As a start I will say that I have never had much use for Flash. I don’t really care much for web video in general and I don’t play web games. That being said, I have seen some very creative design, photography and videography sites that did employ Flash. For me, the fading of Flash feels like it has been a while in coming and iPads, iPhones and Android phones were just the last nail in a pre-made coffin. Actually, make that second to the last. What of Adobe, the owner of Flash technology? Surely they will keep Flash going and rescue it in some dramatic fashion?
That simply will not happen. Flash Player, the app that Flash web contents need to run, is simply a marketing tool for Adobe. They give away Flash Player only to make content easily accessible and get content creators buying their creation tools. Flash Player is a piece of software that has to be adapted to multiple platforms, needs constant updates and development work on the part of Adobe. If Adobe had an alternative way to sell content creation tools that didn’t involve all of that extra budget maintaining a player that brings in no direct revenue don’t you think they would drop it? Considering everything they have invested in it they will not do it over night but as HTML5 and other open source code grows traction they will definitely transition towards it. Their Flash-to-HTML5 demo showed that existing Flash content could be converted to HTML5 with reasonable fidelity. This is not proof that Adobe is going to drop Flash anytime soon, but it does show that they recognize the potential need to accommodate HTML5, SVG and other technologies as an alternative.
There is no reason that Adobe can’t create a great web tool kit that can create Flash and HTML5 content in a manner that will appeal to Flash developers and other content developers alike. In fact, they will likely have to as HTML5 video continues to gain ground on the web, now making more than 54% of web video available and gaining ground on Flash video in a rapid fashion. With tens of thousands of games available cheap or free on iOS and Android, web-based Flash games have surely seen their peak. As HTML5 and the other open source tools are not controlled by one company and are in fact being supported by many (including long time rivals Apple and Microsoft) as the new standard, Adobe has to move forward and adapt to a web where their monopoly is soon to end, and I am sure that they will make a go of it.
Maybe it will even end all of the Adobe vs Apple stupidness. One can always hope.