Looks like last week’s rumor is true, as a new announcement today from NVidia & Adobe states that they are working together on bringing Adobe Flash Player 10.1 to netbooks & mobile devices. The iPhone is still lacking, but betas are expected to be out for PalmOS & Windows Mobile later this year, with Blackberry, Symbian, and Android joining the club in 2010.
Apple will want to jump on board soon, though; Flash Player 10.1 opens up some interesting multimedia possibilities for other platforms. The player supports multitouch, accelerometer and screen orientation, all of which makes for the optimal video-watching experience. It also supports gesture-based controls, which is a boon for gaming. Adobe said that the player won’t be a drain on battery life, either. For example, the player goes to sleep when you receive an incoming call.
Currently the reports are rather high of hype and low on substance. NVidia’s contributions seem to be in the Tegra (embedded) and GPU-acceleration capacities, but people everyone are harping on “Hulu on your BlackBerry!” and “Tower Defense on your Symbian!”. Only time will tell what the reality is.
Missing from the line-up – at least so far – is Apple. Take a look at what Harry McCracken has to say about that – is Flash support on phones a promise for a multimedia future, or just going to end up meaning those annoying Flash-based ads will also play on your phone, sucking your battery power?