Steve Jobs: Mafia-esque bully or future building genius?

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James2097

James2097

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http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughts-on-flash/

By posting this on Apple's main page, Jobs is really trying to kill/do damage to Adobe's flash. I mostly agree, flash is terribly dated and needs to make way for something better. But Jobs half-expecting Adobe to dispense with their bread and butter (which is currently very successful for them) to voluntarily help Apple create an as yet non-existent open-source web-topia is a comical side effect of Jobs' reality distortion field at work. :sly:

I get a feeling that Jobs is both forward thinking genius and utterly cold hearted (yet politely spoken) mafia-don rolled into one. But do you agree with him?
 
I'm of two minds about Flash.

Firstly, Flash makes online video and games quite easy, and has enabled massive amounts of video sharing online, as well as helping to create the phenomenon of browser-based games. Shockwave tries the same, but it's even more fiddly.

But on the other hand... Flash is incredibly resource hungry... fiddly... and prone to bugs, crashing and security flaws. The resource part is the main sticking point. It's not only Apple's iPod and iPad that suffer from use of Flash... other mobile devices and the emerging netbook market are negatively affected by Flash. My netbook suffers tremendous slowdown from Flash use, but at least Mozilla doesn't crash anymore (it used to, all the time)...

It's true that we have to move on to something more modern, but as to who will come up with it... who knows?

I don't think Jobs is trying to kill Flash, but he's appealing for something better... which is something I can agree with. While Flash is a nice toy for games and videos... websites designed specifically in Flash, despite not having any video, is one of my biggest pet peeves and one of the laziest shortcuts modern webdevelopers use.

EDIT: Just read the end of the letter... and he's correct in this: Flash is terrible for mobile devices... and not just Apple's. We've tried it on several (besides the netbooks... which also don't like it so much)... and it does eat up battery and cause massive slow-down... and it works very poorly with touch-screens. Adobe would have to make massive upgrades to Flash 2.0 to make it work perfectly with mobile devices.
 
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niky
While Flash is a nice toy for games and videos... websites designed specifically in Flash, despite not having any video, is one of my biggest pet peeves and one of the laziest shortcuts modern webdevelopers use.
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This. I really hated it especially when I just wanted to say, check a restaurant's website for their address (back before google maps worked brilliantly) on dial-up, but had to wait for the entire flash site to load before clicking to the information I wanted. Flash intros that waste the viewer's time downloading and being forced to sit through was (and still is to a lesser extent) the most annoying trend on the web, especially for businesses trying to be overly trendy (cafe's, shops selling luxury/cool goods etc). I hope web-designers realise the potential customers of all of these businesses will have a vastly improved experience when they quickly and efficiently find the information they want.

I feel flash is used too much, when a simpler solution would work much better. Sadly, I've done multimedia design at uni, and they put SUCH emphasis on building *everything* in flash. Its buggy, slow, and I hate it very much.

I wonder how far off or realistic the more modern solutions are Jobs mentions (HTML5 based)? How will any developer benefit themselves to create these new standards if they are to remain open and free? If flash will be around for a long time to come, in the meantime is Jobs being painfully boof-headed for not incorporating it (perhaps let you toggle it on/off if low batteries/things are going slow etc)?
 
Flash is in a user view point very similar to Apple.

For instance flash is really useful and hard to live without on the web, yet it's very slow and resource heavy and a bit clunky.

Now iTunes works great with my iPod and I buy all of my music from it, but the program is slow cumbersome, unstable and really a bit of adware.

Still flash works great on android so far and if they can live with it then apple is really trying to beat them rather than joining them. (Which we all know from movie clichés is the wrong way to do it :P)
 
iTunes has its problems, but I actually like it better than WMP (I use VLC for everything, mind). Apple's forte is in creating software that is simple, direct and utilizes resources properly. It takes some getting used to if you're a PC User, but Macs are wonderfully free of the lagginess of Windows PCs. (and this is from a hardcore PC user)


Apple's core is simplicity and user-friendliness. I, personally, would never buy one of their trendy mobile products... simply because I find that having a netbook or a regular cellphone makes much more financial sense, but my mother and brother both have iPhones and iPads, and they're wonderfully easy products to pick up and use... I drool over the iPad, but I'm not going to waste my money on something I'd use only as a toy (if it won't do vector graphics and advanced photoshop work, I ain't buying it, no matter how cool it is).

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Flash is not useful for anything. Most websites designed around flash are slower to load, clunkier and less user friendly than others. You don't need megabytes of flash to load drop-down menus or screens... or to implement an on-site search engine... or to do anything that you actually need to do online. In fact, the best designed and highest traffic sites will only use flash for videos, and nothing else.

What Flash does is help provide eye candy and special effects. That is all.

And that's from a browser-flash-game addict. I love the flash games, but everything else online that uses flash? Meh. Online videos are nice, but flash video embedding is clunky... word is, HTML5 video embedding is a whole lot smoother and simpler, taking away the extra layer that Flash imposes and giving you better video playback.

Eventually, Flash may go the way of .WAV files when MP3s came around. People will still need Flash-compatible browsers to play the really old stuff, but most everything published online in the next few years will be written in HTML5.
 
I seriously dont understand what Steve Jobs massive issue is with Flash, what on earth set him off like this? Maybe he was working on something very important on his mac and Flash caused it to crash and he lost everything :lol:. He really has blown this out from a preference to all out war with people siding with different camps.

I do feel that he runs a Mafia esque operation which uses intimidation and bullying to a level way higher than its competitors. His hold on the general consumer is like the brainwashing hold Kim Jong Il has on North Korea! I feel that Jobs' health issues have made him irritable and more willing to be vocal on issues that he probably have had problems with for many years.

I understand that he feels HTML5 is the next big thing but although HTML 5 is the better technology and will ultimately be the standard in the future analysts are predicting that it could take up to 10 years before the entire web has switched to it.

As for now 75% of the video and interactive stuff on the net is flash coded. I do agree to some extend that Flash can be at times buggy and choppy but its popularity means that we get a lot more choice of all sorts of content. Steve Jobs is totally deluded to think that all this doesn’t matter or doesn’t exist. Quicktime is the biggest piece of rubbish I have ever used on windows, talk about slow and buggy plus its basically adware so I cant believe Jobs can even say this about another product.

Many believe his real reasons for the hate it just to peddle more of his own DLC from the Apple Store. Because he thinks you should pay for Tetris when there are a million better free flash versions out there. Apple say thats not the case and that its 'technology issues', in that case they must make some poor hardware / software for the price you are paying!

I find the irony unbelievable, that many buy Apple's to use Adobe software on those machines (particularly creative fields) and I think it’s the last person Apple should be angering. Adobe has really done Apple a huge favor with its software and when it wants some tiny little piece of functionality added in return Job's burns them down with a 1600 word essay about why your company sucks, countless knocks and now this front page statement.

Jobs has the potential to run Apple into the ground with this issue, and I dont know why he would jeopardize so much over it.

Robin.
 
I am inclined to agree with jobs, flash wouldnt work well on the iPhone, iPod touch and the iPad, as it does kill battery life, is buggy, is a security risk, but for sure at the moment is the standard for web, no doubting that. I can see why jobs wants HTML5 pushed, it is a great technology with all the pros of flash but with fewer if any of the cons, and the sooner they all put there eggs in the HTML5 basket, the better IMHO. I dont think it will effect Apple and Adobe's relationship either, as Adobe now HTML5 is the way forward for the future, they just want every last drop out of flash, and they can still get that at the moment.
 
I disagreed with him and called him a dictating ass, right up until I had to actually make something in Flash CS4. Hateful, HATEFUL software which creates bugs literally out of nowhere. And then doesn't let you remove them. Conveniently, Flash player has started crashing fairly consistently (or simply using 90% of my CPU) ever since this little announcement of Jobs'. Do I agree with his little announcement? No. All this 'proprietary = bad' stuff is extremely rich, and 'it's not developed for touch screens' is simply clutching at straws. Just say it's s**t. Go on - you might as well.
 
niky
iTunes has its problems, but I actually like it better than WMP (I use VLC for everything, mind). Apple's forte is in creating software that is simple, direct and utilizes resources properly. It takes some getting used to if you're a PC User, but Macs are wonderfully free of the lagginess of Windows PCs. (and this is from a hardcore PC user)
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It could be sooo much better though. I don't know why that whenever I turn my windows partition on it has to load itunes, itunes helper, quick-time and quick-time helper. And everytime it updates it wants me to install safari and bonjour.

But that's irrelevant, the problem with flash in mobile department is that's it's very buggy and slow at the moment, and isn't really going to get much better on current hardware.

If you look at browser speed comparison between android 2.2 and iphone OS you will see android being faster until you turn flash (beta) on, then it's slow and really clunky to navigate with your finger (Lag). However that's nothing that installing Fennec and adblock plus doesn't cure and then you get the benefit of flash video on all sites, but with no flash adverts.

But then Steve Jobs was never going to let that happen on his products. Which is the philosophy that I really don't like Apple for.
 
The bigger issue between Apple and Adobe now is the development tools that Apple is restricting. And I just find it crazy that Apple is burning bridges with one of their longest standing claims, which was the creativity suites from Adobe.

Between that, and Apple's shot at Google by suing HTC for how Android is implemented on their phones, Apple and Jobs are becoming just a bit too control happy.

As for Flash, I do agree it is dated and rather power hungry, and it would be nice to see it phases out. But that will take some time, and certainly will not be an over night transition or an easy one, since a vast majority of these app Game designers are coming from Flash backgrounds, so cross platform development makes sense.

In short, Flash is dated and problematic, but Apple is also wanting to control every aspect of their devices in their typical manner.

And the Steve Jobs reality distortion field is amazing, I must say. If he thinks iTunes is remotely well implemented on Windows, he is lying to himself. It is, bar none, the worst modern media playing and syncing software on Windows.
 
Flash was cool when it was only used for video or games but now I've been on way too many websites made from Flash which are slow and hard to navigate. I'm glad Jobs is trying to knock it out as it's grown far too big for its boots, however it shouldn't be done by someone rapidly growing too big for their boots too.
 
Everyone knows the real reason that Jobs doesn't want flash on the iPhone is because then it allows people to play games without going through the App Store.

While flash not may be the most optimal standard for web based interaction, it's just naive to ignore that it is the de facto standard across the web. People obviously want it, because otherwise this post by Jobs wouldn't exist.

One thing I do find laughable is Job's hatred of things that aren't open. Lets take a step back here. Apple. The most closed company in the world, complains that Flash isn't open, and then goes on to say that H.264 with HTML5 is a much better way. Guess what H.264 IS PROPRIETARY you have to pay heaps of money to have a web browser that supports H.264 with HTML5.

Conversely, HTML5 doesn't support DRM. Apples favorite thing...
 
Steve Jobs: Mafia-esque bully or future building genius?
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Neither. He is a shrewd business-man doing what he believes is best for his company. Given his and Apple's recent success I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt.

If you think people on the level of Steve Jobs allow emotion to influence their business decisions, you're way wrong.
 
Imari
Neither. He is a shrewd business-man doing what he believes is best for his company. Given his and Apple's recent success I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt.

If you think people on the level of Steve Jobs allow emotion to influence their business decisions, you're way wrong.
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Surely no one really believes Jobs is purely Mafia-don or an angel sent to better mankind. The way I've written it is clearly just supposed to kick off debate in a fun way about Job's decisions regarding flash and his management style.

Whilst an incredibly shrewd businessman, Steve does of course let emotion get in the way a little. He has a passion for certain things that aren't always good business ideas in the current climate. He's human like everyone on the planet. If he didn't have a personal style governed somewhat by emotional response, there would be hundreds of Steve Jobs-a-likes and Apples in the world. There aren't.

Steve's personal likes/dislikes and emotional hunger to achieve certain visions of where he sees things going are a huge part of Apple's failures and success throughout the company's history. For instance... Jobs generally pushes new tech ideas much earlier than some shrewder pure businessmen would, and has strange dislikings of certain technologies that the customers would love (Flash/BluRay...).

He brings things to market that often don't resonate. Newton? Pippin? These would never have been a success at the time. Same goes for Apple TV. Jobs loves big concepts, even if it is too early to capitalise on them. That keeps Apple ahead (All in one computers (from Mac Plus to iMacs)/iPods/iPads/OSX/emphasis on industrial design), but also opens the door to people hating them for various reasons (dropping floppy disks WAY too early with the first iMac etc). Does he have a passionate/emotional management style? Hell yes!
 
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Somebody needs to tell Jobs that his products are landfillers while Flash do no harm, more so, any 10 years old computer can still handle flash. He's rich and spoiled, another egomaniacs that never did anything for humankind beside landfilling emotional holes with his garbage.
 
Robin.
I seriously dont understand what Steve Jobs massive issue is with Flash, what on earth set him off like this? Maybe he was working on something very important on his mac and Flash caused it to crash and he lost everything :lol:. He really has blown this out from a preference to all out war with people siding with different camps.
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The reason is probably that Flash for Mac is the crappiest of all crappy programs. The mother of crap if you will. I have not had one crash on my Macs that was not Flash related in three years since I switched. And apparently it's even worse on iPhone OS. Adobe is just lazy and apparently can't be bothered to create a flash version for Mac/iPhone that is even marginally good. Jobs may just have lost patience with them.
 
Anghammarad
The reason is probably that Flash for Mac is the crappiest of all crappy programs. The mother of crap if you will. I have not had one crash on my Macs that was not Flash related in three years since I switched. And apparently it's even worse on iPhone OS. Adobe is just lazy and apparently can't be bothered to create a flash version for Mac/iPhone that is even marginally good. Jobs may just have lost patience with them.
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Why can't Apple get it to work? It seems to work well on Linux and Android OS. Which is surprising.

I suspect Steve Jobs wants to have full control.
 
Jobs is a man whose single-mindedness has allowed his underlings to achieve great success for him. However, he's dictatorial and cavalier. The way that the App Store approvals process treats the developers who have generated the iPhone/Pod/Pad ecosystem is appalling and short-sighted.

His war with Adobe over Flash is - as Casio says - because embedded Flash in web pages can replicate much of the functionality of iPhone (etc) games sold through the App Store, with Apple taking their 30%. So he's protecting his revenue stream by closing the party to a potential competitor.

On the one hand then, he's protecting his developers, and on the other he's screwing them royally.

I think he's built Apple on a cult of personality, and he's delivered aspirational products to an affluent client base. But then he alienates a goodly proportion of potential clients through his attitude. Through releasing unfinished products lacking core functionality, only to "upgrade" them a year later. I mean, version 3 of an OS before cut & paste is supported? Really?

James2097 is close to the mark when he asks if Jobs is a Mafia don. But he's more a Pablo Escobar than a Tony Accardo. His products are like drugs to people who must have them, will pay over the odds for them, knowing that they're not right, knowing that they're getting stiffed and will get stiffed again soon when it's time for the next fix.
 
owen.c93
Why can't Apple get it to work?
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Because it is not an Apple software. It's made by Adobe and they're the ones who can't make it work. Blaming Apple is like Saab blaming the consumers for not buying their cars.

owen.c93
It seems to work well on Linux and Android OS. Which is surprising.
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It doesn't actually. It's almost as bad on Android. People just dont want to admit that it drains the battery faster than you can drain a beer after a long hot day.

owen.c93
I suspect Steve Jobs wants to have full control.
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You got that right at least. :) But then again, which company CEO wouldn't want that?
 
Anghammarad
It doesn't actually. It's almost as bad on Android. People just dont want to admit that it drains the battery faster than you can drain a beer after a long hot day.
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From experience... yup. And a lot of the mouse-button stuff in some of the games doesn't work properly with a touch-screen. In other words... even if Flash does work on an iPhone or iPad, you still couldn't play games on it until they rewrite the code to allow you to use a touchscreen properly.

Again... I'm not pro-Apple. I don't own an iPod, iPhone, iPad or Mac, nor do I ever plan to own one, since none of them suit my needs... but much of Jobs' rant against Flash is correct. It's not suitable for mobile devices.

It's okay if it stays on the web, but again, I'll be incredibly, indescribably joyous when webdesigners stop using flash for every little bit of miscellaneous content on their webpages... enraptured, actually... and flash gets relegated to being a games-only thing... which is about the only place where it is... well... not useful... but not incredibly annoying.

Oh...
Picture%2080.png

:lol:
 
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GilesGuthrie
Jobs is a man whose single-mindedness has allowed his underlings to achieve great success for him. However, he's dictatorial and cavalier. The way that the App Store approvals process treats the developers who have generated the iPhone/Pod/Pad ecosystem is appalling and short-sighted.

His war with Adobe over Flash is - as Casio says - because embedded Flash in web pages can replicate much of the functionality of iPhone (etc) games sold through the App Store, with Apple taking their 30%. So he's protecting his revenue stream by closing the party to a potential competitor.
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Here's what Jobs said in an interview only yesterday.

- On control of the App Store ecosystem: "We have two platforms we support. One is completely open and uncontrolled and that is HTML 5. We support HTML 5. We have the best support for HTML 5 of anyone in the world. Then there's the curated App Store platform. We've got a few rules (function as advertised, can't crash, can't use undocumented APIs), but we approve 95% of apps within a week...thousands per week."

http://www.macrumors.com/2010/06/01/steve-jobs-in-opening-interview-session-at-d8-conference/
 
Flash is very outdated, slow and did I mention out dated? I'm not a fan of Steve Jobs in the least bit :yuck:, but I would like to see a more efficient flash replacement that everyone can use. However I don't see that happening since its a well known product that has become such a wide spread standard; look at Microsoft for example. No one will have a higher percentage of OS's on the market them cause the base is too strong.

Jerome
 
Jump_Ace
Flash is very outdated, slow and did I mention out dated? I'm not a fan of Steve Jobs in the least bit :yuck:, but I would like to see a more efficient flash replacement that everyone can use. However I don't see that happening since its a well known product that has become such a wide spread standard; look at Microsoft for example. No one will have a higher percentage of OS's on the market them cause the base is too strong.

Jerome
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You never know. Who still uses HoTMaiL here?

Anyone?
 
I still use hotmail... *looks around nervously*



Also, while following the macrumors link posted by Anghammarad, I found that semi-widely reported email exchange between Ryan Tate (that Gawker guy) and Steve Jobs:
http://gawker.com/5539717/

I was actually impressed with the way Jobs handled him, and answered Ryan's questions in an not-altogether dismissing way, despite Ryan being (as far as Jobs knew) a random guy who was clearly being a bit of a ****head (but did have some cutting questions).

The exchange shows some interesting points of view in regards to how Jobs sees what he's doing. What I took from Jobs' attitude was: we're doing what we're doing. If we're successful and customers buy our products, that legitimises all our choices regardless of what you think. If we don't succeed, then these choices won't affect anyone.


Edit: http://www.apple.com/html5/

Jobs really is kicking up the HTML5 drum. I think it really is an all-out war with Adobe at this point. :crazy:
 
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