it's the end of the world as we know it (and i feel fine) by ben garney of pushbutton labs

It’s The End Of The WorldAs We Know It, And I Feel Fine.By Ben Garney

For latest slides & more info, visit http://bengarney.com/

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Introduction

• Who am I?

• What’s going on?

• Where are we going?

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Hill Valley, 1955

Saturday, March 3, 2012

GarageGames, 2006

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Recent Events

• Adobe drops Flash in mobile browsers.

• Financial analyst call in January.

• Open sourcing Flex.

• Flash Player Roadmap last month.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Flash in the Market

• Flash has a great position.

• But right behind it...

• Corona, Moai, Unity

• Scaleform, Iggy, In-house tech.

• HTML5, Emscripten, Swiffy, Gordon

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Erosion

Saturday, March 3, 2012

The Flash Tripod

• Tools - Flash Builder, Flash Pro

• Runtime - Player, AIR

• Platform - SWF, AVM+, APIs

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Declining Assets

Saturday, March 3, 2012

“Declining” Outcomes

• Led to GG sale to IAC for ~$50M...

• Left and started PushButton Labs...

• Torque survived shutdown, still selling!

Saturday, March 3, 2012

“Declining Asset”is a label to help make decisions.

Not business reality.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Back to Adobe...

• Writing on the wall.

• Long term winner: HTML5

• But Flash still lives....

Saturday, March 3, 2012

CommunitySaturday, March 3, 2012

Tech Communities

• Look out for the vocal minority.

• The people you hear from are emotionally invested.

• Users have a limited perspective.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Reaction

• End of the world!

• Flash is dead!

• Wait, are we talking about our ex-girlfriend, or software?

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Reports Of My Death...

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Adobe’s Outs

• Replace Player with HTML5.

• Leverage tools to target JS.

• And the subtle play...

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Adobe’s Outs

• HTML5 is the future.

• Open standard.

• Public opinion supports it!

• Wide deployment.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Adobe’s Outs

• HTML5 is the future?

• Vendor friction.

• Mixed priorities.

• JS is not great for large apps.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Adobe’s Outs

• Take advantage of HTML5 boom.

• Take Flash off the agenda...

• And let it fly under the radar.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Flash Outcomes

• Could die quietly...

• Could maximize revenue in mid-term...

• Could allow a renaissance.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Future Proofing

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Build it,and they will come.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Diversify.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Platforms Die.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

(And I Feel Fine.)

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Conclusion

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Conclusion

• Flash is a “declining asset”...

• (Whatever that means.)

• Leverage Flash as long as you can!

• Your skillsets are not...

• Future proof yourself.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Conclusion

• Thanks for coming!

• http://bengarney.com

• @bengarney

• Questions?

Saturday, March 3, 2012