Public relations
If it wasn't so huge, rich and successful, we'd almost feel sorry for Apple today as yet another tech company decides to have a pop at it.
It's hardly news that Adobe is not happy about Apple's decision to ban iPhone apps developed on the Flash platform, but we didn't expect it to get the marketing department involved. Adobe has launched a print and online marketing campaign in which it protests its love for the web, HTML5 and even Apple, but not for restricting choice. The ads click to a page on Adobe's website on which it talks about the importance of openness.
This is a clear reference to Apple's decision, and is backed up by an open letter from Adobe's co-founders, presumably in response to Jobs' letter of a couple of weeks ago. What's less clear is what Adobe expects the ROI of this above-the-line outlay to be.
In the open letter, entitled ‘Our thoughts on open markets', Chuck Geschke and John Warnock say: "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 publish the specifications for Flash - meaning anyone can make their own Flash player...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."
We find it hard to believe this is merely an attempt by Adobe to win a few geeks over. It's more likely that Adobe is looking to spur on US antitrust regulators into proceeding with their investigation into the Apple iPhone SDK changes.
The fact that Jobs has bothered to address this issue publicly shows he's concerned about it and we wonder if he's going to keep this dispute in the public domain. But as we've commented before, Apple is so big now that it may not be allowed to exercise the same control over its ecosystem as it has in the past.
