The big blue lego of doom
Apple’s yet-to-be-released iPad hasn’t been a critics’ darling like the company expected, and now one of the biggest companies ‘snubbed’ by the iPhone operating system is taking swipes at the tablet.
An Adobe employee released graphics showing popular web applications like Hulu, Farmville and CNN simulated on an iPad. The one thing they had in common: they all had the big blue lego in place of where the content would be.
Anyone who has used an iPhone extensively knows how obnoxious it is to try and visit any non-mobile site that uses flash and see that frustrating blue “plug-in missing” box. It’s one of my biggest gripes with the phone. Obviously Adobe is upset about Apple’s continued exclusion of flash from its mobile browsers, but it was almost acceptable on the small size screen of the iPhone. Now, with a 9-inch screen to deal with, and the company is touting this “magical” device will change the way we consume media.
Even though Flash has fallen out of favor as one of the web development tools of choice, there are plenty of sites that utilize it in simple ways. It seems to be Apple’s way to force developers to use other things, especially their own developed Javascript, something that they can’t conceivably do on the open online world.
Until this changes, it’s another reason for me not to drool all over the iPad, not when I can buy a Windows’ based netbook-tablet for almost the exact same price.
Judson Tate
February 5, 2010 at 10:59 am
Excellent point. I can’t believe they would exclude this from the iPad. It’s so annoying to not have it on iPhone.
Madison real estate
February 5, 2010 at 2:27 pm
I absolutely hate the fact that I can’t see anything on my iPhone that uses Flash but it’s even more surprising that they are allowing this situation to endure with the launch of the iPad. Apple should just suck it up and be inclusive in its support of all web development tools that promote and increase the enjoyment of online media.
Matt Stigliano
February 7, 2010 at 8:39 am
Chelsea – I read recently that Apple and Adobe had come to an agreement to rework Flash for the iPhone OS. Apple’s complaint was that the full version was too much and the mobile version was not enough, so they had to work to find a new middle ground from what I understood. I can’t imagine Apple can continue to ignore Flash – it’s too embedded (no pun intended) in the web world.