"Adobe produces Flash Lite, a scaled-down version of its multimedia platform for the mobile phone, but Jobs seemed to indicate that was just not good enough for the iPhone.
On the other hand, the full version apparently works too slowly to be used on the device. "There's this missing product in the middle," Jobs told investors.
The company itself has said only Jobs knows when and if they will ever support flash. But at the same time, the company itself never planned for the standard version Flash to work on anything other than the desktop.
There are many considerations that need to be addressed before Flash could work correctly on the iPhone. First, Adobe needs to take into account processing, memory, and battery use constraints, something it generally does not need to worry about in desktop computing. Secondly, Adobe needs to recompile the code and optimize it for the iPhone's ARM processor, two things that Apple couldn't necessarily do on its own.
With all this groundwork needed only to make Flash work, the prospects for the technology on the device are not looking good at all. Add to this Apple's increasing distance from Adobe in its development materials for the iPhone - its web applications guidelines urge its developers to avoid Flash and even its movement outside of the iPhone (where its website now includes practically no Flash at all) - and this amounts to a very strained relationship."

Right well let's break it down then - Apple need to speak to Adobe and vice versa. Simple.

(Actually I use Proxomitron and never have Flash enabled unless I absolutely have to - never has affected my browsing at all so far).

Silverlight FTW!

(that is the first time i've ever used FTW in a blog comment... possibly my last)

Depends on how it would perform on a crappy processor with little RAM.

Flash is dead without apple support.. Long live Blue-Ray, Apple and high prices..

ROFLMAO!!

Yes, base the life/Death of a tech on it's adoption in the computer platform with less than 10% of the market.

You were joking, right?

BS. The reason Steve Jobs wants to keep flash out of iCrap (and all other apple's obsolete-out-of-the-box JUNK) is that he wants to give Apple's clunky Quicktime software an unfair advantage on iCrap as well as macs.

Steve is as bad a con-artist as Bill Gates, the only difference is that he is not as smart as gates.

Your comment clearly shows you have never used an iPhone, or most likely any Apple product. Besides, what does Flash have to do with Quicktime? NOTHING. Maybe one could argue that Quicktime competes against FLV, and even that is debatable. Seriously, how old are you?

Well, I use an iphone (yes I caved.)

I can tell you this. Even some javascript runs clunky on the iPhone.. so I can see his point. But yes, sometimes Jobs has a way of saying things that at first read come off rather rude for lack of a better word :)

Well... javascript isn't exactly wonderful in the desktop version of Safari either. But still, it's the best browsing experience I've ever had with a mobile browser. Anyway, I'm not saying that Apple products, or the iPhone, are above any form of criticism. In fact, I myself could criticize a number of things in the iPhone (lack of 3G, for starters.) However, it doesn't hurt to be objective. Your comment was very objective. His comment was not only rude and pointless, but also innacurate (Quicktime being the reason Apple doesn't want Flash?!?!?!)

sometimes Jobs has a way of saying things that at first read come off rather rude

They shouldn't let this guy out in public.

He's a genius, to be sure, but socially inept. I almost think he may have a mild case of asperger's. It's just the way he doesn't seem to understand how people will react to certain things... which most of us "know" innately.

Yeah, just ask Violet Blue!
http://www.news.com/8301-13772_3-9852738-52.html

flash is trash. 90% of my IE7 crashes are caused by Flash9(a-z).ocx
They need more seasoned coders and fewer latte sipping punks fresh out of compsci. adobe sux.

Disable flash and don't look back. Now if only we could get YouTube (Google) to understand... :-)

Dunno that I ever had a crash on FF...

In theory, with the SDK just around the corner, who cares what Jobs thinks? What would prevent Adobe from porting whatever version they like to the iPhone?

Perhaps this will be an opportunity to finally start making Flash go away....

Far away...

Forever.

And to find a replacement.

Heh...

Silverlight? (Just because I can guarantee that'll get a reaction)

*shrug*

While I think it is *better* than Flash, I would prefer neither of them existed. But I'm one of those nutty web-purists who believes the web wasn't built for this crap.

I'm thinking maybe gnash... but that's still buggy.

Silverlight is:
1. not available for linux and
2. M$.

I still use adobe at the moment, but that will change the moment gnash plays my favorite games.

Silverlight is:
1. not available for linux and
2. M$.

Add to 1.: ...at the moment.

Last I heard it was being worked on.

Forget the iPhone. I want a phone that gets reception where ever I am.

Military satellite phone.

That's your option.

Let us know how that works for ya. ;)

Most satellite phones that are in use my the US military are standard commercial INMARSAT, IRIDIUM, and THURAYA phones.

Some may carry a special sim chip with added security, but other than that, there all pretty much the same as what civilians use.

I don't think there needs to be a middle computer between the mac mini and the imac. But with Flash who knows maybe Adobe will do it as a third party add on with the SDK.

Unless iPhone gets Flash, contrary to their obnoxious ads, they will always access the "sort-of, kind-if Internet."

So what your saying is "Sort-of, kind-if Internet" + Flash = Internet?

Flash is great for animations and simple games, but has made web sites filled with Ads and half the ads used in flash don't work properly.

Flash should be kept to Animations, Small Games, and offline Media content.

I use the Internet heavily and, aside from some silly games, annoying ads, and unnecessary bells & whisles, I have no use for Flash. Most of what is needed is either done in PHP or ASP anyway. ;-)

"There's this missing product in the middle," Jobs told investors."

Much like Apple's line of computers.

Where is the middle ground between iMacs and Mac Mini? Namely a computer with a screen at £500.

Personally, I had all-in-one computers. You can't upgrade the monitor without making it look ridiculous, and it's far more expensive to upgrade the machine, since it comes together with a monitor. Surely they are pretty boxes, but not very practical.

the iMac is the middle ground... mac mini < imac < mac pro...

Ok, some lower-middle ground.

iMac is too expensive for the wide audience, thus they don't have a big market share yet.

I've always seen this as the flaw in their bid to make money.