Adobe CEO questions Microsoft Silverlight cross-platform commitment
Microsoft Silverlight has started facing the stick after its launch and this time it is from Bruce Chizen, CEO of Adobe who has questioned the commitment of Microsoft to keep the Silverlight platform compatible with other OS besides Windows. SilverLight is being termed as a challenge to Flash. He stated examples from history where Internet Explorer and Media Player which were compatible with Mac but now work only on Windows platform and he feels that Silverlight may never become a part of cross platform solution.
Flash has existed for over a decade and has gained further popularity with video sharing websites such as YouTube which uses Flash for delivering streaming video to users. Flash is even being used in mobile handsets. Now it will be facing competition from Silverlight in which case Microsoft will make all efforts to give adobe flash a run for its money. Chizen knows this and he is taking Microsoft quite seriously. He stated:
Microsoft is a US$50 billion monopolist who's in the software business. I take them very seriously.
Adobe has plans to launch Apollo, a technology which enables rich internet applications to run offline and the excitement for this technology can be judged from the fact that the alpha version has already been downloaded 110,000 times. It seems Adobe has already started feeling the pressure from Silverlight.
January 15th, 2008 at 6:15 am
Adobe hasn’t been that good about being cross-platform in the past. I remember Linux users waiting forever for Flash 8. Even today, having any flash element on a page, even the most trivial ad, pegs the CPU on my Mac at 100% and makes the fan run at high speed.
I think the threat of Silverlight might lead Adobe to differentiate itself with better cross-platform support.
I don’t know about you, but I’m more afraid of Adobe than I am of Microsoft. Microsoft’s web offerings such as Live search are a joke. Both PDF and Flash dominate their respective markets and, unlike Internet Explorer, don’t have a competitive replacement.
August 6th, 2009 at 3:10 am
very interesting! have been following the issue. have read a lot on the topic at different blogs (download mainly http://www.picktorrent.com )but this piece really gives food for thought. frankly speaking, can’t but agree with the previous reader: don’t worry about Microsoft, Adobe takes a risk
September 17th, 2009 at 4:18 am
Adobe is no doubt a very superb application, but recently, i have heard from somewhere that Google is launching a product like adobe very soon, and it will be totally free.