The flip side of this state affairs no one want to talk about is that Flash enables developers of rich internet applications to bypass the web stores of Google,

The flip side of this state affairs no one want to talk about is that Flash enables developers of rich internet applications to bypass the web stores of Google, Apple and Microsoft. The simple truth is that all the stories about Flash being buggy and open to exploits is that there was nothing in it that couldn't be fixed. For those with short memories they should remember that Microsoft also abandoned Silverlight, although there was nothing fundamentally wrong with it, and that its Linux equivalent Moonlight was also mothballed. Flash was abandoned to buy time for Google and Microsoft to entrench themselves in desktop and browser apps which they now rent, because developing such apps for browser technologies is an expensive exercise in fitting square pegs in round holes only they have the manpower to afford, or to buy out competitors as the competitors find it hard to survive in markets they give stuff away for free until users get hooked on them. Steve Job's ban on Flash was a blatant act rooted in self interest that the media conveniently ignored, spouting the nonsense about Flash's bugginess as though it couldn't be fixed. As for Adobe(Flash) and Microsoft(Silverlight) why would they support tools which would enable competitors to offer applications over the net that could rival their desktop offerings? It is in the same way that the latest snake oil, WebAssembly, is doomed to fail because GAM will never permit web applications that may equal or surpass their own offerings or threaten their mobile ecosystems. On a side note who in their right mind develops contemporary desktop applications in C++ unless they want to deliver their applications in opaque blobs? Would Epic get into a spat with Apple if their games could be played through the browser? Today so many people are so afflicted by the Stockholm Syndrome inflicted by GAM that they seriously believe that web apps cannot rival or match their desktop equivalents, somehow forgetting the huge increases in chip peformance on both mobiles and desktops that should make it a doddle in browsers that are stymied by "modern web safety and security standards", set by you know who.