The answer is more than likely yes, but what I find interesting is that Steve Jobs has been unusually vocal for such a secretive person. It seems that critics are pushing his buttons. Although his responses have been well thought through from the Apple corporate perspective, I think it just gives more ammunition to the critics to answer them. CNN's Money web site had an interesting piece today "What's the bug up Apple's @$$" which describes Apple's behavior towards critics. This fits right into the published email thread between Steve Jobs and Gawker writer Ryan Tate. Are we heading into a soap opera...
During the iPhone's ascendency, Apple's response to critics was very tame and yes Steve Jobs was sick for a big part of that time, however over the last three years I have been impressed how Apple has added key features in the iPhone OS demanded by critics and users. These include Apps, cut and paste, turn by turn GPS, voice control, Bluetooth A2DP stereo streaming (although no AVRCP remote control), MS Exchange ActiveSync, and probably some others that I am forgetting. The Apps and the cut and paste were biggies. I remember Apple's saying Apps were not necessary, since they provided such a rich web browser environment. Apple came to their senses and provided a good development platform, although at the time no multitasking; now we are on the cusp of having that feature implemented. We went through the same pattern with Cut and Paste, first it was we did not need it with the new touch paradigm, then that morphed into we need our time to design correctly (they did).
My hope and point is that the same will be true for Flash. I agree that HTML 5 and H.264 are probably the future. However for a device like the iPad which is supposed to be about consuming content and Steve Jobs touting it as an all-encompassing browsing device, how can you ignore a major part of the web? On the iPhone not having flash can be irritating, but since it is not my primary browsing device I can live without it. If I were to buy an iPad I would want to use as a primary browser and not having Flash is a show stopper. This does not make sense to me, and I think Steve Jobs ego is getting in the way. I am hoping that Apple will go through its no no phase, then will accede to users demands, and go through a thoughtful design and implementation (provide Adobe with the APIs they need to be efficient) as it did with Apps, cut and paste, and multitasking.
If you want to make your voice sort of heard, you can sign a petition at Flash4iPad.com. I say sort of, but the more users and potential customers complain it will start to weigh on Apple's future plans. 500 iPad users were asked by Laura DiDio, principal analyst at ITIC about Flash. According to the CNN article I mentioned previously, "she found that customers are clamoring for Flash support, but said they would continue to buy Apple products even without it". It is a mixed message but we are talking about the initial customer pool and not the average customer who is now buying the iPhone.
Until then my common sense is telling not to purchase an iPad, even though my techy side really wants one. I feel resigned to wait until next March to see what happens with iPad 2.0.
I used to be in your camp on this issue, but am not any longer. I wasn't going to get an iPad until I actually used a colleague's one day, then went out to Best Buy (no Apple store close by) and got the 16 GB entry model. I was concerned that no flash support would be a problem, however I have found that casual surfing hasn't been impeded at all. A number of newspapers have apps, or there are aggregation apps that collect news and video. There's a YouTube app. I found the sites I visit that have heavy flash usage have developed apps (mostly free) for use on the iPad. Besides, flash is the ONLY reason my MacBook Pro crashes, so I understand Steve Jobs on this. The iPad is a phenomenal device. On paper it doesn't look like much, when you consider the features vs. drawbacks, but once you experience one it's remarkable. Just get one. You can always sell it on eBay when the version 2.0 comes out...
Posted by: Chris Beard | May 19, 2010 at 11:40 AM
Chris,
I am glad to hear from a real user. I have not had many real data points, and this gives me more food for thought.
Posted by: Stephen Skarlatos | May 20, 2010 at 07:33 AM