Flash on Google Nexus One Makes App Store Battle Moot

Flash Player 10.1 + Google Nexus One = Mobile Flash = Infinite Apps

Although Apple’s iPhone does a great job approximating a PC-based browsing experience on the go, lack of Flash support which one past high level Adobe employee blames 100% on Apple, really makes the phone a lot less useful than it could be. I spent a good deal of time writing about how lack of Flash support is the real Apple tax and I still contend that because Flash does not run on the iPhone, many Web sites need to do double design and programming work.

In other words, a site which uses Flash needs to have yet another set of pages or sites designed so an iPhone can see what is happening. This is especially frustrating for sites which have videos in a custom Flash player – in order to be seen on an iPhone they need a second version of each video and probably a different interface.

Many Web sites in fact have to design specific applications for the iPhone so their videos can show up properly. While a soaring amount of applications is an awesome stat to push – I would do the same if I worked for Apple, no amount of applications can make up for the many thousands or even hundreds of thousands of Web sites which can only be seen properly via Flash support. By comparison the Android-powered Nexus One doesn’t need as many applications because sites can they can see all the Web sites the way they were intended to be seen.

So while only 10,000 applications run on Android and 100,000 on an iPhone, Google can be considered to actually be ahead of the game when you factor in all the Web sites it can see correctly.

In other words the app store battle has been won by Google – and it will be won by any other mobile device maker which embraces fully functional Flash support.

Apple was not immediately available to comment on Flash support. Any comments they make will be included in an update to this post.

  • https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawlSxO2yFnj6zNbBT4zrSumRjistFkTRYnM
    January 7, 2010 at 3:47 am

    Nokia has had Flash support on a majority of their devices for the last couple of years, shouldn’t that put them ahead of the curve too?

  • Rich Tehrani
    January 7, 2010 at 9:16 am

    Yes it should — they have had Flash on their Internet tablets like the N800 for years — before the iPhone even appeared. The company is strong in India and Europe but Apple and RIM continue to take share in the smartphone market.
    For the record, I think Nokia has great products and they are the market leader in phones but there is a disconnect between the superiority of their products and mass consumer appeal in the smartphone and other markets.
    In many ways the iPhone was a poor copy of an N800 with a better UI and superior form factor and yet we rarely discuss Nokia tablets.
    Now Apple and Microsoft will have tablets — Nokia was 5 years ahead of the game. What happened?
    Perhaps this year will see them coming back swinging.

  • Internet Phone
    January 11, 2010 at 9:08 am

    Hi,
    Nexus One Android device is a great way to take Google Apps with you everywhere. Nexus One not only syncs with multiple Gmail accounts, but it also syncs your contacts, with Google Calendar and with Picasa Web Albums.

  • voip guide
    January 11, 2010 at 9:22 am

    Well i disagree with the approach. Being a web designer, i never design a site using flash as it is not a google friendly application. 95% sites new sites are coming without flash so they don’t need to worry about the remaining 5%.

  • Johan Sundström
    April 12, 2010 at 3:36 pm

    You have things mixed up — web sites not working without Flash is not the Apple tax, but the Adobe tax. It only just happens to be the first time you find yourself in the large group of people (mainly people with disabilities) that can’t access Flash content. While Apple has all sorts of vested interest in not supporting Flash, this one actually benefits the web too, for a change.

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