.

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#308

Post by superchink » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:35 PM UTC

ck2 wrote: post #267

I love this paragraph, check their hypocrisy, switch Adobe/Apple: [Apple]'s products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from [Apple], and [Apple] has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While [Apple]'s products are widely available, this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by [Apple] and available only from [Apple]. By almost any definition, [Apple] is a…

…which is why they don't want another closed system as a layer between their products and their users.

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#309

Post by code_duck » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:36 PM UTC

How is it that Apple can feel reasonable in criticizing flash for being closed and proprietary?

Did I miss the iPhone OS standards committee meetings or something?

Re: Thoughts on Flash

#310

Post by mattmiller » Thu, Apr 29, 2010, 5:36 PM UTC

emontero1 wrote: post #34

"We also know first hand that Flash is the number one reason Macs crash." I can attest to the veracity of this statement. My MBP's processor spikes whenever I get on YouTube or any other Flash-based site. I've had a couple of major crashes on both Firefox and Chrome while using Flash. I've also heard other users express similar views with these and other browsers on Ubuntu.

I was expecting Microsoft to try to scapegoat flash for all of there crashing issues a while back. I would have made sense, and it would have been half true. The bottom line is flash is crappy software, it makes the OS look bad, but the OS gets all the blame.