Who can’t remember back in June when Steve Jobs said that Hypercard was more popular than Flash? Furthermore who wasn’t aware of the hate-hate relationship between Jobs and Adobe and Jobs’ decision to not use Flash as part of his IOS?
Well fast forward to yesterday when the Skyfire, a Flash-enabled browser, went on sale yesterday for $2.99 in the Apple iPhone market. The popular browser that originated as an Android app had to be pulled off the shelves of the iPhone store in 5 hours because Skyfire didn’t have the server space to accommodate any more downloads.
After the Skyfire browser was announced and iPhone/iPad users found out that it supported Flash, it quickly surged in popularity. Skyfire said this on their blog:
The user experience was performing well for the first few hours, but as the surge continued, the peak load on our servers and bandwidth caused the video experience to degrade.
Thus we are effectively ‘sold out’ and will temporarily not accept new purchases from the App Store. We are working really hard to increase capacity and will be accepting new purchases from the App Store as soon as we can support it.
Skyfire will add their browser back to the iPhone store after it rectifies their server capacity issues. They are working hard to ensure that everyone who wants a Flash browsing experience on their iPhone can get it via Skyfire.
So now we have to ask, with Skyfire overloading their servers and pulling their app off the market, does this in fact mean that Steve Jobs was wrong and iPhone users do care about Flash?
Android is the only mobile operating system that can work natively with flash. Android users with 2.2 Froyo or better can download Adobe Flash 10.1 and an Adobe Air module that will allow for the Flash experience, and interactive Flash experience. Android also supports HTML 5, which Jobs insists is the standard going forward.
Because of their consistent developer support and robust portfolio of utilization, Adobe Flash is a staple both online and on the mobile web. The Android Operating System offers many options for its users to provide a seamless experience from computer to phone and back. Android Rocks!
Source: mobileburn, skyfire blog
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just a quick one – skyfire originated on symbian and winmo, not android. :p
See even skyfire can’t reliably support flash user experience, so jobs proved right again
This article is wrong in so many ways. God, since when is Android the be all end all of flash? Far before Android even existed I already had flash on my Symbian device. Even more, no Android browser can stack up with the one on Maemo.
Skyfire didnt originated as an Android app you fanboy, skyfire was first on Symbian and Windows Mobile. And no, Jobs wasn’t wrong. Playing flash content on my Samsung Galaxy S and on my friends Desire is a complete pain, hoggs battery and the phone feels so much slower.
Yawn – Ive almost given up browsing with my droid all together – that has been relegated to my Ipad. I love you people who think your smarter than Steve Jobs…………your so funny:)
Yawn – Ive almost given up browsing with my droid all together – that has been relegated to my Ipad. I love you people who think your smarter than Steve Jobs…………your so funny:)
its not us that know more, its the iphone users that want Flash on there phones. Thats what makes this so funny. Anyway Android will kill all other tablets soon too. so there. iEnjoy your ipab while it iLasts.
Yeah, Android is definitely not the first mobile system to have flash. I knew about Maemo, but I’ll admit that I didn’t know Symbian supported it (and I work in the mobile industry).
I can completely agree with Steve on this one in the sense that Flash feels like it’s in its “summer” or “autumn” stage. There used to be plenty of websites built entirely in flash, but now dynamic animations, etc. are handled mostly with javascript. Flash really only has it’s niche in streaming videos (and iPhone/iPad already has YouTube, Netflix, and Hulu apps, so there’s pretty much no reason for flash anyways)
Poor guy he is trying to save his company and iPhone brand, he is failing.
Android Rules
I honestly like steve jobs… I like to listen to him speak… I also like listening to vic gundoltra and the guys behind android speak because their so nerdy and normal… its us as a people who get all worked up about it. People with their ipads giving elitist attitude because they bought a tablet… or android guys like me slagging em about flash and how useless their products are… were all just a bunch of kids with toys haha its awesome… love technology!!!