There’s been a lot of controversy over Apple’s decision to ban Flash (and Java for that matter) from the iPhone since the day it was released. Now, with the iPad about to hit retail, there’s been more debate on whether this was a technical decision or not, and whether it’s a severe limitation for the devices, or a blessing. Being both a Flash developer, an iPhone OS user an open source advocate, I thought I’d weigh in on the conversation.

Before I get started though, let me point out that I’m not a fan of Flash. I think it’s a real shame that there’s no open, official standard that lets web designers do the things Flash can. Adobe has the web in an awkward stranglehold right now, and I’d love to see that change. But the reality is that Flash is an integral part of the web today.
More My thoughts on Flash and the iPad

When I read Engadget’s “Ten Gadgets that Defined the Decade“, I was amazed by some of their choices. I could easily think of a few gadgets that changed the way we use technology, but weren’t listed. While I agreed with a couple of items on their list, like the iPhone, I couldn’t help writing my own top 10 of the most influential gadgets of the last ten years. Here are my candidates in random order.
More My attempt at the top 10 gadgets of the decade

Symbian may be the smartphone OS with the most experience, it does suffer from a certain dullness. It’s like the MS-DOS of mobile phone operating systems. Where the iPhone basically runs a trimmed down version of Apple’s OSX, Symbian was built to be light. Also on eye-candy. And it shows.

Fortunately, there are developers out there that create software that goes beyond that typical boring Symbian look and feel. Like mobileways.de, who recently released Gravity, a native Symbian Twitter client that brings both features and eye-candy.
More Gravity adds some sexiness to Symbian

Yesterday, Google announced a new beta version of their Sync service. It’s exactly what many Google Calendar users have been waiting for. It lets you synchronize your contacts and calendar events between ‘gcal’ and your iPhone, Blackberry or Windows Mobile smartphone. There’s also a Symbian (SyncML) version, but that does contacts only. But what puzzles me is why.

I’ve been using GooSync to sync my calendar, and their free service has been great. It’s a little limited (no contacts, one calendar only), but it works flawlessly. GooSync uses SyncML, an open standard supported by many handset and PDA manufacturers. So when I read about Google own SyncML option I was fully expecting it to sync my calendar. But alas. Google’s implementation does contacts only.

This got me thinking. Symbian made headlines last year because it plans to go open source. That means they’ll be entering Android territory. Perhaps Google’s little robot isn’t planning on a long time symbiosis with Nokia’s mobile platform? They wouldn’t… or would they?

Around this time of the year, my mobile contract comes up for renewal. For a gadget freak like me that means shopping for a new phone. I could have gone for a sim-only contract and cut costs a little, but with so many shiny new toys available every year where’s the fun in that? I did consider keeping my beloved E51 because I really really liked it, but the E71 was just too darn shiny.

Wired magazine called the E71 an “iPhone killer“, but that really doesn’t do it justice. In fact, except for being roughly the same size, it’s pretty much the opposite of Apple’s offering. It has a physical keyboard, it runs an OS that was designed for mobile phones, and it’s software is an open platform.
More Nokia E71 -- And I thought the E51 was impressive!

Don’t worry. I haven’t switched. But I’ve recently had to alter my perception of Mac users. I used to think of Apple’s clientele as smart, stylish people, who had no trouble parting with substantial sums of money simply to surround themselves with the best-looking devices in the business. But it turns out they’re not unlike me. And I thank a couple of recent iPhone apps for that discovery.
More Hi, I too am a Mac!

As you may know from previous posts, I’m not really a Mac zealot. In fact I’ve never owned an Apple computer myself. I have used them at work, and I’ve always liked having them around just for the sake of competition. It actually was an Apple IIc that got me ‘into’ computers. When I was eleven, a friend of mine’s dad had one and we taught ourselfs Basic just so we could write little games and apps to play with. Fond memories indeed.

Asides from the obviously superior design of some Macs, I just feel there’s little to lure me there. OSX annoys me at least as much as Vista does (which is not much btw), and since the innards are identical nowadays I see no reason for me to switch. Especially not when Apple itself, the company I mean, is bugging the hell out of me.
More Spots on the Apple…

I guess everybody knows the ‘six degrees of separation‘ theory. What it comes down to that you connect with everyone else in the world with a maximum of six ’steps’. If this is true, a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of mine knows Robert De Niro. Cool.

Although I’m not quite convinced the theory holds entirely (what about isolated tribes in the Brazilian rain forest?) I recently discovered that I need only one or two steps to connect to three of the hottest projects in the tech universe.
More Who needs six degrees?