Apple iPhone's To Support Flash Video Very Shortly
Some folks who work closely with the iPhone product line are telling me that iPhones will support Flash video playback very shortly. While I know there has been a lot of speculation about Flash video on the iPhone not being possible due to battery constraints and other technical rumors, the only real thing stopping it from working is an agreement between Apple and Adobe.
While I don't personally have an iPhone, getting Flash video adoption on the handset will go a long way in helping to make video a lot more portable for handsets. Yes, many phones already do video, but iPhone users amongst all others are always very adamant about showing what the phone can do and the moment it does Flash video, you'll see a lot of iPhone users showcasing that to anyone who wants to watch.
UPDATE: I am already getting a lot of questions about what "very shortly" means and it's a valid question. The answer is I don't know for sure, but based upon who told me the info to begin with, I took it to mean this quarter.
i'm guessing the traditional apple CDN akamai would be the one responsible for ensuring all these new flash videos go smoothly?
Posted by: shaun | Tuesday, February 12, 2008 at 07:28 PM
Is this support for Flash as a whole or just for Flash Video (ie, FLV and the new F4V)?
Posted by: Tim Siglin | Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 08:40 AM
I used to be able to play flash rendered videos back in quicktime on a mac or pc and was a little peed of when they disable this or took it away.
As Quicktime is the multimedia architecture that handles all media related files, you would assume that the I-Phone and relate Mac products should be able to handle this as standard and would be part of the phone anyway.
You can read the disgruntlement below shared by others.
http://www.oreillynet.com/mac/blog/2006/09/surprise_quicktime_713_disable.html
http://www.hd-productions.biz
Posted by: HD-Productions.biz | Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 05:30 PM
It will be interesting to dive further to establish what this means at a codec level. Will it support Flash9 (H.264) or will it utilize the VP6 codec? Another interesting question for this source is when will Apple enable the streaming component to the version of Quicktime which is on the iPhone? At this time, it is impossible to stream live to the iPhone, it only handles file based playback now.
Posted by: James Meeker | Monday, February 18, 2008 at 10:11 AM
there is a solution to play all flash videos on your iPhone and iPod — its free - and it works. Great! Now i can visit all videopages with video content and can watch them right on my iPhone.
http://videohamster.com/ipod
Posted by: 99alf | Wednesday, February 27, 2008 at 06:46 AM
the iPhone will play the videos on apple.com...so im trying to figure out what format theyre in so maybe other videos online will play??
Posted by: Jose Herrera | Wednesday, March 05, 2008 at 08:13 PM
Hi, there is a way how to watch flash videos on the iPhone. Try this tutorial:
http://en.vimjak.cz/iphone/how-to-play-flash-videos-on-the-iphone
Posted by: Karel | Tuesday, November 11, 2008 at 05:31 PM
The "Very Shortly" was posted in Feb of 2008, its now Feb of 2009, Where's the Beef?
Were leaning to the new Storm Blackberry. Supports everything we need. Were a media company, We have over 60 iphones and were tired of not being able to see our own clients web needs on the spot. Last year we picked up the iphones not thinking this would be become a long time problem. It's 2009 and we can't wait any longer. We would love to come back some day but it seems hopeless with the EGO of Steve.
The Storm has better resolution and better sound. What I really care about is the flash and video. Future is now. I will miss my apps but this is business. Were a MAC based operation, and didn't really want to make these changes but again we cannot wait another penny. My employees are constantly having to pull over to the local coffee house and whip out a latte and the laptop just to help a client. TIME AND MONEY. Plus it really ticks me when were trying to move forward in thinking yet it feels like were moving back in time with capability. Client want it now, and thats my bottom line. Now is what my clients get.
Apples new motto should be "Lose the EGO Steve". Wake up Steve its 2009.
Posted by: Michael Allen Jones | Thursday, February 12, 2009 at 04:11 PM
i totally agree with you, its been too long now and we still have no answer for this question.
im glad i picked a blackberry over the IPHONE, if nothing else at least i can watch all of my videos which i cant say for IPHONE users.
boooooooooo you steve
Posted by: Blackberry man | Wednesday, June 24, 2009 at 09:10 AM