7 ms·

I am super excited to see Apple push Flash out of the browser. http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/safari-power-saver@2x.png http://cdn.arste

I am super excited to see Apple push Flash out of the browser. http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/safari-power-saver@2x.png http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/safari... http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/safari-plugin-ask@2x.png http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/safari... Flash has been in decline since the first iPhone, but is still used to track people with unkillable cookies and to make obnoxious ads. Hopefully those days are now over. I wish Google and Microsoft would follow suit. Google probably will resist the most due to the entrenched interests of DoubleClick and YouTube.

tvon 13y ago
While I like their opposition to Flash[1], IMO you will eventually just end up more advanced HTML ads that are harder to detect. [1] primarily because there are no viable competing implementations to what Adobe puts out
- roc 13y ago
  While many people like to block Flash for content reasons, Apple's motivation is more about security and performance. Or, more specifically, Adobe's lack of interest in addressing such issues in a timely manner; at least on OSX.
  - Joeri 13y ago
    In my opinion a flash animation still outperforms a CSS-based animation in many cases. The problem with flash was never that it was inherently slow, but that people abused it to do slow things. On the security front though, you are absolutely right.
    - robmcm 13y ago
      That's so true, and as more and more ads go HTML you will see crappy devs animating the dom resulting in poor performance on iOS devices and damaging battery life. So the cycle continues.
    - bruceboughton 13y ago
      But it's within Apple's control to improve the performance/battery consumption of CSS animations. It's not within their control to fix Flash.
    - roc 13y ago
      The performance side has nothing to do with animation performance and everything to do with the resources used to achieve it. Flash will murder a macbook's battery and generate an absurd amount of heat, doing nothing more than streaming h264.
- jbverschoor 13y ago
  This is already happening and it's driving me nuts. So many sites consume way to many cpu time with js.
slg 13y ago
>I wish Google and Microsoft would follow suit. Google probably will resist the most due to the entrenched interests of DoubleClick and YouTube. This has been a feature in Google Chrome for at least a year. It isn't on by default, but you can change the browser to block any plugins until you specifically allow them on the page. https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/142064?hl=en https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/142064?hl=en
- nostromo 13y ago
  This is a case where defaults matter. Advertisers won't stop using Flash because 0.01% of Chrome users dig into their advanced settings and turn it off. Apple is working backwards from, "what's best for our customers" here and I think that's great.
  - pbz 13y ago
    What's best for our customers or what's worse for our competitors.
    - EdwardDiego 13y ago
      Precisely.
    - meepmorp 13y ago
      What are you actually trying to argue?
  - saraid216 13y ago
    I'm confused about what your goal here is. Are you trying to get advertisers to use HTML for their ads?
    - jfb 13y ago
      People block Flash for a variety of reasons; ads are only one. Drive-by security breaches and terrible energy performance are two others.
davidbanham 13y ago
So much of the advertising industry is so entrenched in Flash. It's a big beast to turn, especially when you consider that not just the last mile delivery servers need to support CORS and videos need to be in a compatible format (webm, please), but also the entire production pipeline needs to evolve their processes and tooling. I've been kicking and screaming to get more of our partners onto HTML5 for a couple of years now. I've met with some success, but there's an awful lot of hoop-jumping to get there. Many advertisers are still of the mindset that "HTML5 is only for mobile", if they're even aware of it. Maybe once this battle is won we can look at a smarter VAST standard!
laureny 13y ago
> Flash has been in decline since the first iPhone, but is still used to track people with unkillable cookies and to make obnoxious ads. And games. A lot of games. As long as the major companies making money off Flash games don't move to a different technology, Flash will never go away.
Nickoladze 13y ago
Google bundles their own build of Flash in with Chrome, the normal Flash plugin doesn't work with Chrome. It's the only browser on Linux that still gets new (non-security updates) versions of Flash. Besides, they've been moving YouTube to HTML5.
- interpol_p 13y ago
  > Besides, they've been moving YouTube to HTML5. I wish this was working properly. I am using the HTML5 trial and embedded videos will randomly not work, and many, many other videos will simply show static with "You need Adobe Flash to view this video." For some strange reason, the exact same videos work fine on my iOS devices — just not on a no-flash desktop web browser. I'm suspicious that YouTube purposely allows a larger selection of their content to work with iOS using HTML5, and purposely fails/requires flash on a desktop under HTML5.
  - drill_sarge 13y ago
    http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/87011 http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/87011 This is what you want.
    - interpol_p 13y ago
      Thank you! I didn't use exactly that script, but it led me to the YouTube5 safari extension which works beautifully and has some great features.
  - eunice 13y ago
    Especially when changing useragent to iPad Just Works
  - GoofballJones 13y ago
    I get the opposite, I get videos that play fine for a web-browser, but won't work at all on mobile, even though it should. I've even taken a video, uploaded to my account and it STILL says "the owner has indicated that this video not show on mobile" or words to that effect. Though when I uploaded the video, there was no setting to click to make it unavailable to mobile users.
dunham 13y ago
Nice to see proper flash blocking in Safari. Previously, I ended up deleting the plugin and having to wipe out the package receipts to convince Apple to stop re-installing the plugin.
pjmlp 13y ago
Sure, because blocking HTML5 ads is soooo easy.
elorant 13y ago
Flash has been in decline since the first iPhone, but is still used to track people with unkillable cookies and to make obnoxious ads. Hopefully those days are now over. No, they’re not. HTML5 supports session storage which will lead to some very nasty cookies stored for an eternity on your machine.

tvon 13y ago

While I like their opposition to Flash[1], IMO you will eventually just end up more advanced HTML ads that are harder to detect. [1] primarily because there are no viable competing implementations to what Adobe puts out

roc 13y ago
While many people like to block Flash for content reasons, Apple's motivation is more about security and performance. Or, more specifically, Adobe's lack of interest in addressing such issues in a timely manner; at least on OSX.
- Joeri 13y ago
  In my opinion a flash animation still outperforms a CSS-based animation in many cases. The problem with flash was never that it was inherently slow, but that people abused it to do slow things. On the security front though, you are absolutely right.
  - robmcm 13y ago
    That's so true, and as more and more ads go HTML you will see crappy devs animating the dom resulting in poor performance on iOS devices and damaging battery life. So the cycle continues.
  - bruceboughton 13y ago
    But it's within Apple's control to improve the performance/battery consumption of CSS animations. It's not within their control to fix Flash.
  - roc 13y ago
    The performance side has nothing to do with animation performance and everything to do with the resources used to achieve it. Flash will murder a macbook's battery and generate an absurd amount of heat, doing nothing more than streaming h264.
jbverschoor 13y ago
This is already happening and it's driving me nuts. So many sites consume way to many cpu time with js.

slg 13y ago

>I wish Google and Microsoft would follow suit. Google probably will resist the most due to the entrenched interests of DoubleClick and YouTube. This has been a feature in Google Chrome for at least a year. It isn't on by default, but you can change the browser to block any plugins until you specifically allow them on the page. https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/142064?hl=en https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/142064?hl=en

nostromo 13y ago
This is a case where defaults matter. Advertisers won't stop using Flash because 0.01% of Chrome users dig into their advanced settings and turn it off. Apple is working backwards from, "what's best for our customers" here and I think that's great.
- pbz 13y ago
  What's best for our customers or what's worse for our competitors.
  - EdwardDiego 13y ago
    Precisely.
  - meepmorp 13y ago
    What are you actually trying to argue?
- saraid216 13y ago
  I'm confused about what your goal here is. Are you trying to get advertisers to use HTML for their ads?
  - jfb 13y ago
    People block Flash for a variety of reasons; ads are only one. Drive-by security breaches and terrible energy performance are two others.

davidbanham 13y ago

So much of the advertising industry is so entrenched in Flash. It's a big beast to turn, especially when you consider that not just the last mile delivery servers need to support CORS and videos need to be in a compatible format (webm, please), but also the entire production pipeline needs to evolve their processes and tooling. I've been kicking and screaming to get more of our partners onto HTML5 for a couple of years now. I've met with some success, but there's an awful lot of hoop-jumping to get there. Many advertisers are still of the mindset that "HTML5 is only for mobile", if they're even aware of it. Maybe once this battle is won we can look at a smarter VAST standard!

laureny 13y ago

> Flash has been in decline since the first iPhone, but is still used to track people with unkillable cookies and to make obnoxious ads. And games. A lot of games. As long as the major companies making money off Flash games don't move to a different technology, Flash will never go away.

Nickoladze 13y ago

Google bundles their own build of Flash in with Chrome, the normal Flash plugin doesn't work with Chrome. It's the only browser on Linux that still gets new (non-security updates) versions of Flash. Besides, they've been moving YouTube to HTML5.

interpol_p 13y ago
> Besides, they've been moving YouTube to HTML5. I wish this was working properly. I am using the HTML5 trial and embedded videos will randomly not work, and many, many other videos will simply show static with "You need Adobe Flash to view this video." For some strange reason, the exact same videos work fine on my iOS devices — just not on a no-flash desktop web browser. I'm suspicious that YouTube purposely allows a larger selection of their content to work with iOS using HTML5, and purposely fails/requires flash on a desktop under HTML5.
- drill_sarge 13y ago
  http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/87011 http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/87011 This is what you want.
  - interpol_p 13y ago
    Thank you! I didn't use exactly that script, but it led me to the YouTube5 safari extension which works beautifully and has some great features.
- eunice 13y ago
  Especially when changing useragent to iPad Just Works
- GoofballJones 13y ago
  I get the opposite, I get videos that play fine for a web-browser, but won't work at all on mobile, even though it should. I've even taken a video, uploaded to my account and it STILL says "the owner has indicated that this video not show on mobile" or words to that effect. Though when I uploaded the video, there was no setting to click to make it unavailable to mobile users.

dunham 13y ago

Nice to see proper flash blocking in Safari. Previously, I ended up deleting the plugin and having to wipe out the package receipts to convince Apple to stop re-installing the plugin.

pjmlp 13y ago

Sure, because blocking HTML5 ads is soooo easy.

elorant 13y ago

Flash has been in decline since the first iPhone, but is still used to track people with unkillable cookies and to make obnoxious ads. Hopefully those days are now over. No, they’re not. HTML5 supports session storage which will lead to some very nasty cookies stored for an eternity on your machine.