Occupy the Hype - HTML5 vs Flash, please put it to rest.

Occupy Flash is an HTML purist site calling for the boycott of the Adobe plugin. Personally this is really very silly...

One fine Sunday morning I perchanced upon a website entreating for the occupation of Flash. It was distinct in that such a site had managed to get itself into the mainstream media by co-opting the use of 'occupy' as a slogan.
Yes, it calls itself 'Occupy Flash', (www.occupyflash.org) and this nicely designed one page site entreats for the boycotting of Adobe Flash in order to 'speed up the evolution of the web'. In some ways attempting what the online community did with Internet Explorer 6 to hasten its demise.
 

Personally I think this is really quite silly....

First, to get it out the way, co-opting the terminology of a movement which is really quite serious in order to gain attention is clever, but sadly I think we will soon see a rash of Occupy XXX appear all over the web, as the term gets moulded into whatever ideology, product or brand who use it.

That aside, I for one have long been done with the tiresome Flash hate club.
Here at Rain we use what we think is 'the best tool for the job', and quite frankly the marvelously over-hyped saviour of the web which is HTML5 currently is not yet up to task.
A few very quick examples are the thousands of high-end flash games out there, streaming rights-protected video, and 3D implementation. Whilst HTML5 and open standards can do something similar, it currently isn't up to par, nor is it done as quickly, easily and cross-compatible than Flash.

This article is no means a defence of Flash, nor from a Flash lovers stand-point but from an intelligent look at the right tool for the job. Quite plainly, if we occupy Flash right, what is there to use effectively in its place? ..... Nothing.
HTML5 is currently used for what it works well with, for what it doesn't there is..... Flash(?)

The only reason we have seen a big push on HTML5 and now the ubiquitous Javascript slideshow replacing the Flash banner, is thanks to Apple making an easily better animated version not available on its platform. Whilst I really like building javascript sliders and seeing all cool things being developed around that area, I can't help feel I could do something much better in Flash and in half the time.
I've often pondered on the reason for the Flash hate club, and personally decided it comes from very hardcore programmers unhappy that Flash allowed designers to do what previously was their forte without needing the technical nous.
It's not dissimilar to the HTML coding purists despise of software such as Dreamweaver, on the grounds that it writes crappy code. I personally don't like using Dreamweaver myself as I write code, but am quite happy for others who do if it gets the job done.
As we follow the 'do what works best' methodology I tried replicating quite a few things in Flash with javascript and html, but so far it doesn't compete, and additionally takes way much more work to get not near the same effect. Therefore I still have a problem with using something more time consuming and inferior for the sake of what?

For example, with video, in Flash you just need one format, and call it streaming via Flash. Job done. Currently if you wish to use standards HTML5 it requires the video files in 3 different obscure formats, and no it won't work in IE8, so you create a 'Flash fallback player'.
That isn't really a very good alternative! And what are these new formats, because finding a piece of software to convert to them wasn't initially easy! If we are going open standards at least have a format everyone can simply export video to!

So when/if the various browser companies sort their acts out and get on board with supporting the same formats, and implementations of HTML5 the Occupy Flash argument may have some sense attached. However the reality is, they're not, they don't and it doesn't. We can talk of proprietary plugins, but in this case, at least its going to work.

The myth of the Flash Pop Up Ad

Another popular criticism of Flash is annoyance of the dreaded Flash pop-up adverts that intrude upon our web experience.
Okay, hold on a second here please and understand this: 'THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH FLASH'
The pop-up itself, that is popping up with javascript! Yes friends, the dreaded pop-up is caused by javascript and HTML. If you remove Flash, you still get annoying pop-up ads. They just don't display Flash. So in the future what you can look forward to are annoying pop-up ads in HTML5 & Canvas. The argument of Flash being anything to do with pop up ads, is vapid.
Marketeers make pop-ups ads in whatever technology allows them to do this with most ease. So as soon as HTML5 is mature enough, we will still have the same annoying, multimedia pop-ups; just as HTML5 --- nothing will have changed, except maybe you can't uninstall the a plugin to stop them (^_-)b .

HTML5 is the future, what's the worry?

Adobe have already conceded the Flash fight for mobile, and have also said that the future will be with HTML5, as seen in their latest Edge software, which is kind of like Flash 4 in HTML5  (ie. a bit crap) .
No one will have a problem if there is a better tool for the job, that is easy to develop in and works the same across all platforms, and offers a rich online experience. That's why the Occupy Flash site seems incredibly nugatory. And that's why I was incredibly pleased to find the response to this from some people at 'Occupy HTML'.
Occupy HTML (www.occupyhtml.org) is a copy site, as a response to Occupy Flash getting the media attention. Occupy HTML gets it right, calling for 'The movement to rid the world of HTML purism'. And their message is exactly what I am saying in this article, and hopefully the message of any serious web developer.
 

'Our goal: To get the world to embrace the best web technologies available to create the best user experiences possible.'

This means choosing the best tool for the job, and finally when HTML5 can provide us with easy development to build efficiently the equally rich experience the user wishes, then it will be adopted by technologists. The big difference in the demise of IE6 movement was that users of IE6 were end users, and it not being any of their business to be educated regarding web technologies. Therefore web developers and technologists needed to push forward the demise of old technologies and browsers. In this argument the user group are web developers, whose job it is to know very well about the web, and what is the best tool for the job at hand. Therefore to quote OccupyHTML:
 

'Championing simplistic statements regarding web technologies makes the web less educated.'

People really need to jump off the purist band-wagon, it doesn't make you sound clever, and unless they can provide a realistic alternative, just admit that certain things are good for certain cases. HTML5, for me came with a lot of hype. And at least so far for me, when coming to implement it, it hasn't live up to it.

As it matures and is able to fulfill the things promised, the web will adopt what works and less useful technologies will phase out. Preferred technologies go beyond technological arguments such as performance and code and it is blinkered to not take that into account. Real world factors, such as ease of use, ease of development, user base, knowledge base and consistency across all devices and platforms all contribute to why developers will chose a technology.
 
So for now Occupy the Hype, with some Common Sense.