Adobe, Apple working together on Flash for iPhone - Page 4

Users completely blocking all ads isn't simply "not propping up" - it's completely sabotaging.

We weren't talking about AI in particular, but if you don't like to see any ads at all, you don't have to use any site that has them. To block all ads then continue to take a benefit from commercial sites that use them as a means of operation is on the hypocritical side.

http://news.netcraft.com/

Apache gained 1% share in January. That said, I run Apache on Windows rather than IIS sometimes.[quote]

I don't know about that. It's been gaining over time. One very small setback doesn't change that.


Of course they did. The reason why IE gained marketshare was because it went to a free model, when everyone else had tocharge. That's the old monopoly profits talking. Netscape charged from the very beginning. I paid $39.95 for it when it first came out, and even got a Netscape cap.

It was only after IE made little momentun against it that MS decided to give it away.

As is well known in economic theory, a so so free product often can drive a good but paid product out of existence.

This isn't the only time MS has done this.

You also forget that MS lost the case against them over this.


You've gotten history backwards. Totally.


Read almost any article about IE vs almost anything else.


I'm realistic. This is a world where things compete in the marketplace. I back one, that, of necessity means that I DON'T back another.


I didn't say you wrote it. You were hinting it though. It's just a fact.


That's not a sly question. It's a pointless one. We're talking about a company that does have that power. What's the point in bringing up something that never existed? Do you want to write a book about alternative history?

I already said, in response to this question, that I wouldn't want to see any company in that position. That should be a good answer. I even included Apple. That should have been a GREAT answer.


That's one of the biggest jokes going around, MS innovating.


That's not an answer to the previous point.


You were talking about thousands for OS's. I don't remember any personal computer OS that cost anywhere near that. Most early machines came with the OS, and updates were free. Same thing for programs.

Apple only started to charge anything with System 7, because they saw MS making so much money over it.


MS didn't make anything cheap in the 80's. IBM made the OS cheap. MS followed along.

It wasn't MS that was responsible for that. MS didn't even come up with the idea of a computer OS. If They weren't lucky, and a bit underhanded, they wouldn't even of had the OS for IBM, as we all know. They would have been relegated to making the Basic program for IBM for which they were hired in the first place, and today, MS might not even be around.

MS didn't even come up with the first word processing program. XYWrite, and Wordperfect were much earlier and far more popular until Windows came out. electric Pencil was one of the first easy to use word processors, and there were some very good ones for the Atari, Amiga, Commodore, etc., before Apple hired MS to write Word for them.


Yes, they are relevant for business. business and government still buys at least 50% of PC sold. But even for individuals, the Mac is a good buy. You can poll the people here.


Yes, they absolutely are. And they should be. I've had to defend Apple on this point as well. I don't argue with it.


We can thank IBM for that. I remember the reviews of the first IBM PC. Almost to a man, they said that the Apple II was equal, or possibly even a slightly better machine, but that the PC would sell because of three things.


I B M

Nowhere was MS mentioned as the reason.

The original IBM PC, in its basic version was $1,600 without a monitor, of course. Pretty cheap for it's time from a company such as IBM, about the same price as the Apple II, but with far more cache.

Once Phoenix clean roomed IBM's BIOS, the race was on. Imagine if IBM decided to not allow MS to sell PC-DOS?


It could have been, but it might have been better. We just don't know! There's no way to know, and what matters is what did happen, and what we do know.


I guess if an expert disagrees they live in an ivory tower, but if they agree, they don't?


BS yourself Vinea. Why even say that? You're talking about mainframe and mini computer manufacturers. not only did they all have their own flavor of Unix, but they all had their own processors, etc.

The PC world is very different. Now, everyone uses the same chip families. There is a price mindset. Competition would drive software prices down, not up.


There was bad management in numerous companies. That's true. But with a lot of these companies, it was the PC that drove them out of business ultimately. They simply couldn't compete against that. They were too small.
Advances were coming no matter what. And as I said, it's been considered that they slowed down with the advent of the PC (as opposed to the pc).

MS has had bad management as well. They've lost billions on other businesses.


I wonder!

It's very simple. I back OS X. I'd like to see it take much more marketshare that it has.

So everything that hinders that progress is something I'd rather not see. If Windows hinders that, I smile at Vista's problems. If Linux distro's have driver problems and such, I smile at that.

I'm just being honest. I don't believe in pretending to think otherwise.

But in answer to Vinea, I did say that I think the ideal situation for the computer world in general would be about an even split between Windows, OS X and some form of Unix, Linux based or otherwise.

here is advertising, and so there is money. but there isn't money like you can find in a Newegg, or some other online retailer. The WSJ charges $99 a year ($49 if you subscribe to the print version). The Times has stated that it's losing money on its online site where they don't charge a fee.

Daring Fireball had less Ads, but it's also a far smaller site. Basically a few small articles a day, with no forums or anything else.

At least lately he has listened to me when I berated him for putting up that hysterical article about Apple owning all of multitouch, and put up the one I posted here also.

Oh, it's so very good that you're back!

What would we do with you?

You are surely AI's conscience, and steadfast righter of wrongs.

And so I salute you sir!

I am abashed!

We are responsible for it, aren't we?

If no one came here, who would the Ads be speaking to? How much could AI charge? What would be the purpose of the site?

I can't answer to how many Ads, or what kinds. I'm just saying that sites must be paid for somehow.

If there are no Ads, and no one pays a subscription fee, how do YOU propose to pay the expenses?

That's not quite right. I think it's silly to equate a Linux gain as an Apple loss or a Linux loss as an Apple gain. There is some of that, but not much, and for the most part, they're not serving the same markets anyway, I don't think most of the people that use Linux would really consider Apple. Not only that, Apple gets several benefits from the Linux ecosystem by using many of the projects whose existence or much of the continuing maintenance was done by Linux users and for the benefit of Linux users.

AI is going to need to have a business model that works in the real world. I hate to tell you but the overabundance of ads drives people to block them all. I can't read the main page of AI on my work-supplied winmobile stupidphone because there is sooooo much ad content I can't wade through it all to find the headlines. I'm not going to click on any of the ads anyway. Not on my Mac and esp. not from my winmobile stupidphone.

This is like saying my I owe it to my local NBC affliate to watch 8 minutes of their ads for 22 minutes of content. With my DVR I watch almost zero ads and still get the 22 minutes of content. If they are going to stick with that business model they are going to have some serious problems. Same with AI, esp as Safari gets better adblocking and flashblocking software options.

I could click the affiliate links from the Mac Price Guide page, but mostly that requires me to share browsing and purchasing information with these shady characters:

• www.anrdoezrs.net
• clickserve.cc-dt.com
• www.kqzyfj.com
• www.tkqlhce.com
• www.jdoqocy.com

At least the Amazon affiliate information is self-contained.

I'd say most Linux folks want both platforms, but don't want to pay for what they perceive as a OS X toll in hardware fees.

However, seeing as I'm neither a Mac or Linux guy, but as a NeXT guy, I value both equally for their strengths and weaknesses.

Having both is a boon.

I'm glad I no longer touch Windows. It limits my profit options, but it also destroyed my variety of skillset options.

If we look at the fact that there will be a certain number of computers sold each year, and that each system will sell a certain percentage of that, then we can easily see that there is a back and forth movement in marketshare.

Right now, Windows is slowly losing marketshare, and OS X is slowly gaining. Linux is up for grabs here, because no one really has good numbers for that,

But, except for the few that use more than one system, the vast majority choose one.

Whichever one they choose means one less user on another system. Even though some people don't believe that marketshare has anything to do with the number of developers of good software, drivers, hardware etc, we know that it does. OS X has many more developer now than it had when it was on the way down, and many were bailing ship.

I have nothing against Linux, even though Torvolds is an ass (as many in the Linux community state as well).

But realistically, I've read in numerous places from many in the computer journals that Linux is really OS X's biggest threat. I believe that. I feel it too.

I've seen more than a number of high profile Linux users over the past few years make the move to OS X, and they've stated the same thing.

As long as Apple sells a big enough percentage of computers as a portion of its dollar sales and profits, they will not license OS X. The higher cost of Macs sadly makes some think that it's not as good a buy as it is.

I know a few Linux users who think that, and have turned to Linux on old Macs, or cheap PCs. Those are lost OS X sales. upon rare occasion one will come back, being frustrated with the limits that Linux has.

I do therefor, see this as a competition, and, as an OSX user, and an Apple investor, I'd rather see all of them come back.

How would that not happen if OS X wasn't better to them, and Linux worse?

I don't want to see Linux disappear. but don't forget that not all those open source projects are for Linux. Many are for Windows, and others for OS X, or even Darwin.

What's wrong with that?

Let's put it his way, a few people block all the Ads, most don't.

The problem is that everyone is scrambling to find a way to pay for things.

I asked before, how do you propose to pay for all the expenses?

The old business model worked for decades. It's only a problem now because of technology. Not watching the Ads may be good for you, but it doesn't help them pay the bills.

If you don't trust clicking on any of them, then what else do you propose?

Saying that you don't want to do something is fine, but it doesn't solve the problem.

That's interesting. So what DO you use? You aren't saying that you are typing your posts on a Next, are you?

I build my own PC's and run Linux on them.

When I got my iPhone I had to buy a copy of Windows XP and Microsoft Office for Outlook.

I set it up to dual boot and installed iTunes.

I only boot into Windows to sync or install updates.

iTunes doesn't work with Linux.
Safari doesn't work with Linux.
You can't check the iTunes store with Linux.
You can't visit MobileMe with Linux.

I might consider buying a Mac but I derive a great deal of pleasure from creating a PC from a bunch of parts I put together.

I love the first time your creation passes POST and sits there waiting for an OS, somehow walking into a store and buying one just doesn't deliver the same satisfaction.

Using Flash involved running Firefox in 32bit emulation on a 64bit system.

Have to agree with you Mel but only in part, especially re Flash ads.

Until I installed Click To Flash, I thought that most of the ads, particularly videos were 'Flash'. However, most of the sites I visit don't have Flash ads and if any, only one on the page.

So 'my' concern' and thus my choice to install Click To Flash is it really worth it? This is particularly true using my Macs, but for the iPhone, I don't want to see any ads whatsoever.

Now this just came to a surprise, but when I wrote a script to turn on/off 'Click To Flash' I was a little perplexed that when I thought I had turned it on, I was still seeing ads in spots that I shouldn't be seeing. Well, it turns out that Macworld, for example, superimposes an ad image over its turned off Flash spot after a few seconds. See Additional Comment below

So, now I have to question, is the Flash ads that prevalent that one should block them all the time. Although I feel that most sites that don't employ the technology are significantly cleaner, Apple being the best. However, for those that demand Flash, certainly its rather limited usage is not a profound reason to support it for advertising, that is.

Additional Comment

I just reopened Safari and was surprised to see that AppleInsider had 3 Flash spots, whereas before I am sure there was never more than one. Now it has switched one of the Flash spots to a regular ad.

Current Flash Usage Per Page

• 9to5mac 0
• Anandtech 1
• AppleInsider 3
• Ars Technica 1
• David Alison's Blog 0
• Engadget 0
• LeopardTracker 0
• Mac OS X Hints 0
• MacDailyNews 0
• Macsurfer 1
• MacUpdate 0
• MacUser 0
• Macworld 2-3
• Microsoft 1
• Tidbits 1
• TÚAW 0
• Version Tracker Mac 0; Windows 2; iPhone 0; Palm 0
• ZDNet 1

Note Adobe Flash Professional page has a small 'Flash' bar via Click To Flash, but it is only a TYPE headline. Weird.

P.S. FYI, here is an interesting posting on Mac OS X Hints back in 2003 titled, "Stop all advertising banners in web browsers" in which RobG comments, "Here's my obligatory webmaster comment ... if you block all ads all the time, those sites that rely on ad revenue may eventually start charging for access (see recent warnings on Macintouch, MacSurfer, etc.). I leave most ads enabled, only blocking pop-ups and highly annoying Flash ads, and occasionally buy stuff via click-throughs just to support my favorite sites ... one could argue the merits of the advertising-supported web model forever, though, and this hint does provide some good solutions to blocking highly annoying ads." http://www.macosxhints.com/article.p...blocking%2Bads

This is ridiculous. I know, absolutely, 100%, that I will not purchase anything or subscribe to anything through an online ad. Therefore, the ad serves no purpose to me, except making my browsing experience less enjoyable.

Likewise, me looking at ads on the internet has absolutely no benefit for the advertiser, nor for the site. Therefore, me not looking at ads on the internet has absolutely no negative effect.

That I can tell, it is working so far, though things can change.

What do you suggest as an alternative that would work in the future?

That's a little like saying a sale for Seiko or Casio is a loss for Rolex, an extreme example, but I don't see anything that would say on a macro scale that Linux is getting anything other than a few customers on the margins, the budget constrained, such as some of your examples, generally aren't going to go for Macs.


I don't understand your fixation on Torvalds in this discussion. He only works on a small part of the platform. Do you use Macs because you respect Jobs, or do you use them because they do what you want? I hear that Jobs can be kind of a dick too, but that has little bearing on what software I use.


But I can't think of any open source software made originally for Windows and heavily maintained by Windows users that makes it into Apple's stock operating system. But with Linux, there are several that follow the bill with respect to Linux users that are installed within OS X or are available on the install DVD.

I agree. I'm certainly not saying that Flash Ads are the most wonderful thing. mostly, I ignore the movement and flashes of colors etc.

The only ones that really bother me are the very rare (I've only seen three so far) ones that actually move into the text space of the article itself, and stay for tens of seconds. THAT'S annoying! Otherwise, I don't find flashing, moving Ads annoying. Ignoring them is very easy. I don't understand why some people seem to have such problems with them. I can only assume that people with ADD have trouble keeping their eyes where they want them to be, and wander over to these Ads.

I do keep the pop-up setting though. Opening an entire page is just wrong.

But RobG is saying exactly what I'm saying. Web sites need income. It's one way or the other.

The problem is that people seem to think that the digital world, because it's so easy to steal things there, should always be totally free. Free of fees, free of advertising to pay for it.

Ain't gonna happen!

You're wrong in that. It's been shown that even just seeing an Ad for a second is enough to bias you towards the the product, even if you think otherwise.

But, you can be selfish if you want to be. There are always some.

Thinking that you can get something for nothing is a common component of greed, and fraud.

So you block all Ads. If enough people do that, then you will either be paying for many sites directly, or will not have most sites to go to at all.

You lose either way.

Well, of course it is. most people have only one watch. They will decide to go expensive or cheap, but in the end most people will still have only one watch.

From what I remember, many people actually sve up for something they really want. They also buy on credit, though I usually advise against that.

Buying into a Mac or Linux involves more than just the upfront cost.


He has far more influence than that. He personally stopped the 3.0 project, because he felt the 2.xxx was good enough. He also has a major say in licensing, and personally approves much of what goes into the kernel, which is all Linux is, for those out there who still don't know that.

He also make off the cuff remarks that are criticised both within the Linux community, and without. Remarks that are, more often than not, ill thought out. Often those are derogatory when pointing to Apple, the Mac and OS X. That annoys me as well.

I bring him up as so many bring up Jobs in the context of Apple, or Gates in the context of MS.


[/quote]

There are some. but there are many open source projects just directed to OS X, though some of them filter out to Linux and even Windows later on.

I like Flash. Clearly, if it comes to iPhone, it will be optional. Everything has its advantages and disadvantages, that's life. Deal with it. It's not like you don't have a choice. There are plenty more annoying thing in this world than Flash - like war, hunger, crime, disasters, and f**king idiots who put 1000 watt stereos in their car, roll down the windows, and play hip hop turned up to 11 just to annoy me.

As you and I have concurred before, the more one gets stuff for "free" the more they want for free. Fortunately, nothing is for free. And it is unfortunate that those that don't understand the concept want those that do, to pay it for them.

Said "product in the middle" would be incompatible with everything that's in Flash today. So, what's the point? Just use existing open web standards.

Apple can put Flash in Safari on the iPhone if they want, but there'd better be a big "Flash OFF" button in the Safari preferences.

Some web sites receive payment for ad views (i.e. the number of times their ads are displayed), not your purchase or subscription through the ad. In other words, by blocking the ads (ad blockers usually work by not downloading content from known ad sites), you are depriving the web site of revenue.

Flash blocking and ad blocking are two seperate things.

I'm on an iPhone now, yet I can stiill see ads on this site.

By relying solely on Flash a website would be alienating potential customers and reducing their revenue potential.

Linux, OS X, NeXT, FreeBSD and soon OpenSolaris.

You still use NeXT? What for? On what system?

Pictures please!

Hardware or software, preferably both.

I was thinking that, as you said that you were a Next guy, you might actually be using one. Do you have one that you use for the net? Is it really possible today? That is, is there a browser that is modern enough to function well enough?

I really hope this is true.

Apache has always done well and will continue to do well.


No. NOBODY charged which is why the Netscape move was particularly stupid. NCSA Mosaic was always free and that was the standard price for browsers. MS simply went with the flow and Netscape decided to try to monetize what was always free. Netscape was free from day 1 until they started charging.

"Netscape announced in its first press release (October 13, 1994) that it would make Navigator freely available to all non-commercial users, and Beta versions of version 1.0 and 1.1 were indeed freely downloadable in November 1994 and March 1995, with the full version 1.0 available in December 1994. Netscape's initial corporate policy regarding Navigator is interesting, as it claimed that it would make Navigator freely available for non-commercial use in accordance with the notion that Internet software should be distributed for free.[3]"

From wikipedia which I hate to quote but is the easiest source at the moment. They typically don't get this kind of thing wrong anyway.

IE appeared in 1994 and had zero traction until after a) it improved and b) netscape started charging for something that you could get for free from everyone else. Had Netscape kept to their original 1994 policy then IE3 never would have gotten the legs it had.

Same for Windows NT. Had Sun released Solaris X86 for $250 or less when Windows NT was trying to get traction MS would have very limited server marketshare today.

These guys did it to themselves.


IE never cost money other than originally it was part of the Plus! package. Most folks never got the Plus! package so it really wasn't available until it was a free download or simply part of the OS. It has never been a for pay download.


Mosaic and other Mosaic based browers had always been free.


Yes, undeservedly in some cases. Yes, bundling gave them a competitive advantage but it still should not have affected the final outcome. Both Unix and Netscape was in the dominant position. It was their race to lose.


Really? Then find something to prove me wrong. You cannot because if you look at the history you will see that Netscape started charging for its browser just as IE started not sucking.


Yes, mischaracterization of what others write is a "fact".


It's the same question folks ask when people say US dominance of the world is bad. Compared to whom? If you say that MS has been such an evil influence on the computing world then it should be easy to point to another company and say "They could have done far better for these reasons and they've proven they are more trustworthy".

I can confidently say that the US, with all it's faults, is a better superpower than any other nation could be because I cannot point to another country that has done better or could likely do better.

I can confidently say that MS, with all it's faults, was a better monopoly for computing than any other computing company because i cannot point to another company that did better or could likely do better.

Not Apple, Not Novell, Not IBM, not Sun, not DEC, not Commodore, not Atari, etc.


Then you would have preferred the balkanization of the Unix market to the monopoly dominance of Windows? Show me another model where we get to the commoditization of computing without MS? Apple vs IBM would have resulted in PC prices staying at the $3K plus range for a very long time.


MS Research is probably the closest we have left to a Bell Labs or Xerox PARC.


Sure it is. IBM has changed Java. Apple has changed Java. MS has changed Java.


it was Digital Research's royalty payments that made CP/M on the IBM more expensive than DOS.


Underhanded in what way? They SENT IBM to Digital Research. When DR balked for whatever reason they paid for PC-DOS. Had DR not been such idiots then we'd have been running CP/M (at $200 more per computer) instead of PC-DOS.


Which has what to do with anything? Apple wasn't first with the GUI either.


Except that most folks prefer to pay less for their computers. In the 80s-90s damn few folks could afford $3K for a PC.


You're making the assertion that MS has been bad for computing and yet we're in about as good a place as you can be so the onus is on you to show how it would have been so much better.


A price mindset instilled by MS, not by IBM, not by Sun, not by DEC, etc. Yes the PC world IS different and I say it is because of the Wintel alliance which was very different mindset from the rest of the computing world.


Yes, and again, they have NEVER shown another reasonable path to where we are today.

And he was right unless you're a freetard. GPL 2 is superior for business over GPL 3 because it makes no limitations on what you use something for. The FSF has it's own agenda and it is not business friendly even if it makes the occasional concession to Google.

There was no "3.0 project". It was the adoption of the GPL 3 license that he stopped.


Yes, he approves what goes in the kernel because he's the kernel maintainer and he's a damn good one. And no, Linux isn't just the kernel any more than OSX is just mach.

Jobs has far more influence in what happens in OSX than Linus has in what Linux looks like. Heck, i'd say that Shuttleworth has more say in end product than Linus since he funds ubuntu.

Stick to what you know.


He is criticized within the Linux community for being a pragmatist rather than a freetard. He's much more open source than FSF as a religion. So he gets criticized for the same reason that you get annoyed when he dares to say something about OSX.

He gets a lot less flack than Theo. But you don't know who that is do you?


Other than Apple funded initiatives very few OS projects start in OS X and filter out. Arguable none of Apple's are native to OS X either. I can't think of any OS X native open source projects that have moved outwards so since there are "many" perhaps you can name more than one?

Most, if not all, Windows based open source projects stay within Codeplex and on the .NET platform although I suppose many Java open source project are done on Windows. But those are more java platform than windows based so they really don't count.

I've had my 16GB iPhone 3G since August 2008 and I have yet to miss not being able to access Flash content when using Mobile Safari. Usually, if I am visiting a site using my iPhone, it's for quick information. Websites with fancy flash menus often have a flash-less version of the site, so I didn't even notice a difference in usability.

When I want to watch flash videos and other flash-intensive stuff, I save that for when I am at a desktop browser.