woooah. greetings my old friend wordpress (that slapper Twitter seems to have distracted me!!). Im sitting here listening to massive fireworks going off in the background on the eve of Aucklands Anniversary day, whilst watching Federer V Murray in The Australian Open mens final. I am just back from a long weekend on the east coast where the weather was stunning, the company surperb and the pace gentle. In between points, I am catching up on all the commentary/opinion, noise/nonsense generated from the release of Apples latest piece of hardware the iPad.

So, the name kinda sucks, it doesnt have a webcam??, could have been a touch bigger, lacks a number of very useful input/output ports… oh yeah, and still doesnt support the super power of the internet, my good friend the Adobe flash player. So will I be purchasing one? Hell yeah.

Regardless of the above weaknesses for me this device offers the following attractions:

1. ability to engage in online communications (email, messaging, social media) via a premium hardware device with a great user interface.
2. likely to be a superior option for reading online/electronic material, i.e. e-books, RSS feeds, online news sources etc.
3. Fantastic learning/distraction device for young children (ok for anyone), via games, educational software etc.
4. Did i mention games?
5. so yeah, the above points pretty much cover every evening of my life these days (other than when I’m at the beach)…. don’t be judging me fools.

I have been developing web based content exclusively using the flash platform for nearly 10 years now. Its my passion and a lucrative career. Its also about the only thing I am half-way decent at (or at least prepared to admit publically) so I am pretty keen for its continued success. In that time theres always been a percentage of people talking shit about the demise of flash, all I could do was yawn. Theses days however Im less inclined to yawn. As a recent convert to mac hardware (OSX can kiss my arse) I am starting to raise an eyebrow, and cock my ear in the direction of the naysayers.

Thats not to say I think the flash platform is in anyway near death, but i think its reign as superpower of the browser based internet is over. I would suggest this is due to a combination of vastly improved HTML/CSS etc functionality, increasing support/demand/awareness of open standards, increased uptake of Apple hardware where Flash plugins continue to perform badly, and to a lesser degree the introduction of competitive technologies such as silverlight and Unity3D.

Love or hate the Apple, to deny its increasing influence on all things interweb is to deny your opposable thumbs. My question is this, if Apple could no longer accuse the flash plugin of shit performance and massive CPU/battery drain, could they continue to deny my all powerful friend? Conversely, if Apple are full of shit, and its their hardware, their OS that is rubbish and simply cannot handle flash, cannot thee prove it?

Ok, I will confess, a number of Vodka redbulls have passed, as has much tennis whilst penning this, so by all means destroy me…

chur