Adobe Keeps Mum On Jobs' Flash Criticism

Adobe Systems responded to Apple CEO Steve Jobs' criticisms of the Flash program with a short statement, avoiding any specific comment on his remarks. During Jobs' annual shareholders meeting on Tuesday, he offered some frank commentary on workability of a Flash application in Apple's popular iPhone.

Adobe senior public relations manager Stefan Offermann says Flash and Flash Lite, the two programs Jobs' spoke about, are a "huge success" and says Adobe will "look forward to our continued relationship with industry leaders to deliver engaging experiences to consumers worldwide." Offermann added there would be no further comment from Adobe on this issue.

The bombshell of the meeting came when Jobs leveled criticism against Adobe's Flash player, which has been conspicuously absent from the iPhone since its launch last year. He said the PC-grade Flash program "performs too slow to be useful" and Adobe's Flash Lite, designed for mobile phones, "is not capable of being used with the Web." Jobs did not suggest a new Adobe product or collaboration with Apple was underway, though he did suggest "there's this missing product in the middle."

Jobs' comments are likely to dishearten developers who have been clamoring for Flash support on the iPhone. Apple enthusiasts were hoping the March 8th meeting would reveal a place for Flash in the iPhone's SDK debut. Jobs' comments seem to suggest Apple will wait until Adobe creates a product that can perform to the company's expectations.

In his blog last month, Adobe's chief spokesman Ryan Stewart said Adobe is waiting on Apple to make a move. "No one aside from [Apple Chief Executive] Steve Jobs has any idea if or when it's coming," he wrote. "Everyone I talk to doesn't know anything." In a post earlier this week, he offered new criticism of the iPhone. "I'd even go as far as to say that the Web experience isn't complete on the iPhone until some kind of Flash support is added," he wrote.

An Adobe spokesman that previously worked at Apple moved to discount the notion that Apple and Adobe have a contentious history, as some reports claim. "We're really working well together," he said. "Any report that we are at odds working together is not correct."