Adobe Takes The Battle With Apple On Flash Up Another Notch

Adobe (ADBE) is not giving up in its battle to convince Apple (AAPL) to changes its stance on Flash.

• The company has bought a series of full-page ads in various newspapers – I saw it in the WSJ, the S.F. Chron and the S.J. Merc – that addresses the issue. “We (HEART) Apple,” it says in large type, which is followed by a list of other thinks they love. “We love creativity. We love innovation. We love apps. We love the web. We love Flash. We love our 3 million developers. We love healthy competition. We love touch screens. We love our Open Screen Project partners. We love HTML5. We love authoring code only once. We love all devices. We love all platforms. What we don’t love is anybody taking away your freedom to choose what you create, how you create it and what you experience on the Web.”
• The company has launched a Web site to address the issue, which has a big “We (HEART) Choice” headline, and links to various materials supporting their case.
• Among other things, Adobe has posted a letter from its co-chairmen and founders, Chuck Geschke and John Warnock, who make the case for open standards.

Here’s their letter, reproduced in full:

The genius of the Internet is its almost infinite openness to innovation. New hardware. New software. New applications. New ideas. They all get their chance.

As the founders of Adobe, we believe open markets are in the best interest of developers, content owners, and consumers. Freedom of choice on the web has unleashed an explosion of content and transformed how we work, learn, communicate, and, ultimately, express ourselves.

If the web fragments into closed systems, if companies put content and applications behind walls, some indeed may thrive � but their success will come at the expense of the very creativity and innovation that has made the Internet a revolutionary force.

We believe that consumers should be able to freely access their favorite content and applications, regardless of what computer they have, what browser they like, or what device suits their needs. No company � no matter how big or how creative � should dictate what you can create, how you create it, or what you can experience on the web.

When markets are open, anyone with a great idea has a chance to drive innovation and find new customers. Adobe’s business philosophy is based on a premise that, in an open market, the best products will win in the end � and the best way to compete is to create the best technology and innovate faster than your competitors.

That, certainly, was what we learned as we launched Postscript and PDF, two early and powerful software solutions that work across platforms. We openly published the specifications for both, thus inviting both use and competition. In the early days, Postscript attracted 72 clone makers, but we held onto our market leadership by out-innovating the pack. More recently, we’ve done the same thing with Adobe Flash technology. We publish the specifications for Flash � meaning anyone can make their own Flash player. Yet, Adobe Flash technology remains the market leader because of the constant creativity and technical innovation of our employees.

We believe that Apple, by taking the opposite approach, has taken a step that could undermine this next chapter of the web � the chapter in which mobile devices outnumber computers, any individual can be a publisher, and content is accessed anywhere and at any time.

In the end, we believe the question is really this: Who controls the World Wide Web? And we believe the answer is: nobody � and everybody, but certainly not a single company.

Chuck Geschke, John Warnock
Co-founders
Chairmen, Adobe Board of Directors