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Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

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Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#31

Post by okasaki »

igravious wrote: post #10
kijin wrote: post #2

Four years after YouTube started "experimenting" with HTML5, it still uses Flash by default to show me videos on the latest versions of Firefox and IE. If Flash is not installed, YouTube resorts to HTML5 , which seems to play just fine, but still displays a big red warning about the missing Flash. Why can't they use HTML5 by default and resort to Flash if and only if the browser doesn't support HTML5? Why do they hav…

Why do people keep equating DRM with proprietary? Granted, it does allow for lock-in, but it depends on who's doing the lock-in. I don't think the case has been sufficiently made that DRM is bad in and of itself. I am all in favour of open standards, no vendor lock in, I'm in favour of open source and free software. Let me reiterate just so there's no confusion, I use Ubuntu on the desktop, I use Gentoo on the server…

Harm doesn't have to be inevitable for something to be morally bad. E.g. drunk driving, unprotected sex, and so on.

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#32

Post by clarry »

gkoberger wrote: post #7

Man I hate Flash. But for all the shit it gets, I can't help but be grateful for it. Because of Flash, we've had easy to use video on the Internet for a decade. It's 2014, and browsers still can't do video as well as Flash. Yes, it's time for Flash to die. But it really stepped in and moved the web forward when the browsers and W3C were too slow. It deserves an honorable discharge.

For me "easy to use video on the Internet" always was a direct link to a file that I can download just like any file, and play in my media player of choice just like any other video file. Flash never worked so well; it only ever caused grief for its crashes, slowness, security problems, nonportability, compatibility issues, etc. So far HTML5 hasn't worked much better.

I don't see how flash moved the web forward, it certainly didn't do so for me as a user. Maybe it did for the guys upstream who would rather have control over all my access to their data, instead of letting me just download it and do what I want with it.

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#33

Post by frou_dh »

I haven't had any form of Flash installed for a long time. For sites that show me a message saying Flash is "required" to view something, it's amazing how often that "requirement" instantly evaporates when User Agent is switched to spoof an iPad. We can see that Flash is not only correlated with bad taste, but lying too! ;)

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#34

Post by userbinator »

soup10 wrote: post #14

Flash will probably make a comeback when mobile hardware can support it without burning batteries(I wouldn't count on adobe optimizing it any time soon, making non bloated software isn't in their dna). For all it's faults, flash is an incredibley fully featured authoring tool for 2D multimedia and casual games. Html5 may be technically capable of matching flash functionality, but it's rarely as easy or convenient and…

That reminds me of these quotes from the SWF format spec (from v9, but still there probably in the latest version):

"Simplicity - The format is simple so that Flash Player is small and easily ported. Also, Flash Player depends upon a limited set of operating system features only."

"Scalability - The files work well on limited hardware, and can take advantage of better hardware when it is available."

Looking at the rest of the format spec, you would get the same impression, that a fully functional player could be written much better than Adobe's. Almost makes you wonder, did Adobe kill Flash?

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#35

Post by nwh »

igravious wrote: post #10
kijin wrote: post #2

Four years after YouTube started "experimenting" with HTML5, it still uses Flash by default to show me videos on the latest versions of Firefox and IE. If Flash is not installed, YouTube resorts to HTML5 , which seems to play just fine, but still displays a big red warning about the missing Flash. Why can't they use HTML5 by default and resort to Flash if and only if the browser doesn't support HTML5? Why do they hav…

Why do people keep equating DRM with proprietary? Granted, it does allow for lock-in, but it depends on who's doing the lock-in. I don't think the case has been sufficiently made that DRM is bad in and of itself. I am all in favour of open standards, no vendor lock in, I'm in favour of open source and free software. Let me reiterate just so there's no confusion, I use Ubuntu on the desktop, I use Gentoo on the server…

> Why do people keep equating DRM with proprietary?

DRM must be proprietary. The whole point of DRM is that only the authorized devices get the "special source". DRM is closed source, obfuscated binaries, tricks and traps to drop people reverse engineering them. If it was open source then the functionality could be duplicated or the special sauce modified for any use.

There's no other conceivable way DRM can function.

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#36

Post by therobotking »

clarry wrote: post #32
gkoberger wrote: post #7

Man I hate Flash. But for all the shit it gets, I can't help but be grateful for it. Because of Flash, we've had easy to use video on the Internet for a decade. It's 2014, and browsers still can't do video as well as Flash. Yes, it's time for Flash to die. But it really stepped in and moved the web forward when the browsers and W3C were too slow. It deserves an honorable discharge.

For me "easy to use video on the Internet" always was a direct link to a file that I can download just like any file, and play in my media player of choice just like any other video file. Flash never worked so well; it only ever caused grief for its crashes, slowness, security problems, nonportability, compatibility issues, etc. So far HTML5 hasn't worked much better. I don't see how flash moved the web forward, it c…

For me the great thing was it allowed streaming video in a quality not matched by the terrible RealPlayer and the like. Downloading videos is easy now but back on slow ADSL to download a video was an overnight task but streaming was pretty much instant.

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#37

Post by DaleHarries »

TillE wrote: post #21
gkoberger wrote: post #7

Man I hate Flash. But for all the shit it gets, I can't help but be grateful for it. Because of Flash, we've had easy to use video on the Internet for a decade. It's 2014, and browsers still can't do video as well as Flash. Yes, it's time for Flash to die. But it really stepped in and moved the web forward when the browsers and W3C were too slow. It deserves an honorable discharge.

It was a huge step up over the genuinely awful RealMedia. For a while, that was the de facto standard for audio and video on the web.

Lmao! Oh god yes Real Player!

Is the Real Player still going?

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#38

Post by valleyer »

ivank wrote: post #9
sneak wrote: post #6

Flash is more alive than ever. Facebook video, Google Street View, half of YouTube - it's amazing to me that Google allows this to go on (or maybe they're just strategizing against mobile platforms they don't make native apps for). Also, almost every video player these days outside of the biggest companies. I recall trying to watch some US govt streaming stuff recently that didn't work. We must continue the fight. Th…

YouTube is ~99% HTML5 in my Firefox profile that lacks a Flash plugin and is in the http://youtube.com/html5 trial. It's still somewhat lacking because Firefox stable doesn't enable Media Source Extensions yet, but that should be fixed in a few months. I also see an HTML5/WebGL (?) Street View in the new Google Maps.

99%? Based on what? Number of videos? Or number of videos watched? Source, please?

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#39

Post by nness »

kijin wrote: post #2

Four years after YouTube started "experimenting" with HTML5, it still uses Flash by default to show me videos on the latest versions of Firefox and IE. If Flash is not installed, YouTube resorts to HTML5 , which seems to play just fine, but still displays a big red warning about the missing Flash. Why can't they use HTML5 by default and resort to Flash if and only if the browser doesn't support HTML5? Why do they hav…

Maybe because HTML5 video still has fractured codec support, which means every video, in every resolution they provide, needs to be encoded in at least WebM and MP4 using H.264 (which is a licensing drama in itself) -- including video ads. Could practically double their storage requirements.

Re: Is Flash Dead Yet? - 2010

#40

Post by hdctambien »

okasaki wrote: post #31
igravious wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people keep equating DRM with proprietary? Granted, it does allow for lock-in, but it depends on who's doing the lock-in. I don't think the case has been sufficiently made that DRM is bad in and of itself. I am all in favour of open standards, no vendor lock in, I'm in favour of open source and free software. Let me reiterate just so there's no confusion, I use Ubuntu on the desktop, I use Gentoo on the server…

Harm doesn't have to be inevitable for something to be morally bad. E.g. drunk driving, unprotected sex, and so on.

Unprotected sex is morally bad?
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