I’m not buying an iPad. It pains me to say it, but I’m boycotting. I’m not buying an iPad because iPads don’t support Flash.
I don’t believe Apple doesn’t want Flash on iPhone and iPads because Flash is unstable or drains battery power. I believe Apple doesn’t want Flash on iPads because Flash would allow people to completely circumvent the iTunes store. Flash would allow any website to serve video and music to an iPhone or iPad, not just Apple or its partners (such as YouTube, Pandora, Netflix). Flash would also allow anyone to create a web-based apps that could rival the apps currently distributed from the iTunes store.
Apple wants to keep their iron-grip on their products. On some level, I admire that. On another level, it feels like this is against the spirit and nature of technology and the Internet, which I imagine in my naive way, as always inevitably pushing towards more openness. I am perplexed that other people don’t see this as a huge problem.
John Gruber and others have been gleefully dancing on Flash’s grave because iPads and iPhones don’t support Flash. I won’t try to understand the motivation, but while I do see the iPad as a brave step into the future. I also see it as a $500 prison cell where I am locked into an environment wherein I can’t even decide what parts of the Internet I would like to see or use.
Apple, who once told me to “Think Different”, is now censoring my expression with information purification directives. Where is that woman with the hammer when we need her?
I could go on. I previously wrote a tirade, but I’ll try to remain calm.
I was willing to accept that my iPhone didn’t support Flash. When I bought my iPhone I was amazed to have access to the Internet on a mobile device that was attractive, legible and usable. I went from trying to type web addresses on a number pad to the iPhone. It was a huge step. I could forgive my iPhone if it didn’t support Flash, my old phone didn’t either.
When Steve Jobs says the iPad is “the best way to browse the web” and “it’s like holding the internet in your hands” he flat-out lied. The iPad might be the best way to browse a censored web, but that’s it.