HTML5 - The Way of the Future

In late 2011, a year and a half past Adobe and Apple's public feud, Adobe ceded to HTML5. The company stopped developing Flash for mobile devices (Goldman).

"HTML5 is now universally supported on major mobile devices, in some cases exclusively," wrote Danny Winokur, Adobe's general manager of interactive development.... "This makes HTML5 the best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms." (Goldman)

It was expected that 90% of mobile browsers would be HTML5 enabled by 2013 (Goldman). Adobe would still focus Flash on the PC market for gaming and video, but soon major video services would begin moving away from supporting Flash to focusing on HTML5.

YouTube changed their video player to default to HTML5 in January 2015. While YouTube will still use Flash if HTML5 is not available, Flash is not a priority anymore (Paul). Netflix has also moved to streaming video through HTML5 rather than Microsoft Silverlight. Hulu still uses Flash and has not moved to HTML5 yet, but is expected to eventually.

Even though certain uses of Flash are being replaced, it will take time to fully transition users to newer technology. While Flash will become less common, "Flash video looks prepared to survive with online advertising, smaller video sites, and YouTube visitors who aren't using a modern browser" (Paul). Eventually, these uses of Flash may also fade way. For now, they are just another reminder that technology replacement isn't a linear process. Furthermore, it is a reminder that a technology is being replaced because it has become less useful. Becoming less useful does not make a product inherently bad, but rather means it needs to find a new, possibly less popular, niche.

A Return to Animation

In the wake of these changes, Adobe has returned to marketing Flash as an animation tool. In December 2015, Adobe officially changed Flash's name to Adobe Animate for future releases. This is an extremely recent change made the week of this paper's deadline, and there may be further updates that this paper did not keep track of. Adobe announced this change in the following statement:

Because of the emergence of HTML5 and demand for animations that leverage web standards, we completely rewrote the tool over the past few years to incorporate native HTML5 Canvas and WebGL support. To more accurately represent its position as the premier animation tool for the web and beyond, Flash Professional will be renamed Adobe Animate CC, starting with the next release in early 2016.

Today, over a third of all content created in Flash Professional uses HTML5, reaching over one billion devices worldwide. It has also been recognized as an HTML5 ad solution that complies with the latest Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standards, and is widely used in the cartoon industry by powerhouse studios like Nickelodeon and Titmouse Inc. (Lee)