The blind hatred for Flash around here is a bit confusing. When HTML5 starts being used for heavy animations everywhere, people will curse it just as much. (I've been forced to make such things in HTML5 before -- it's not pretty. Things start to buckle when you've got complex, fullscreen animations going on.) As others have said, 90% of the time it is the people making the content, NOT the tool. Or people choosing the wrong tool for the job. There are places where HTML5 makes sense, and places where Flash makes sense. It's not a binary choice of existence. Both can co-exist. Adobe certainly thinks so. A lot of these anti-Flash cats sound like the guys who internet-rage in a Playstation vs. Xbox war. People who actually create content (and I am occasionally one of those) use whatever tool we think is best for the job. Sometimes we're forced to use what the client wants.
I'm not dissing "HTML5"; it's about time HTML started catching up with Flash. But Flash is so far ahead from a programming language & API point-of-view, HTML/Javascript always be playing catch-up. Especially since Adobe is not bound to a standards compliance body that is constantly in-fighting (go read up on the history of Javascript and realize it hasn't had a real update to the language in 10 YEARS because of corporate bickering). So I guess yes, I am dissing Javascript. It's stuck in the 90s. Terrible language. But I'm not dissing the concept around HTML5; that of adding APIs to allow for multimedia integration into web pages. It's just the execution of that concept that is a bit wonky right now. Unfortunately, the Javascript standards body is still as incapable as it ever was, so I don't see much improvement there. Web browsers can only strap so many rockets and nitrous packs on an '83 Honda before they run out of room.
Okay, first off, I'm not sure what you do for a living... I do web work. That right there is where my hatred for Flash comes from. I despise it. I'm not naive, I'm not a "noobie", I'm not a random person jumping on a bandwagon. I am a web consultant/designer.... I have worked with it every day for way to long now. To show you my true hatred for it, when I get a new client, if they want flash work, I pass them on and don't build their website. I dislike working with it that much. It is horrid on mobile devices as well.... and with the new craze on mobile, just about every client wants a mobile version of their site. I just don't like it... period. I dislike it's resource usage, I dislike it's cluttered look, I just dislike it. I guess that's my prerogative. I'm allowed to take on any job I want, as I own the company, and I don't take on flash jobs.
Here is another reason, and a lot of folks don't think this far I suppose... but I come from a "search engine optimization" (SEO) background. I am assuming you don't know a lot about SEO, as it seems most folks don't. I have studied it for years now.... I code in SEO best practices, as well as do much offsite SEO. Anyways... my point... have you ever tried to fully SEO a flash site? Once you do, you'll see my hatred for flash. It's getting better, much better, but still FAR behind non-flash sites.
Anyways, my hatred is not "blind" hatred... it's there for a reason. To be fair, there are some VERY cool flash websites out there, and VERY amazing flash animation
(ninjai: the little ninja anyone? OMG google that and watch if you have never seen it!!!!)
Wait until you embrace HTML5 + CSS3 + Javascript exclusively. It will solve all of your problems because a very small group with Apple Or Google (Chrome), etc will be able to see it and the vast majority with just about everything else will see & hear nothing (because they still use IE6-8) etc. We just updated our website to try to include iDevices and found that even IE9 seems to have trouble with relatively basic CSS3 stuff like drop shadows.
Our little world here (we Apple people and iDevice users) is such a tiny little pool. If you are creating animations & media for the masses, there is no either-or (as in either HTML5 or Flash):
- If you want the vast majority of the planet to be able to see your media, animations, etc, it must be done in Flash
- if you want the minority (such as iDevice users) to be able to see it, you'll need a special version in HTML5 (but even then HTML5 is far from being able to do everything you can do in Flash)
- And if you want them ALL to be able to see it, you have to spend the money & time on doing BOTH
We just went through this at our company and learned that even if any company wants to fully jettison Flash and solely go with HTML5 now, unless ALL of their audience is Apple, Google Chrome and a few others, you're saying goodbye to the vast majority of a world audience if you do that. HTML5 may be the future, but it's a distant future, and it offer NO possible replacement in the present for anyone desiring to reach all of the potential audience that Flash reaches.
Right now, the ONLY thing it does is creates a reason to spend more for double development to cover most of the world (Flash version) and the iDevice crowd (HTML5 version).
Well... all I can say as a web designer.... there is ONE, SINGLE, line of code you can put into your website source that will fix you IE9 issues you are having with CSS. One line.... maybe 20-30 characters long. That's it.
As far as the "vast majority" will never see your HTML5 site... I mean really... you are speaking of the folks using as far back as IE6... now, to be fair, you are right, that is a BIG chunk of people. But lets be realistic here... if I'm doing web design and hosting etc.... do you think those IE6 folks are my target audience? Should I waste my time and resources to appease them as well? They are an afterthought. Granted all of IE still makes up damn near 50% of internet browsers being used today... but in reality probably only a small handful of that 50% is my target audience. They are older folks most of the time, and computer/internet illiterate folks who are using whatever browser came pre-installed on their machines when they bought them.
You know who those folks are being targeted by? Ever seen those shotty computer virus commercials? That's their target audience because those IE6 people are running such outdated materials and probably aren't even sure how to properly protect their computers from viruses.
AFTERTHOUGHT
I am not a blind Adobe hater. I use CS5.5 daily for my job, EVERY DAY. I religiously work with illustrator and photoshop. They do things that other programs CANNOT do. I would love to ditch CS5.5 altogether, but I cannot. I tried pixelmator, and it's amazing, but their little slogan of "the photo editor for the rest of us" is not a lie.... it is not a professional grade photo editor. Have you ever tried opening up a EPS file in pixelmator? It's a disaster.
I just wanted to show I use adobe software daily, and I am not a blind adobe hater. I am however a FLASH hater.
I praise Adobe for making Adobe Edge and I will probably download it tonight and take it for a test run to see what it's all about.
As far as them doing it sooner... I dunno about that... they are still 3 years ahead of the curve as far as HTML5 goes.
