I’m sure I’m not the only child of the ’80s who watched Johnny Dangerously several (hundred) times as a kid. One of my favorite characters was Roman Moronie, whose command of the English language — well, more specifically, English profanities — was tenuous at best. I’m sure he would be highly offensive to a particular nationality or ethnic group, if it were possible to tell where he was actually from. (That mystery itself being a joke in the movie; at one point a newspaper headline reads: “Roman Moronie deported to Sweden — claims he’s not from there.”) Yes, I was a big fan of ’80s Michael Keaton movies that, in retrospect, are somewhat problematic. Johnny Dangerously, Mr. Mom. I think I partly liked him because I thought maybe he was related to the characters on Family Ties. OK, I was old enough to know better than that.
What does this have to do with Apple vs. Adobe, or anything for that matter? I’m not sure, but I do know that their battle has escalated to fargin’ war!
Steve Jobs fired the first metaphorical salvo last month with his Thoughts on Flash. I thought he nailed it, as expected. Of course Adobe can’t let him win, so yesterday Adobe retaliated with their “We [heart] Apple” / “We [heart] Choice” ad campaign and an open letter of their own.
The idea that Flash is somehow open — or that Apple is somehow trying to “close” the web — is both disingenuous and misguided. My natural inclination is to blather on ad nauseum about such things, but as I’m home with a sick kid today (which is to say, there’s enough nauseum in this house already), I’ll let some more pithy writers say it for me.
First, an excellent and concise response from Jim Whimpey in Brisbane, Australia (by way of John Gruber in Philadelphia):
Adobe: not open, claim to be.
Apple: not open, don’t claim to be, contribute heavily to that which is truly open.
If that’s not pithy enough for you, a picture is worth a thousand words. Via Jeffrey Zeldman in NYC:
Update: Over on the Macworld website, the Macalope has some choice words on this topic. It’s worth reading in its entirety, but here’s my favorite bit, dissecting excerpts from the Adobe open letter:
If the web fragments into closed systems, if companies put content and applications behind walls…
You mean like the wall of a lousy runtime environment that would just as soon crash the Macalope’s browser as play back a Daily Show clip? The wall of a development environment controlled by one company that makes some pretty good coin off the deal?
Oh, no. That’s not the wall you were talking about. Sorry. Go on.
…some indeed may thrive — but their success will come at the expense of the very creativity and innovation that has made the Internet a revolutionary force.
The Internet is an open range where anyone can compete in any way they like. But Adobe didn’t make the Internet. In fact, they tried to wall off a section of it. Apple, on the other hand, made its own walled garden with a scenic view of the Internet.
Comments
4 responses to “Apple vs. Adobe: This is fargin’ war!”
Not that it will happen but I want to see Adobe stop making Photoshop for the Mac. That would be all out war. This stuff makes me laugh, on both sides. Hey free press right?
It seems like most people who have iPhones aren’t too bothered by not having Flash on their device. For me I think is would be a plus and a minus. There are a good percentage of sites that use flash that would have some benefit. There are also Flash adds and such which would not be a benefit. It will only have a minor influence on my next phone purchase. At this point I will likely get another Android phone. I am really curious on what the Windows Phones will be like though. I just hope T-Mobile steps up and gets some better phones by then.
It’s a safe bet that the big applications like Photoshop will never go away on the Mac, but honestly I’m so fed up with it, too, that I almost wouldn’t miss it.
As for Flash… well, you know I’m biased. I’ve never seen a Flash-based site I liked. There are some specific aesthetic reasons why I dislike Flash, along with my other reasons… actually, I think I should probably write a dedicated post explaining why I’m so anti-Flash.
The only people really defending Flash at this point seem to be Adobe and designers/developers who have invested a substantial amount of their career in Flash. But I think the sooner we’re rid of it, the better, and its days on the web are numbered.
As for Flash on mobile devices… enough said.
I’d like to note that I have hated Flash since 2001.
Just since 2001? I’ve hated it since before it was spun off of Shockwave!
Seriously though, I’ve been opposed to it on principle since I first encountered it. But I’ll save the details for that upcoming post I mentioned.
For now, I think my CAPTCHA says it all: implementation filth.