April 20th, 2009
Adobe's Flash: Coming to a TV (and living room) near you
Adobe said Monday that it is taking its Flash software, which is commonly used for Web video, to TVs, set-top boxes and Blu-ray players.
And Adobe has a big chunk of the industry including Comcast, Disney, Netflix and others lined up behind Flash (Techmeme, statement). The first Flash optimized devices will be available in the second half of the year. Adobe is expected to demonstrate its technology at the NAB conference in Las Vegas.
Dubbed the “Adobe Flash Platform for the Digital Home”, Adobe is making a play to be a standard in the living room. What’s notable here is that a common technology and player may allow for video content to hop across screens. Adobe is already a dominant player for Web video.
A few key points:
- Intel’s Media Processor CE 3100 will optimize Flash technology on its system on a chip for consumer electronics.
- Adobe launched an effort called Strobe, which is an open standard of software components to create players and customize them (statement).
- The digital living room invasion is a coup for Adobe, which is increasingly seeing competition on the Web from Microsoft’s Silverlight. Silverlight has been used to stream big events like the Olympics and NCAA basketball tournament, which is broadcast by ZDNet parent CBS.
Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and Editorial Director of ZDNet sister site TechRepublic. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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