Twitch, a live-streaming platform dedicated to gaming, is the latest company that has started the process of migrating to HTML5. They announced that they have redesigned the controls of their video player to HTML5 from Flash but however the video is still in Flash. The company still maintains that it is an “important step to releasing the much-anticipated full HTML5 player”. For those that use the service, the updated changes are being rolled out gradually.
YouTube, the leading online video platform transitioned from Flash for HTML5 on January. Adobe Flash Player has had a host of problems: It is vulnerable to hacks and uses a significant amount of a computer’s resources to render video content. The late Steve Jobs wrote a post about his thoughts about Flash where he shared the same sentiments above including other problems about the battery life issues & the fact it was made for PCs mostly. Facebook’s Chief Security Officer, Alex Stamos tweeted about Flash where he urged Adobe to kill it.
It is time for Adobe to announce the end-of-life date for Flash and to ask the browsers to set killbits on the same day.
— Alex Stamos (@alexstamos) July 12, 2015
Completely eliminating the use of flash in the online space will take time. We’re in the smartphone age where the battle to phase out Flash will most likely be won in this landscape unlike in the desktop scape. Flash is still used widely in browser games, some desktop apps, mobile games and the most scary of all it has access to microphone and cameras of devices. Adobe Flash’s security issues will be the biggest reason for its impending death in the future.
